If there is one feature that Twitter doesn’t currently have that we all wish would be added, it’s the edit button. A quick fix beats the heck out of deleting and tweeting again with the correct spelling, username, etc.

Matthew Keys of The Desk says that three Twitter employees say that the social network is currently developing an edit function and is working on fine-tuning the feature’s functionality.

Straight from Keys, here’s what the edit feature would do:

Once a user publishes a tweet, an “edit” feature will be present for a limited amount of time (Twitter is still currently working out the length of time the feature would be available). The feature would allow a user to make “slight changes” to the contents of a tweet, such a removing a word, correcting a typo or adding one or two additional words.

An edit could only be performed once per tweet. Once the edit is made, it would be immediately visible on that user’s Twitter feed. The edit would also show up on the feed of anyone who re-published the tweet using Twitter’s built-in “re-tweet” feature.

Based on this description, editing is not going to be a complete overhaul function. I believe that’s called the delete button. Twitter is working on an algorithm to determine if the overall meaning of the tweet is being completely changed. Whether that works or not remains to be seen.

However, allowing for relatively small changes to allow for clarity makes Twitter a better place for the dissemination of information. It’s very easy for one missing letter or one missing word to completely change the meaning of a sentence. Allowing editing can only be a good thing.

For their part, Twitter isn’t saying anything about editing. It’s been long known that adding editing has long been a priority. Now, it sounds like we’re just weeks or months from editing tweets becoming a reality.

Source: The Desk