Twitter is removing the location, birthday, and joining date information from profile headers across the platform, as spotted by Nima Owji, an app researcher.
In a rather mundane upgrade (or just grade, I guess?) to the platform, Twitter is deciding that information such as the above mentioned three points is better relegated to the About section on a profile, retroactively giving that section a bit of a reason to exist. Then again, I feel like information such as someone’s birthday should be on display at the front of someone’s profile in an easily-accessible area, as is the case right now. When Facebook decided to remove birthdays from the front of their community’s profiles and relegating them to the About section, it suddenly became a lot more annoying to keep track of those special days and all that. Then again, Facebook also makes birthdays easier on everyone by sending notifications to users and allowing everyone to keep track of them via a single long list. Twitter isn’t exactly offering any similar features up, but isn’t necessarily hindering the ability to find a profile’s birthday either, making this an extremely lateral career move for the platform.
As for location and joining date, there’s not really all too much to say, is it? Locations can easily be exploited for the purposes of online harassment and whatnot, so it’s not like someone’s ever going to specify anything more than the city and/or country in which they live. This isn’t exactly top-shelf priority information that the community’s gunning for either, so moving it elsewhere is probably going to be met with nothing more than a shrug. Joining dates are also just as useless, and are at best used to distinguish between fake accounts and real accounts (the former are often made much later than the latter).
Information that will continue to remain in the profile header for now include an account’s bio, job title, and personal link(s). I feel like that’s the most relevant information short of birthdays anyways, and maybe the only reason I’m personally fixated on birthdays in the first place is because of the number of times I’ve forgotten to wish friends and loved ones. So, here’s to perhaps the most mundane edit that Twitter has made to its interface in perhaps forever. Is this the necessary step that the platform needs in order to regain much-needed modern relevancy? Signs point to no, but I’m willing to be surprised.
Read next: The most popular emojis on Twitter (and why we love using them!)
In a rather mundane upgrade (or just grade, I guess?) to the platform, Twitter is deciding that information such as the above mentioned three points is better relegated to the About section on a profile, retroactively giving that section a bit of a reason to exist. Then again, I feel like information such as someone’s birthday should be on display at the front of someone’s profile in an easily-accessible area, as is the case right now. When Facebook decided to remove birthdays from the front of their community’s profiles and relegating them to the About section, it suddenly became a lot more annoying to keep track of those special days and all that. Then again, Facebook also makes birthdays easier on everyone by sending notifications to users and allowing everyone to keep track of them via a single long list. Twitter isn’t exactly offering any similar features up, but isn’t necessarily hindering the ability to find a profile’s birthday either, making this an extremely lateral career move for the platform.
As for location and joining date, there’s not really all too much to say, is it? Locations can easily be exploited for the purposes of online harassment and whatnot, so it’s not like someone’s ever going to specify anything more than the city and/or country in which they live. This isn’t exactly top-shelf priority information that the community’s gunning for either, so moving it elsewhere is probably going to be met with nothing more than a shrug. Joining dates are also just as useless, and are at best used to distinguish between fake accounts and real accounts (the former are often made much later than the latter).
Information that will continue to remain in the profile header for now include an account’s bio, job title, and personal link(s). I feel like that’s the most relevant information short of birthdays anyways, and maybe the only reason I’m personally fixated on birthdays in the first place is because of the number of times I’ve forgotten to wish friends and loved ones. So, here’s to perhaps the most mundane edit that Twitter has made to its interface in perhaps forever. Is this the necessary step that the platform needs in order to regain much-needed modern relevancy? Signs point to no, but I’m willing to be surprised.
Read next: The most popular emojis on Twitter (and why we love using them!)
