It’s not uncommon for social media users to share links to articles that they haven’t read.
According to a 2016 study from Columbia University and Microsoft, 59 percent of links posted on Twitter remains unclicked. Another research suggests that 70 percent of Facebook users only read the headline of science stories before commenting.
Now, Twitter is trying to prevent people from sharing articles that they haven’t read. “Sharing an article can spark conversation, so you may want to read it before you tweet it,” says the social media giant.
With that in mind, the company is testing a prompt that’ll ask people if they really want to retweet a link that they haven’t read.
In its announcement on Wednesday, Twitter wrote:
“To help promote informed discussion, we’re testing a new prompt on Android — when you Retweet an article that you haven’t opened on Twitter, we may ask if you’d like to open it first.”
As said earlier, the test prompt is only available on Android devices. Also, Twitter did not say when it intends to bring the feature to other operating systems.
Twitter’s Past Battles with Misleading Content
As you may have guessed, the feature is an effort to curb the misinformation on the social media platform.
Twitter has been fighting misinformation on its platform for years. However, the company — like other social media companies — is now taking a more hands-on approach.
Earlier in the year, the platform started labeling tweets that contained misleading information about COVID-19. Last month, Twitter also launched a test that allows users to restrict who can reply to their tweets.
Other features that the social media platform has rolled out recently include the ability to hide specific replies and a cleaner interface for threaded conversations.
Meanwhile, the European Union has announced that it wants to hold Twitter, Facebook, and Google responsible for the spread of fake news. The union would start demanding a monthly report on how these social giants are fighting misinformation on their platforms.
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