- Today, Twitter released its much-awaited Fleets feature for India which will enable users to share a tweet or pic for 24 hours
Today, Twitter released its much-awaited Fleets feature for India. This latest feature will enable micro-blogging site users to share a tweet, pictures, and even videos that will only be available for 24 hours on their profile.
Announcing the feature on his Twitter, the site’s product lead, and Periscope’s co-founder, Kayvon Beykpour introduced it to the Indian users.
Namaste! Starting today, Fleets are coming to India. If you’re in India, check it out and let us know what you think! #FleetsFeedback 🇮🇳 pic.twitter.com/U6QiHynm1U
— Kayvon Beykpour (@kayvz) June 9, 2020
Unlike Tweets, Fleets disappear after 24 hours and don’t get Retweets, Likes, or public replies– people can only react to your Fleets with DMs. Instead of showing up in people’s timelines, Fleets are viewed by tapping on your avatar.
Sharing the thoughts on its similarities with Stories, Beykpour said,”…there are many similarities with the Stories format that will feel familiar to people. There are also a few intentional differences to make the experience more focused on sharing and seeing people’s thoughts.”
Additionally, those who want to reply to a Fleet, they can click on it to send a Direct Message (DM) or emoji, and continue this conversation on their DMs.
“We’ll learn from the India test how adding a new conversation mode changes the way Indians engage on Twitter. It would also be important to see how it further amplifies user diversity by encouraging people to express what they think in a light-touch and light-hearted way, “he added.
Twitter may be the last major social platform to explore Stories, a feature that Snapchat has conceptualized. Instagram, Facebook, WhatsApp, and YouTube have since replicated the Stories format. Also recently, Spotify revealed it was testing a Stories-like feature and even Skype, Match and Bumble were trying their hand.
This is the first time Twitter has brought a feature to India in a timely manner in several years — or is doing something noteworthy in this Asian market, where its platform has been scrutinized for not taking swift action to spread misinformation and misuse messages.
It will be interesting to see how Indian users react to this new update by Twitter. Indian social media users have experienced this everywhere ranging from Whatsapp, Facebook, Messenger, Instagram, and Snapchat. I hope it doesn’t become redundant for them.
