Twitter hears your pleas for an 'Edit' button, offers downvotes instead

We really hoped our vague memory of Twitter announcing the imminent introduction of upvotes and downvotes back in July was possibly just a fever dream of some kind. Alas, it appears that recollection was, in fact, a reality. Not only that, but Twitter plans to continue rolling out reply downvoting to even more users in the coming weeks, first on its website before moving to offer the update on iOS and Android apps.

“We learned a lot about the types of replies you don't find relevant and we're expanding this test,” the Twitter Support account posted on social media yesterday, adding that “Downvotes aren’t public, but they'll help inform us of the content people want to see.”

So, to be clear: You can soon click a button signaling your displeasure at someone’s reply to your tweet, but no one except you and Twitter itself will be aware of it. In return, Twitter will continue to fine-tune its algorithms to ensure that your social media echo chamber continues resonating at an appropriately hellish frequency. Meanwhile, you still have to pay for an “Undo” button. Great system we got here.

Just give us an ‘Edit’ button already — Perhaps we sound like a broken newsfeed here, but for the love of God, just give everyone an “Edit” feature already. Twitter continues to roll out and experiment with new, cash-grab features like NFT profile pictures and Bitcoin integration, while all anyone really wants is the opportunity to fix that typo they just tweeted out to everybody. Hell, we’d settle for them fixing the algorithms that keep inexplicably boosting right-wing content, even. Instead, we get the promise of new ways to send them data for the vague promise of a more enjoyable UI.

Even Dorsey endorsed it — A lifetime ago back in 2016, former Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey even conceded that an “Edit” option was probably a good idea for his social media platform. Of course, we haven’t seen anything about that since then, but we still hold out hope that some blessed day, Twitter will roll out an update people actually want to see, as opposed to downvotes and more Bitcoin.