Twitter Experiments With New Tools to Make Its Recommendations More On Point

Twitter has been busy as a bee working to improve its algorithms for recommending content from accounts users are not currently following. As part of this process, the platform has been testing a new feature called “Related Tweets,” placed just below conversations on a tweet detail page. These show up on the user’s page in the form of a thread of posts meaningfully related to the main one. People have had a lot to say about the feature, criticizing it for not being able to correctly determine tweets that are truly related or at least relevant. There is still no official response from Twitter addressing pleas for removing “Related Tweets” or introducing a handy option to have those disabled by the user.

Another tool the company is now experimenting with should allow users to remove a recommended post from their timeline if they do not like it or do not find it relevant. The ‘X’ button will not only let you dismiss content you do not find helpful or exciting faster but also give users an option to share their feedback if they feel willing to.

Even though Twitter’s recommendation algorithms are far from perfect and, at the moment, serve more to promote random content than to give users what they really want to see, it is encouraging that the platform acknowledges the problem and is trying hard to do something about it. With time, the company might come up with some really valuable tools to help new users discover the content they would like to follow, even if the platform’s AI does not receive too many signals regarding what it might be.

What are your impressions of Twitter’s recommendation system? Are you a fan or a hater of the “Related Tweets” feature? Feel free to comment below this post – we would love to know what you think!