Twitter’s subscription company Twitter Blue has announced that it will roll out a series of new features in the coming weeks. The service is also expanding into many more countries. Launched for the first time in June this year, Twitter Blue was only available to users in Canada and Australia. It was also only limited to iOS.
But this is about to change. According to a statement released by the company, Twitter Blue will start to roll out in the US and New Zealand. The service will also be available to Android users. A lot of new features are coming to the service, including one that allows users to undo a tweet. This will allow users to recall a tweet before it's sent, something that could potentially save folks from a lot of embarrassing things.
Twitter Blue is also launching something called “Reader Mode” for all tweet threads. We are not sure what the feature is supposed to do but we can’t wait to see it. There will also be new features that allow users to customize or theme the app based on their preferences. The platform will also offer Labs, a feature that allows its users to try out new offerings before they hit the market.
However, perhaps the biggest gains will be for people who love to read and find news stories on Twitter. For instance, Twitter Blue will roll out a feature that lets people read ad-free articles on the platform. In such situations, Twitter Blue will share part of the subscription fees with the content creators. All ad-free articles will also have a label underneath the headline to let you know there are no ads there.
So far, there are 300 hundred publishers who have signed up for this ads-free news service. They include some of the major news agencies in the world such as BuzzFeed, The Atlantic, The Washington Post, and others. Despite this, only US-based publishers are eligible for the program. While Twitter Blue has indicated that it hopes to include other major publishers from other countries, it's not clear how soon that will happen.
It is important to note though that those different publishers will have the right to decide which content they avail as part of this service. In some cases, Twitter Blue users may need an additional subscription to the publisher to read certain articles. This could be a huge hurdle in the future. Besides, the ad-free articles are still limited to the iOS platform.
Paying a subscription for Twitter Blue does not mean users won’t see ads on Twitter. This in fact will be the story for a long time. Twitter has made it clear that at the moment, it is not considering any ad-free product for Twitter.
However, there are still some additional perks to get from Twitter Blue. For example, it’s possible to customize your navigation bar and pin areas of the app that are more useful to you. As of now, a monthly subscription for the service costs $2.99 a month.