Most will be familiar with the principle KISS – keep it simple, stupid. Then last month social media giant Twitter announced that after successful testing, it was doubling its character limit and rolling out 280-character tweets for all users. This was in a bid to attract younger users and more users in general who felt restricted cramming their thoughts into 140 characters.
Yay or nay?
There are some obvious benefits, the instant one being more flexibility to say more and the clarity of message. It surely makes it easier for people to tweet and tweet more often simply because they have to spend less time editing to accommodate the character limit.
Can you imagine waking up in the morning and checking your Twitter feed and scrolling through endless long tweets! Users can rest easy.
Twitter product manager Aliza Rosen said, “During the first few days of the test many people tweeted the full 280-limit because it was new and novel, but soon after behaviour normalised.”
A popular platform for micro-blogging and self-expression in real time, it’s no surprise that users will from time to time try and get creative and make the most of the longer character limit. But as the novelty wears off, keeping it short and to the point will outdo longer tweets.
So the good news is, while 280 characters are ‘good to have’ – brevity still rules.
