Twitter starts with voice DMs
Twitter has begun rolling out voice DMs in India, Brazil, and Japan, per AndroidCentral. India was the latest country to get voice DMs, while Brazil got them last year. People with access to this feature can tap a voice recording icon within a DM conversation to record a message of up to 140 seconds in length. The feature is available on both the iOS and Android versions of the official Twitter app in the countries where Twitter has made it available.
If you want to see a quick demonstration of how it works, Twitter India posted a short video explaining how to send a voice DM.
?test,?test: Starting today, you’ll be able to record and send voice messages in DMs ? Here’s how?
PS. The experiment will be rolled out in phases. pic.twitter.com/aqQM6h9sof
— Twitter India (@TwitterIndia) February 17, 2021
Voice DMs would bring Twitter’s private messaging functionality closer to feature parity with Messenger and WhatsApp, which already have similar features. It’ll be worth watching how Twitter moderates voice DMs, given how text DMs are already used for harassment and abuse on the platform. It would probably not be fun to get a two-minute long message of some stranger screaming at you because you said something unkind about a Marvel movie.
“India is a priority market for Twitter and that is why we’re constantly testing new features and learning from people’s experience on the service here. We’re excited to bring the voice messages in DMs experiment to the country and give people a new way to express themselves and help them connect through the nuances, emotion, and empathy built by hearing someone’s voice,” Manish Maheshwari, Managing Director, Twitter India, said.
