The New Twitter and why I don’t like it
For months now, the “new” Twitter has been warning me that I should switch to that, because soon I will have to one way or the other.
Today there was a severe warning
You all know how I love Twitter and what I think about its value and role in forming my PLN! And, on first look, the new Twitter looks a bit more attractive, doesn’t it. Have a look at the same selection
If you are so inclined, you can find out who has retweeted your tweets and whose tweets you have retweeted. Oh well, I am personally not about to pore over details like these!!!! 🙂
But the new twitter has major flaws.
DM’s (Direct Messages)
(These are private messages only you and their recipient can read – they do not appear on the public timeline)
Your old DM’s are lost to you for good. All you can access is DM’s from the last 20 people you have messaged with. Gone are private communications with friends, emails or links or conversations you have had with them and would like to save. I am really quite upset about that!!!
Hashtag Searches
Hashtagged searches don’t save as in the old Twitter – all my saved searches can be seen below, PLUS my lists
In the new Twitter interface, all I get is “who to follow” and “trends” . I’m OK with suggestions of similar Twitter users, usually I see recommendations of educators, but not the hashtags. Hashtags can now be found under “saved searches” which is OK and lists, somewhere next to saved searches.
In the old Twitter I knew immediately how many lists I am in which you can see clearly in the first screenshot of the old Twitter. To get that information, I have to click on my “followers” link and then I get it. More clicks….
Replying to more than one Twitter Contacts
In the old Twitter interface, this is possible; you simply hit the reply link of as many users as you wish to reply to and your response goes to all of them – see below:
In the new Twitter, this is no longer possible. You can reply to only one person at a time – a new window opens, and if you attempt to include another user, this is not possible and you get an error message – see below
Am I moaning for no reason at all? Will I soon get used to this and think nothing of it?
What do you think? Do you prefer the new or the old Twitter? And why do we never get asked?
Facebook does the same all the time. The minute you get used to one interface, they do something and change it all!
I am really annoyed at losing my old DM’s!
I rarely use the Twitter page and tend to stick to Tweetdeck. I’ve never really thought about messages as anything other than temporary and disposable, like conversations. I might remember them, but I can’t save them! Apart from links that get bookmarked, of course.
I suppose it’s a case of changing your methods of use a bit. I’m sorry you are upset at losing the DMs! 🙁
Hi Richard, thanks for comment. I thought that perhaps if enough people felt the same way, it might be a good idea to put some pressure on Twitter to resolve this issue.
The tool is fantastic, DM’s or no DM’s, and encourages us to communicate so well. It brought this post to your attention, for one thing.
I think it’s wonderful to be able to communicate my thoughts, important or not, to a wider audience of my peers, and generate some discussion.
My reaction is probably an expected one – we always try to resist change to what we are used to, don’t we…:-)
Marisa
I agree with you and like Richard, am really glad for a client as I don’t like new Twitter either – in my case, I use (and love) HootSuite.
As a tip, though… re your old DMs as you seem keen to keep these – I simply get all DMs sent to my email inbox then they’re there forever… however, catch is, not your end of the discussion. That’s in the other person’s email inbox…
So if you happen to be specifically looking for one or more particular conversations – with one specific someone and you need to keep both sides of it, not just what was said to you but what you said back – then the very best way to get a hold of these old conversations is via SnapBird
http://snapbird.org/ a pretty excellent tool (I give it the 5stars) – especially when you really need to archive something for prosperity..or for whatever other handy use it could deliver.
Thanks for great link, dear Karenne – Do you have a Mac?
My main gripe with new twitter is the dimensions of the two panels, the right hand panel where on the old version was a nice discreet size about a quarter of the screen with useful info, the size of the new panel is almost equally split with the timeline panel, it looks very instrusive and as you scroll down the page all you see is half a screen of literally nothing as the info on the right is limited to the very top. Also, new twitter totally obscures the background that you love ans spent time creating. Pity that they didn’t include in the settings a way of customising the look of your twitter page inc. re-sizing the panels.
It is kind of too much of a wide panel, I agree, Stuart, and most of it full of suggestions and inane information, such as “People like you” or people Twitter thinks I should be following!
Thanks for comment
Marisa
Stuart,
You can try http://userstyles.org to change your new twitter page. Hope this helps you. 🙂
I totally agree! I keep going back to the “old” Twitter, mainly because I can’t see the DM history. Also, I’ve received some very cool DMs I’d like to keep.
For me the deal breaker with New Twitter is the inability to reply to more than one person with a single tweet. Other things (DMs, hash tag searches, et. al.) I can live without, but I want the ability to make multiple replies.
I believe as of yesterday everyone has been forced to use the ‘New Twitter’ format. The New Twitter is NOT dial-up friendly. For some reason I constantly get a pop up box that says ‘You have exceeded your hourly limit. Please try again later’!!!! Not only that, the New Twitter is constantly loading older tweets at the bottom of the page. Now I am starting to get ‘script error’ messages! Very, very frustrating to say the least! I guess it’s time to try ‘tweetdeck’or anything that might make the ‘New Twitter’ work better for me???
Not a happy camper. :(((
I tried the new Tweet format and I think it works great.
And what about all the features missing? Granted, there are new features which may be an improvement but why lose your DMs or multiple replies?
Follow the #newtwitter hashtag on Twitter to find out more if you like
But thanks for stopping by and commenting
Marisa