There are quite a few updates users have been requesting from Twitter, chief among them is the ability to edit tweets. Even Kim Kardashian chimed in on that request with a tweet to Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey. But instead of addressing one of the most frequent complaints, the powers that be decided to update the app by changing favorites to likes because…hearts are better than stars.
You can say a lot with a heart. Introducing a new way to show how you feel on Twitter: https://t.co/WKBEmORXNW pic.twitter.com/G4ZGe0rDTP
— Twitter (@twitter) November 3, 2015
The social media platform announced the update today on Twitter’s official blog, citing confusion among new users as the primary reason for change:
“We are changing our star icon for favorites to a heart and we’ll be calling them likes. We want to make Twitter easier and more rewarding to use, and we know that at times the star could be confusing, especially to newcomers. You might like a lot of things, but not everything can be your favorite. The heart, in contrast, is a universal symbol that resonates across languages, cultures, and time zones. The heart is more expressive, enabling you to convey a range of emotions and easily connect with people. And in our tests, we found that people loved it.”
They suggest that “you can like a lot of things but not everything is your favorite.” But since the platform debuted in 2006, favorites have functioned more as a bookmark of sorts: users favorite tweets they don’t necessarily like but rather want to save and reference later. Will likes now be seen as an endorsement of a tweet rather than just a way to bookmark them? And what will become of the #FridayFaves hashtag (and better yet, how will we commemorate our #2015Faves as the end of the year approaches)? Only time will tell.
In the meantime, about that editing function…
[via Buzzfeed]
