“Trying to cram your thoughts into a Tweet – we’ve all been there, and it’s a pain.” – that’s how Twitter product manager starts their article about new feature development. Limitations were the main reason for the changes made to the application.
Due to Twitter research, 9% of all tweets written in English were exactly 140 character long.
Almost 1 in every 10 tweets was written and probably needed to be shortened in the process, with the thought that your message could be more specific or better explained.
Looking at this statistic may lead us to a conclusion that the change was necessary.
On the other hand, many will say that the 140 limit was something with a huge emotional attachment from the users. This exact number of characters defined Twitter for a long time.
Everybody on the platform agreed to the idea of brief and short messages which can be sent or received.
It was kind of a challenge for everyone to shine in the jungle of 2-3 sentence messages…
The 280-character limit is a terrible idea. The whole beauty of Twitter is that it forces you to express your ideas concisely (1/47)
— James Poniewozik (@poniewozik) September 26, 2017
With our social media manager, Postfity supporting 280 characters limit on twitter you don’t have to cram anymore!
Twitter, however, found another issue with the limit…
The platform is used in many languages all over the world.
Product team analyzed different tweets and it appeared that you need a quite noticeably different amount of characters to share the same exact message in various languages.
Languages with symbols such as Chinese or Japanese were much less “character intensive” than the ones which used the alphabet system.
Small percent of Japanese tweets have 140 characters (only 0.4%). But in English, a much higher percentage of Tweets have 140 characters (9%).
Most Japanese Tweets are 15 characters while most English Tweets are 34.
Twitter research shows also that the character limit is a major cause of bad experiences in English speaking users, but it is not for those Tweeting in Japanese.
Twitter is more popular in markets with symbol-based (less character intensive) language speaking countries.
It leads to a simple conclusion – bigger character limit will attract more users from markets, which were concerned previously about the limitations.
What does the change mean for the small Businesses or Influencers on Twitter?
Actually, this feature will give you few not so obvious advantages in communication:
1.Customer service
Yes… Finally, it will be possible to address you User issue without the need to send them to use your “Support Form” or email. Tweeter is the main source of all customer service requests for a companies.
Public tweets shouldn’t be a place to solve every issue with your product, but sometimes if the problem can be solved quickly and may also affect other users – it’s wise to address it that way, so everyone can see it. It makes you look like a more caring company that way, and can lead to a bigger trust to your brand/person.
2.No more 1/2
Tweets with 1/2, or 1/3 is a thing of a past now! Remember how annoying it was to find only one part of a message and look for previous one by clicking on it and redirecting…
3.Disclaimers
Some of the tweets contain paid sponsor message, some contain alcohol/tobacco advertisement which needs to have special text displayed with them to be legal. The same with the financial sector.
https://twitter.com/kennethn/status/913053785517260801
This legal sentence sometimes took 1/2 or 1/3 of the entire message which looked ridiculously and made twitter not an attractive place for some advertisers.
4.CREATIVE AND FUNNY TWEETS WITH #280characters !
The reason why many of us excited about the changes, or probably reason why some of you clicked on the article and read it up to this point is to see all of the creativeness from various brands on Twitter!
Not to keep you waiting… enjoy!
https://twitter.com/BrianRossAd/status/928049095343669248
We could end it with this one really…
I, for one, welcome the advent of #280characters. For too long, I have been neglected, omitted, and discarded. There will no longer be any reason, justification, or excuse for not using an Oxford comma. You can even put two spaces after the full stop (but that looks a bit silly).
— Oxford Comma (@IAmOxfordComma) November 9, 2017
This new #280characters system is great. pic.twitter.com/vcGBxdJ2rD
— LonelyGoomba (@LonelyGoomba) November 8, 2017
#280characters? Sheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee-it!
— Isiah Whitlock Jr. (@IsiahWhitlockJr) November 8, 2017
???? . * . ????
*
* . ????️ . ✨ *
. *
Thanks @Twitter, we can
always use more space ????
. . .
. * ???? *
????
* ☄️#280characters— NASA Goddard (@NASAGoddard) November 8, 2017
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You have arrived at your destination.#280Characters— Google Maps (@googlemaps) November 8, 2017
MCDOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO #280characters
— McDo Philippines (@McDo_PH) November 8, 2017
Dear @Twitter. Thank you for giving us all #280characters. Our club name can finally be expressed in its full glory.
Yours sincerely,
Borussia Verein für Leibesübungen 1900 Mönchengladbach e.V. pic.twitter.com/FTBBJjPfxT— Gladbach (@borussia_en) November 8, 2017
Thank you @Twitter, now we can finally write in one tweet all the trophies we've won! ????
7 #UCL ????
5 #UEFASuperCup ????
2 Cup Winners' Cups ????
3 Intercontinental Cups ????
1 FIFA Club World Cup ????
18 Scudetto titles ????????
5 Italian Cups ????????
7 Italian Super Cups ????????#280characters ???? pic.twitter.com/onffmFrbR0— AC Milan (@acmilan) November 8, 2017
Now that we all have #280Characters, we expect your Twitter complaints about specific calls against your favorite teams to be calm, well-reasoned, and full of complete sentences. Thanks in advance for this positive step forward in basketball officiating-related discourse."
— NBA Referees (@OfficialNBARefs) November 7, 2017
NEE-NAW ????NEE-NAW ????NEE-NAW ????NEE-NAW ????NEE-NAW ????NEE-NAW ????NEE-NAW ????NEE-NAW ????NEE-NAW ????NEE-NAW ????NEE-NAW ????NEE-NAW ????NEE-NAW ????NEE-NAW ????NEE-NAW ????NEE-NAW ????NEE-NAW ????NEE-NAW ????NEE-NAW ????NEE-NAW ????NEE-NAW ????NEE-NAW ????NEE-NAW ????NEE-NAW ????NEE-NAW ????NEE-NAW ????#280characters
— London Ambulance Service (@Ldn_Ambulance) November 8, 2017
Although now we may be able to use up to #280characters, we still only need five to express the essence of football: MESSI pic.twitter.com/WqxNIe1zuG
— FC Barcelona (@FCBarcelona) November 8, 2017
Dobby’s Christmas list: socks socks socks socks socks socks socks socks socks socks socks socks socks socks socks socks socks socks socks socks socks socks socks socks socks socks socks socks socks socks socks socks socks socks socks socks socks socks socks socks #280characters
— Wizarding World (@wizardingworld) November 8, 2017
"Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh! Let's name the zones, the zones?! THE ZONES! Let's name zones of the open seaaaaaaaaaa! Theeeeeeeeeere's eipelagic, mesopelagic, bathyal, and abyssalpelagic, hadipelagic, and all the rest are too deep for you and me to seeeeeeeeeee!!!!!!!" #280characters pic.twitter.com/fnu1uI80ac
— Pixar (@Pixar) November 8, 2017
The only good thing about #280Characters is… more space for animal emojis! ????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????
— WWF UK ???? (@wwf_uk) November 8, 2017
#280Characters you say?! Okay: ????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????☘️????????????????????????????????????????????????????❄️????☀️????????⛈????????☁️????????⚡️☄️
— BBC Earth (@BBCEarth) November 8, 2017
All the elements! #280characters HHeLiBeBCNOFNeNaMgAlSiPSClArKCaScTiVCrMnFeCoNiCuZnGaGeAsSeBrKrRbSrYZrNbMoTcRuRhPdAgCdInSnSbTeIXeCsBaLaCePrNdPmSmEuGdTbDyHoErTmYbLuHfTaWReOsIrPtAuHgTlPbBiPoAtRnFrRaAcThPaUNpPuAmCmBkCfEsFmMdNoLrRfDbSgBhHsMtDsRgCnNhFlMcLvTsOg https://t.co/XGjVfHcMmT pic.twitter.com/HwgN2YJli5
— Royal Society of Chemistry (@RoySocChem) November 8, 2017
????????⠀⠀????⠀????⠀⠀⠀????⠀⠀????⠀⠀????
????⠀????⠀????⠀????⠀⠀⠀????⠀⠀⠀⠀????
????⠀????⠀????⠀????⠀⠀⠀????⠀⠀⠀⠀????
????????⠀⠀????⠀????????⠀????????⠀ ????????????⠀⠀????⠀????⠀⠀⠀????⠀⠀????⠀⠀????
????⠀????⠀????⠀????⠀⠀⠀????⠀⠀⠀⠀????
????⠀????⠀????⠀????⠀⠀⠀????⠀⠀⠀⠀????
???????? ⠀????⠀????????⠀????????⠀ ????
#280characters— Bud Light (@budlight) November 8, 2017
I
wrote
a poem
in a tweet
but then each line grew
to the word sum of the previous two
until I began to worry about all these words coming with such frequency
because as you can see, it can be easy to run out of space when a poem gets all Fibonacci sequency#280characters
— Brian Bilston (@brian_bilston) November 8, 2017
123456
password
12345
abc123
admin
football
qwerty
welcome
letmein
login
121212
passw0rd
princess
ninja
forgotpassword
flowers1234
lovedogs
dragon
secret
sunshine
master
baseball
trustno1
monkey
1234567890
zaq1zaq1
1111111
solo
123456789
password1#280characters of bad passwords— LastPass (@LastPass) November 8, 2017
Wait, hold on a second? Do I have #280characters?!? Oh no…quick think of something really interesting and long to talk about. Um…..uh…..all the pressure. The Pressure that comes with the privilege. Wait!! I know what’s so important!! Ok, I’ve always wanted to tell you all,
— Sarah Michelle (@SarahMGellar) November 7, 2017
Did we do it right? #280characters pic.twitter.com/Lg2DZZgo4o
— Netflix ANZ (@NetflixANZ) November 8, 2017
And trust us… You can easily find many more