Twitter is a social media platform that tests features before it makes them available to the general public. In a similar attempt, the micro-blogging site has now started testing a new feature, Spaces, much like Clubhouse-like voice-based chat rooms. Read on to know more about it.
Twitter’s Spaces is like Clubhouse’s voice chat rooms
Twitter has publically started testing the Spaces feature and made the announcement via the Spaces’ official Twitter account. The feature will allow users to strike a voice-based conversation over the platform. Users can create a ‘Space’ that their followers can join to participate in a conversation. Anyone on Twitter can listen in on the conversation, though only the host can control who gets to speak.
The Spaces feature will also allow users to add emoji reactions to the conversation to make it more engaging. Twitter is soon expected to add the ability to transcribe the voice-based chat for more accessibility.
aye we’re live! what up y’all, we’re the team behind Spaces––a small experiment focused on the intimacy of the human voice?
— Spaces (@TwitterSpaces) December 17, 2020
Twitter had released a teaser of the feature earlier and said that it would prioritize marginalized communities, aka groups that are more likely to be subjected to abuse and harassment on its platform. To recall, Twitter, last month, said it’s planning to add automated captions to audio and video on the platform by early 2021, a feature that would help people with disabilities.
For those who don’t know, Clubhouse, which is the inspiration of Twitter’s Spaces features, has been in the news for poor moderation and safety issues. We hope Twitter’s version comes with added security for ease of usage.
In addition to the launch of Spaces, Twitter said it’s developing other features for testing, including reactions similar to hand gestures, live transcriptions, reporting and blocking, and the ability to share Tweets in Spaces.
In similar news, Twitter recently announced that it will relaunch the public verification program for the blue badge, starting January 20, 2021. The company, after user feedback, has made the final policy draft of the same and suggested that it will try making the process more accessible to users, than usual.