Personal News
Twitter announced it tests edge-to-edge media in tweets on iOS, creating a more full-screen, almost Instagram-like experience for the photos and videos on your timeline.
In an email to The edgeTwitter writes that it is testing the change because it wants to better support both visual and text conversations. You can get an idea of what this looks like in a video posted to Twitter’s support account:
Testing in progress on iOS:
Edge-to-edge tweets that span the width of the timeline so your photos, GIFs, and videos have more room to shine. pic.twitter.com/luAHoPjjlY
– Twitter support (@TwitterSupport) September 7, 2021
This change, if rolled out beyond a small group of iOS users, also helps Twitter address concerns about image cropping it has faced in recent years. Image cropping algorithms have been informally shown to have a bias towards white faces, something Twitter confirmed earlier this year. Twitter has attempted to solve this problem by eliminating the cropping of photos, but this design test takes it a step further by emphasizing Instagram-style visuals. Whole joke formats get lost in the process, but such is the cost of progress.
Of course, some people have taken issue with Twitter’s design before. Searches for “New Twitter” bring a lot of complaints, like that the new layout causes headaches and edge-to-edge screenshots of tweets may look confusingly like a real tweet. Obviously, Twitter might have a few more tweaks to make before this test becomes something official.
