Twitter is testing a feature to let people send a Direct Message (DM) straight from a tweet. But it is not exactly a new feature. Also, it is a feature that does not sit comfortably with many users, as the DM channel is known to be where many online harassers lurk. So why make things easy for them?
Twitter feels the feature will make it easier to start a conversation from an user's timeline.
"For when you want to reply directly to a Tweet's author, we're making it easier to DM them from your timeline to start a conversation," a Tweet from the official Twitter Support handle said.
Twitter is testing this DM icon on Tweets with some of the users on iOS.
Some of you may recall that this is not the first time that Twitter is taking a stab at the feature.
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Don't make it easy for harassers: Twitter users
Back in 2016, Twitter did provide an icon, clicking on which took one straight to the DM function. At that time, Twitter had claimed that the DM usage was seeing a spike and hence the feature to facilitate its use even more. But somehow that died a slow death for unstated reasons.
In the meantime, the DM channel also saw plenty of controversies. 'Sliding into the DM' became a phrase, and the verb 'sliding' was suggestive of many things. DMs became the playground of trolls and in the case of women tweeters, many of their online harassers and stalkers took the private DM option to peddle mischief.
And that fear is still rampant as Twitter begins testing the immediately clickable DM option. Soon after Twitter Support put out its tweet, New York City public defender Eliza Orlins, responded saying that offering a shortcut to DMs would make users even more susceptible to harassment.
"Please don’t do this. One extra step of having to go to someone’s profile to send a DM cuts back on harassment.
This is almost never about “starting a conversation,” when people are sending unsolicited DMs.
At least give us a safety feature to not allow this on our tweets," She tweeted.
Many other Twitter users also shared her misgivings.
Twitter, for its part, says that DM setting are not being changed, and all users will retain control of their DMs. Users can close their DM channel for unknown handles.
But in these times of monetisation, most people tend to keep their DM channel open for their transactions. And hence there is some regret over Twitter's latest moves. But since it is just testing, this may not come out as a full-fledged feature. Even if it did, Twitter can still kill it.
Like last time around.
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