The entire pack of social media platforms in today’s time feels more like a family. All the different platforms we have, from Facebook to Snapchat to Instagram to Twitter, they all feel like siblings. All of these social media sites have a similar layout, and perform the same basic functions.
And to corroborate my point, news is coming in that Twitter has also decided to take the ‘road more traveled’, as the company has decided to launch its own version of stories called ‘Fleets’. These fleets will not be able to receive any likes or retweets, in a bid to enable a sense of privacy on the public platform.
Fleets will work just like every other ‘Stories’ setting on every other social media platform. You would be able to view the stories as they appear on the top of your Twitter feed. They will be less public than tweets, that is, they won’t circulate across Twitter’s network, won’t show up in Search or Moments, and can’t be embedded on an external website. However, they will still be very much public as even non followers will be able to see your Fleets. Still, they are an answer to the privacy concerns being raised on Twitter’s ‘public approach’.
These Fleets, just like on other SM platforms, will be up for 24 hours, and will then become obsolete. Users will be able to see a new bar at the top of their Twitter feed, housing circular icons(again, just like Stories from Instagram). At the left most corner of this bar will be your own display picture in a bubble, with a plus sign(if you don’t have any Fleets posted yet). Pressing on this plus sign will allow you to post your own Fleet. This ‘posting’ screen is a little different than the one on other platforms and seems more minimalistic, which Twitter has said is because of the platform being more ‘written oriented’. However, users will still be able to upload pictures, videos, and other media if they want to.
Mo Al Adham, Product Manager at Twitter said, “Based on the test, we’ll learn how the existence of a new way of chatting changes the way you interact on Twitter and whether it allows you to share what you’re thinking more comfortably.”
Fleets will also not house the ability to receive likes or comments. However, users can reply to these Fleets privately via direct messages, if the person they are replying to has turned that option on.
The gestures on these Fleets will also be different from the one on Instagram stories, where users will have to scroll through the fleets downward (instead of touching the right side of the screen) to get to the next fleet. However, scrolling to the next user’s fleet section will still work like it does on other apps, that is, by making a left swipe.
The feature will only come out in Brazil for now, from which point on it will become ready for a global launch depending on how well it does in the area.
