the tweet beat

Turns Out Twitter Is Occasionally Capable of Giving People What They Want

Photo: Twitter

Historically, Twitter isn’t known for giving its users what they ask for. Not even Kim Kardashian West could convince Jack Dorsey to build an edit button. But occasionally people shout enough about a mundane issue that Twitter listens. After years of complaints, the platform has created a switch that allows users to toggle between viewing tweets chronologically and having them sorted algorithmically. And on Thursday, the company announced that it is tweaking night mode to give users even darker options.

In case you don’t already worship at the altar of dark mode — you should, it’s great — the feature allows you to change the background color of your Twitter app from white to gray, making it easier to read in … the dark. It’s also just generally easier on the eyes if you’re spending hours a day staring at a screen. The new dark mode comes with three decreasingly bright options: light, dim (the previous dark-mode color scheme), and “lights out.” iOS users will be able to set an automatic dark mode, where your device will switch to dark mode at night and back again in the morning.

It’s a little thing, sure, but it’s a good thing … unlike another announcement from Twitter this week regarding tweets from certain powerful users. Vijaya Gadde, the company’s head of legal, policy, and trust and safety said that Twitter is “exploring how it can annotate offensive tweets that break its rules but remain in the public interest.” Which would mean a person, like say, Trump could continue tweeting essentially whatever he likes, terms of service be damned.

Turns Out Twitter Is Capable of Giving People What They Want