Twitter to Increase Tweet Character Limit to 4,000, Elon Musk Says

[Tom_Aatje]

I'm just waiting for a decent replacement of Twitter to pop up at this point, and then I'll delete my account. I don't think I'm hard right or left, but the insane right wing rants have been flooding my timeline since that buffoon took over. It's basically become Truth Social 2.0 at this point.

 

[mannyvel]

But - but - but - then people would have to be able to read and comprehend, which is antithetical to the whole Twitter experience.

 

[atomic.flip]

I suppose new tweets can now be described as having been Elongated...

Oh bravo!!! Hahaha. This is the one post that has made me willing to comment on this story. Thank you. Hahaha 😅

 

[Bawstun]

This just replaces the current method of a thread of 20-30 tweets in a row when someone is posting a long thing. People can still do normal short tweets.

I fail to see the issue here.

Simply having the option means that many many many millions of people WON’T keep it short and simple though. I cringed when they expanded it to 280 from 140 but 4,000 is crazy, you might as well not set any limits at that point. I always thought of Twitter’s bread and butter as their forced focused narrative. You had to remove fluff from a statement because there wasn’t room for anything else. Concise and to the point, information was crammed into a tiny data point…now it won’t be all that much different from reading the front page of Reddit or CNN or some such.

 

[Bawstun]

This is an extremely bad idea. I hope someone can talk him out of this, or maybe make it a paid feature or something.

 

[msackey]

So, no longer tweets then. Just boring long essays with just more hate crime disguised…

I’m thinking, why bother setting a limit AT ALL if they’re making such an expansive move.

I believe the primary reason for the short tweets was mainly to get succinct and short messages out. It was a different kind of space to re-present ideas and thoughts. That made sense. But if they’re going to expand tweets to 4000 characters (estimated about 570 to 1000 English words which is roughly 1 page to 3.5 pages) why stop there? Is Twitter trying to compete with platforms like Substack and Medium, in which case that also doesn’t make sense because neither of those platforms have character limits at all.

Fundamentally, does Elon recognize what he’s trying to do? Does he self-reflect on why he’s doing what he’s doing? Consumption and production of tweets is a very different modality and a different type of production than Substack and Medium which are essentially spaces for mini-essays to long essays and chapters of works.

Basically, I think I’m saying I don’t think Elon knows what the hell he’s doing or if he thinks he does, he’s not really thinking about effects and does not seem to have a long term view.

 

[msackey]

Simply having the option means that many many many millions of people WON’T keep it short and simple though. I cringed when they expanded it to 280 from 140 but 4,000 is crazy, you might as well not set any limits at that point. I always thought of Twitter’s bread and butter as their forced focused narrative. You had to remove fluff from a statement because there wasn’t room for anything else. Concise and to the point, information was crammed into a tiny data point…now it won’t be all that much different from reading the front page of Reddit or CNN or some such.

Agreed! It’s much harder to keep a thought succinct and much easier to go on and on about something.

 

[FrizzleFryBen]

New features aside, twitter web app is much faster for me these days.

Agreed - it's much faster now that there are no ads to show. I have only seen 1 ad in the last week on either mobile or browser. Additionally, on mobile, they limited the number of new tweets in a feed to about 28 at a time. Down from what seemed like 100+ at a time. So, everything does appear faster when about 15% of what was is being served up.

 

[fatdickie]

What are you talking about? How will they charge people to “access their long-form content?”

Twitter already has a memberships program available to some content creators where readers can pay to access exclusive content. Long-form content will be an easier sell if they paywall it.

 

[mannyvel]

I suspect the reason for this is so twitter can take on prnewswire, which makes a buttload of money by providing a place for people to post and search for PR releases.

 

[^^BIGMac]

Folks just need to stop giving this buffoon airtime. Twitter is dead.

Well thank God for small favors.

 

[dk001]

4k? Don’t take it as gospel.

I suspect we will see Twitter go through several changes.
No one but Elon knows where he wants to take Twitter. Usership is skyrocketing since he took over.
Give it time. As a long time Twitter user (there is so much more beyond politics on it) I can already see the recent changes for the better when compared to the last few years.

I’m looking forward to see just where this goes.

 

[jimbobb24]

This thread should be locked at 140 posts

 

[Scotticus]

I'd point out the Saudis owned that percentage of Twitter before Elon bought it. They merely held onto their existing shares and didn't take the buyout price at Elon's invitation. No one seemed to care that the Saudis owned a ton of Twitter stock when it was a public company. Why be concerned about it now? As long as Elon has 50.1% or more, he does what he wants.

Do you really not get the difference between public and private companies?

 

[jimbobb24]

Or it might help saying things actually meaningful rather than shouting meaningless sound bites. I think Twitter character limit encouraged populists a la trump because in 140-280 characters you can just over simply reality and you can’t argument properly without using dirty tricks.

The idea that the format favored one sides rhetoric over another is a view of simplistic partisanship. Unless you are saying populists adapted better to using the format for their rhetoric which is an odd compliment to pay them. But it seemed pretty clear it was mostly a platform that mostly did rhetoric and all sides excel at that.

 

[tobybrut]

Do you really not get the difference between public and private companies?

Yes, and any differences in this case are irrelevant.

 

[anson42]

Or it might help saying things actually meaningful rather than shouting meaningless sound bites. I think Twitter character limit encouraged populists a la trump because in 140-280 characters you can just over simply reality and you can’t argument properly without using dirty tricks.

Increasing the max length of a tweet will certainly not eliminate the short form tweets that have been effective to date. Sure, it allows longer, actual conversations that some will appreciate but I imagine those would be ignored by the original populist tweeter who already broadcast their point in 140 characters.

 

[jimbobb24]

Twitters core customer base is:
-Crazy unemployed left wing arm chair warriors here to defend the world against the right.
-Crazy unemployed right wing arm chair warriors here to defend the world against the left.
-Upset Karen's here to make sure the injustice of waiting too long for a free drink at Starbucks is righted.
-Old people still lost in the AOL chat lobby.

It's a winning formula.

In terms of MacRumors posting this story.......what else are they going to put on here? It's not like there are constant Mac specific things going on. I'm sure a lot of people reading have Twitter accounts and would be interested. I'll take this stuff over seeing another interview with Rene Richie.

My brother is none of those. He just likes following soccer on Twitter. It’s more than boring political hot takes.

 

[jwdsail]

Four.. thousand..

...

huh..

TLDR

 

[HorstBockman]

Q: Does Facebook have a limit?
A: yes, 33k
Conclusion: twitter isn't needed for long posts, except if you're Elon Musk.

 

[Razorpit]

Folks just need to stop giving this buffoon airtime. Twitter is dead.

😂 whatever you say. It’s the ‘22 version of “I’m moving to Canada.”

 

[Applɘ Aꙅylum]

Twitter is gonna be awash in sea of too much TL;DR posts.

140 characters was good - short and tense. Much like headliners on newspapers.

 

[GooseInTheCaboose]

So, no longer tweets then. Just boring long essays with just more hate crime disguised…

Yeah basically turn twitter into reddit
Now very little makes twitter unique besides some verified accounts

 

[DailySlow]

Twitter will eventually increase its character limit from the current 280 to 4,000, the company's new CEO, Elon Musk, has confirmed on Twitter.

In reply to a question whether rumored plans for Twitter to increase the character limit to 4,000 were true, Musk responded "Yes," without providing additional information. Twitter originally had a character limit of 140 before it was increased to 280 in 2017.

The exact details of the increase in character limit are not yet known, but previous reports and tweets by Musk suggested Twitter may make it easier for users to break up long chains of texts into multiple tweets part of a thread. It seems that an increase to 4,000 characters would eliminate that idea, and users could simply post longer blocks of text in single posts.

Twitter announced over the weekend that it plans to relaunch its Twitter Blue subscription service on Monday, which will offer users a verified blue checkmark and other perks such as the ability to edit tweets and upload higher-resolution 1080p videos. Twitter Blue will relaunch with a higher price of $11/month for iPhone users after Musk criticized Apple's 30% commission taken from in-app purchases.

Article Link: Twitter to Increase Tweet Character Limit to 4,000, Elon Musk Says

Truly dumb and shabby. 240 chars more than enough and of course a thread is possible. This now is akin to mutating from bipedal to quadruped - it’s a whole awkward herd I am not interested in.

 

[now i see it]

Wanna see how long a 4000 character Twitter rant is? Here’s 4000 characters in Lorem Ipsum:


Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Sed dapibus sollicitudin turpis in sollicitudin. Vivamus eu tempor sem. Curabitur aliquet elit id metus luctus vestibulum. Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Fusce risus mi, malesuada id faucibus vitae, gravida in augue. Nullam et maximus dolor, sit amet faucibus enim. Morbi hendrerit nisl eget tincidunt fringilla. Ut faucibus sodales diam at vehicula. Pellentesque quis euismod elit, non hendrerit odio. Nullam condimentum dolor finibus eros porttitor, eget sagittis lorem blandit. In pellentesque turpis vel justo malesuada vestibulum. Vestibulum ornare pulvinar justo, at auctor massa vestibulum ac. Quisque pellentesque mauris diam, non dapibus eros gravida at.

Pellentesque scelerisque lorem at fringilla porta. Etiam tempus malesuada sem, a eleifend mauris suscipit ac. Ut at imperdiet tortor, eu bibendum lorem. Sed lacinia aliquam nunc in egestas. Cras est felis, consequat at auctor ac, pharetra quis velit. Ut rutrum, magna sed bibendum rhoncus, ipsum diam facilisis eros, ut cursus felis nisl vitae orci. Sed pulvinar interdum orci, a facilisis eros dictum at. Fusce porta erat vel libero hendrerit porttitor. Aenean aliquam ex leo, id tincidunt ligula porttitor sed. Fusce malesuada molestie suscipit. Praesent vehicula eros et dui bibendum, at tempus nisi tincidunt.

Vivamus rutrum sem eu finibus ornare. Sed pulvinar tristique justo, non sodales nisl varius in. Vestibulum vel aliquet orci, sodales suscipit purus. Pellentesque ultricies, ante a suscipit aliquet, ipsum augue mollis mauris, et consectetur nibh nulla sit amet turpis. Etiam at ipsum vel diam placerat viverra tempus at mi. Pellentesque id lacinia nunc. Nullam cursus mauris malesuada nibh condimentum, nec lacinia quam aliquam. Cras sed pretium ex, id consectetur odio. Phasellus consectetur diam eros, eget sodales dolor facilisis ut. Donec urna tellus, sagittis eu ante ac, porttitor ullamcorper tellus. Nam a justo justo. Duis elementum interdum lectus, nec pulvinar libero tempus at. Nullam a aliquet ex, ac ultrices est.

Nullam et consectetur odio, at facilisis lacus. Proin magna dui, rhoncus nec felis in, luctus accumsan sapien. Vestibulum a luctus eros. Ut tristique malesuada nibh, tincidunt ornare mi convallis eu. Nam rutrum et neque luctus pellentesque. Donec condimentum malesuada pretium. Nulla facilisi. Mauris elit mauris, facilisis sed dui et, mattis tristique erat. Nam tempor efficitur turpis vitae laoreet. Aenean ultrices lacus risus, non sagittis lectus mollis in. Fusce congue massa tellus, ac tincidunt lectus fermentum ultrices. Quisque sodales massa non pulvinar accumsan. Etiam ut euismod mi, sed pretium felis.

Vivamus condimentum laoreet sem sit amet eleifend. In ut molestie nisi. Morbi efficitur nunc odio, nec semper elit vestibulum vel. In a arcu vitae lectus fermentum volutpat ut nec tortor. Phasellus rhoncus aliquet neque et gravida. Maecenas molestie, purus sit amet venenatis lacinia, enim risus imperdiet justo, consectetur aliquet mi quam nec orci. Nullam lorem neque, lacinia et dui eget, consequat malesuada libero. Etiam iaculis maximus leo, vel tempus nunc volutpat nec.

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