7 ms·

> Return to a reverse chronological time They've had this for years. Press the "swish" (stars) button top right.

yupper32 4y ago
We have to remember that a lot of people who criticize twitter don't actually use twitter. This happens so often with so many things. Facebook: "I haven't used Facebook in 10 years, and never bothered to unfollow things on my feed back then, but it sucks! The feed is just garbage!" SNL: "I haven't watched SNL since the 90s. It hasn't been funny in years!" Expensive restaurants: "I went to one Michelin star place in 2007 and it was like 3 bites of food! I don't know why people bother!"
- danachow 4y ago
  Your examples are still straw men. I do occasionally have the misfortune of using twitter - sometimes a link is posted or sent to me, or I am curious if something specific is trending. It sucks ass and is unenjoyable in my opinion - the worst when someone tries to use it as a full blown blogging platform. It seems designed to exploit certain triggers for compulsive content consumption. There are numerous similar testimonials of people that still regularly use twitter if not compulsively, so the straw men are irrelevant.
  - yupper32 4y ago
    You use twitter in a different way than the vast majority of users. Twitter users follow people and see their posts. Their feeds are mostly their followers posts. You ever look at the youtube home page when you're logged out? It's absolute garbage. It's also not the way most people use youtube.
    - danachow 4y ago
      > You use twitter in a different way than the vast majority of users. Can you actually back this up with any evidence, because I don't buy it off hand. You're saying it's uncommon for a huge long tail of rare users and lurkers that just casually drop in to twitter to see some one off post/conversation from an aggregator or their friend sent them, or post/DM bitch to a company that fucked them? I have a twitter account, I have a handful of followers (all likely from more than 5 years ago), but I hardly use twitter enough to even care. And I don't think this is that rare. > You ever look at the youtube home page when you're logged out? It's absolute garbage. It's also not the way most people use youtube. I don't follow your point. Most people use youtube by following links from aggregators such as reddit or here. They don't actively participate in the youtube "community" with its cesspool of comments nor even subscribe (what is it - like 3 to 5 subscribers per 1000 views) - that is hardly the "vast majority".
      - chaosite 4y ago
        > Most people use youtube by following links from aggregators such as reddit or here. That's a strong assertion. You have any data to back it up? > They don't actively participate in the youtube "community" with its cesspool of comments nor even subscribe (what is it - like 3 to 5 subscribers per 1000 views) - that is hardly the "vast majority". I think you're right about the comments and even subscriptions, but you're entirely skipping the "algorithmic" way of using YouTube, which is using the suggested videos on the homepage like the person you were replying to alluded to, as well as the related videos. Also, searching. YouTube can and will suggest new videos from channels it has decided you like on the homepage whether you're subscribed to them or not. It will also put them in the related videos, even if they're unrelated to the video you're currently watching.
      - alexb_ 4y ago
        >Most people use youtube by following links from aggregators such as reddit or here. Huh? This is blatantly false. Link aggregators are not as large as you think. People go on youtube.com and watch the videos there, or check out their subscriptions, or use the search bar in youtube.
- overgard 4y ago
  > We have to remember that a lot of people who criticize twitter don't actually use twitter. And yet its influence on media I do consume is undeniable. I dont think there are many journalists not on twitter
collinvandyck76 4y ago
The problem with this approach is that they frequently revert you back to algorithmic order. edit: to everyone saying that this doesn't happen anymore, thanks for the clarification! i guess i stopped fighting the algorithm back when this wasn't the case.
- antiterra 4y ago
  Social media sites do this because all their stats show that users actually ‘like’ non chronological order even when they say they don’t. Telling people what they want when they ask for something else is a big nono, so they just change it for you on the sly. Of course, the main way they measure ‘liking’ the site is via engagement, which may actually just measure compulsion to use, not enjoyment. And, of course, the however small, cohort of people who genuinely ‘like’ chronological order are ignored.
  - dzhiurgis 4y ago
    Hence instead should just be url, like /latest. Bookmark it, occasionally check mainline when bored.
  - lewispollard 4y ago
    My guess was actually that it's more efficient to show users a bunch of popular, cached content than it is to show them a truly chronological timeline full of new and unpopular content, which is unlikely to hit their cache so readily.
    - tantaman 4y ago
      If social networks worked like TV and there were only a few popular channels / pieces of content, sure. But algorithmic feeds are endlessly unique and composing them is vastly more difficult than doing chronological order.
      - tacocataco 4y ago
        Isn't each individual person a "channel"?
msh 4y ago
But it would keep resetting to the algo Timeline until recently.
kelnos 4y ago
Sure, but what percentage of users know about it? Of those, what percentage remember it? Defaults matter! Most people will just see the default state of things and not be too curious about ways they could change things, and never even notice this sort of setting. And on top of that, like Facebook did long ago with its chronlogical timeline setting, it resets itself back to the algorithmic timeline periodically.
jacobsenscott 4y ago
I've been using twitter for years and had no idea this was an option. This is clearly deliberate - the option is nowhere in the settings menu, where one would look for this. The star icon gives no indication it is even clickable, and does not communicate "sort order". There are fairly standard icons for that.
- guerrilla 4y ago
  It's in the same place it was for Facebook.
  - qwertox 4y ago
    Many of us don't use Facebook.
- giobox 4y ago
  I only learned what the "Sparkle Button" (that really does appear to be its actual name) does the other week in an article discussing its terrible design too. Instantly earned a spot in my personal UX Hall of Shame. Click the "Sparkle Button" to change the timeline sort algorithm. Right, totally obvious...
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
  - ramesh31 4y ago
    >Click the "Sparkle Button" to change the timeline sort algorithm. Right, totally obvious... Holy crap, I can actually use Twitter again. Thanks.
- caslon 4y ago
  Every time I have made a twitter account, I have seen a box along the lines of "Viewing your Home feed. For the latest tweets, switch to Latest." I think in this case it might be that you clicked through a pretty hard to miss box.
grishka 4y ago
I've never seen the algorithmic one in the first place. Probably because I have an old enough account?
- zippergz 4y ago
  Unlikely. I've been a regular user since 2006 and both on the web and the apps, the algo timeline has been there for a long time but I never use it.
  - grishka 4y ago
    I mean it's there, as in, there's a button to switch to it, but I don't think I've ever had it switch automatically. The one thing that is mighty annoying though, is how it keeps pushing "recommendations" on you. The "someone liked", "someone follows someone", this kind of stuff. If only there was a dedicated button to make someone else's tweet appear in your followers' timelines... I somehow managed to break that misfeature by muting a bunch of "words" that are apparently contained somewhere in the recommendation objects because apparently the mute feature checks not only against the text of the tweet but against some kind of serialized form of it. So I no longer have these neither on the web nor in the Android app.
    - chc 4y ago
      In my experience, those "recommendations" only appear in the algorithmic feed. Are you sure you haven't been using it unknowingly?
spurgu 4y ago
You can also use Tweetdeck.
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
remram 4y ago
This applies to your feed but not to replies in a thread.
kingrazor 4y ago
My problem is that when I select that, I see a completely different feed, regardless of post times. In the algorithmically sorted mode I see tweets that I'll never see in the chronological mode.
vt240 4y ago
Twitter does in fact still reset it all the time, at least on my account. I'll notice it when I run into a bunch of those recommended tweets/follows, which don't appear in the chronological feed. edit but it has been much better recently than it was when the new UI was first released.

We have to remember that a lot of people who criticize twitter don't actually use twitter. This happens so often with so many things. Facebook: "I haven't used Facebook in 10 years, and never bothered to unfollow things on my feed back then, but it sucks! The feed is just garbage!" SNL: "I haven't watched SNL since the 90s. It hasn't been funny in years!" Expensive restaurants: "I went to one Michelin star place in 2007 and it was like 3 bites of food! I don't know why people bother!"

danachow 4y ago
Your examples are still straw men. I do occasionally have the misfortune of using twitter - sometimes a link is posted or sent to me, or I am curious if something specific is trending. It sucks ass and is unenjoyable in my opinion - the worst when someone tries to use it as a full blown blogging platform. It seems designed to exploit certain triggers for compulsive content consumption. There are numerous similar testimonials of people that still regularly use twitter if not compulsively, so the straw men are irrelevant.
- yupper32 4y ago
  You use twitter in a different way than the vast majority of users. Twitter users follow people and see their posts. Their feeds are mostly their followers posts. You ever look at the youtube home page when you're logged out? It's absolute garbage. It's also not the way most people use youtube.
  - danachow 4y ago
    > You use twitter in a different way than the vast majority of users. Can you actually back this up with any evidence, because I don't buy it off hand. You're saying it's uncommon for a huge long tail of rare users and lurkers that just casually drop in to twitter to see some one off post/conversation from an aggregator or their friend sent them, or post/DM bitch to a company that fucked them? I have a twitter account, I have a handful of followers (all likely from more than 5 years ago), but I hardly use twitter enough to even care. And I don't think this is that rare. > You ever look at the youtube home page when you're logged out? It's absolute garbage. It's also not the way most people use youtube. I don't follow your point. Most people use youtube by following links from aggregators such as reddit or here. They don't actively participate in the youtube "community" with its cesspool of comments nor even subscribe (what is it - like 3 to 5 subscribers per 1000 views) - that is hardly the "vast majority".
    - chaosite 4y ago
      > Most people use youtube by following links from aggregators such as reddit or here. That's a strong assertion. You have any data to back it up? > They don't actively participate in the youtube "community" with its cesspool of comments nor even subscribe (what is it - like 3 to 5 subscribers per 1000 views) - that is hardly the "vast majority". I think you're right about the comments and even subscriptions, but you're entirely skipping the "algorithmic" way of using YouTube, which is using the suggested videos on the homepage like the person you were replying to alluded to, as well as the related videos. Also, searching. YouTube can and will suggest new videos from channels it has decided you like on the homepage whether you're subscribed to them or not. It will also put them in the related videos, even if they're unrelated to the video you're currently watching.
    - alexb_ 4y ago
      >Most people use youtube by following links from aggregators such as reddit or here. Huh? This is blatantly false. Link aggregators are not as large as you think. People go on youtube.com and watch the videos there, or check out their subscriptions, or use the search bar in youtube.
overgard 4y ago
> We have to remember that a lot of people who criticize twitter don't actually use twitter. And yet its influence on media I do consume is undeniable. I dont think there are many journalists not on twitter

collinvandyck76 4y ago

The problem with this approach is that they frequently revert you back to algorithmic order. edit: to everyone saying that this doesn't happen anymore, thanks for the clarification! i guess i stopped fighting the algorithm back when this wasn't the case.

antiterra 4y ago
Social media sites do this because all their stats show that users actually ‘like’ non chronological order even when they say they don’t. Telling people what they want when they ask for something else is a big nono, so they just change it for you on the sly. Of course, the main way they measure ‘liking’ the site is via engagement, which may actually just measure compulsion to use, not enjoyment. And, of course, the however small, cohort of people who genuinely ‘like’ chronological order are ignored.
- dzhiurgis 4y ago
  Hence instead should just be url, like /latest. Bookmark it, occasionally check mainline when bored.
- lewispollard 4y ago
  My guess was actually that it's more efficient to show users a bunch of popular, cached content than it is to show them a truly chronological timeline full of new and unpopular content, which is unlikely to hit their cache so readily.
  - tantaman 4y ago
    If social networks worked like TV and there were only a few popular channels / pieces of content, sure. But algorithmic feeds are endlessly unique and composing them is vastly more difficult than doing chronological order.
    - tacocataco 4y ago
      Isn't each individual person a "channel"?

msh 4y ago

But it would keep resetting to the algo Timeline until recently.

kelnos 4y ago

Sure, but what percentage of users know about it? Of those, what percentage remember it? Defaults matter! Most people will just see the default state of things and not be too curious about ways they could change things, and never even notice this sort of setting. And on top of that, like Facebook did long ago with its chronlogical timeline setting, it resets itself back to the algorithmic timeline periodically.

jacobsenscott 4y ago

I've been using twitter for years and had no idea this was an option. This is clearly deliberate - the option is nowhere in the settings menu, where one would look for this. The star icon gives no indication it is even clickable, and does not communicate "sort order". There are fairly standard icons for that.

guerrilla 4y ago
It's in the same place it was for Facebook.
- qwertox 4y ago
  Many of us don't use Facebook.
giobox 4y ago
I only learned what the "Sparkle Button" (that really does appear to be its actual name) does the other week in an article discussing its terrible design too. Instantly earned a spot in my personal UX Hall of Shame. Click the "Sparkle Button" to change the timeline sort algorithm. Right, totally obvious...
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- ramesh31 4y ago
  >Click the "Sparkle Button" to change the timeline sort algorithm. Right, totally obvious... Holy crap, I can actually use Twitter again. Thanks.
caslon 4y ago
Every time I have made a twitter account, I have seen a box along the lines of "Viewing your Home feed. For the latest tweets, switch to Latest." I think in this case it might be that you clicked through a pretty hard to miss box.

grishka 4y ago

I've never seen the algorithmic one in the first place. Probably because I have an old enough account?

zippergz 4y ago
Unlikely. I've been a regular user since 2006 and both on the web and the apps, the algo timeline has been there for a long time but I never use it.
- grishka 4y ago
  I mean it's there, as in, there's a button to switch to it, but I don't think I've ever had it switch automatically. The one thing that is mighty annoying though, is how it keeps pushing "recommendations" on you. The "someone liked", "someone follows someone", this kind of stuff. If only there was a dedicated button to make someone else's tweet appear in your followers' timelines... I somehow managed to break that misfeature by muting a bunch of "words" that are apparently contained somewhere in the recommendation objects because apparently the mute feature checks not only against the text of the tweet but against some kind of serialized form of it. So I no longer have these neither on the web nor in the Android app.
  - chc 4y ago
    In my experience, those "recommendations" only appear in the algorithmic feed. Are you sure you haven't been using it unknowingly?

spurgu 4y ago

You can also use Tweetdeck.

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

remram 4y ago

This applies to your feed but not to replies in a thread.

kingrazor 4y ago

My problem is that when I select that, I see a completely different feed, regardless of post times. In the algorithmically sorted mode I see tweets that I'll never see in the chronological mode.

vt240 4y ago

Twitter does in fact still reset it all the time, at least on my account. I'll notice it when I run into a bunch of those recommended tweets/follows, which don't appear in the chronological feed. edit but it has been much better recently than it was when the new UI was first released.