When Twitter announced the edit tweet feature a few weeks ago, many users were concerned that this feature would be abused. It looks like Twitter has thought about this and is also preparing a solution.
If the tweet edit feature is launched later, Twitter will likely save the edit history of the tweet so that the traces don't just disappear. This was conveyed by application researcher Jane Manchun Wong.
In his tweet, Manchun Wing said the tweet edit feature would have an 'immutable' function, meaning that Twitter would create a new tweet after the tweet was edited, but keep the previous version of the tweet.
"It seems Twitter's approach to Edit Tweets is immutable, instead of changing the Tweet text within the same Tweet (same ID), they will regenerate a new Tweet with the changed content, along with a list of the old Tweets prior to the edit," Manchun said. Wong, as quoted from The Verge, Monday (18/4/2022).
In a subsequent tweet, Manchun Wong said it is currently unknown how the edit history will be displayed to Twitter users or whether it will be displayed.
But if Twitter decides to publicly display edited tweet history, this could be a way to address concerns about potential abuse of the feature.
In addition to the update from Manchun Wong, application researcher Alessandro Paluzzi also uploaded a screenshot of the tweet editing feature. In the first screenshot, Paluzzi shows the 'Edit Tweet' option appearing in the three-dot menu on the right side of the tweet.
After selecting the button, the user will be directed to the tweet composer which looks the same as when composing a normal tweet, but the field is already filled with tweets that are ready to be edited. In addition, the command button displayed reads 'Update' instead of 'Tweet'.
But the screenshot that Paluzzi uploaded doesn't show the edit history option. Twitter also has not confirmed the presence of this option.
"There's nothing else to share at this time other than what's in the Tweet from @TwitterComms and the Tweet from @JaySullivan, VP of Consumer Products," said a Twitter spokesperson.