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Twitter’s unreleased edit button finally revealed in hidden code

Published 13:28 3 May 2022 BST

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Our prayers have been answered

After what feels like an eternity of waiting, Twitter looks like it's finally getting an edit button after details of the feature were recently shared online. Researcher Jane Manchun Wong, one of Forbes' 30 under 30, shared screenshots to Twitter that seemingly revealed plans for a button that allows you to make changes to tweets after they've been posted. Wong regularly digs into online platforms, analysing code and posting her findings on social media and appears to be the first person to publicly share details of this long-awaited Twitter feature. The edit button appears via a dropdown menu alongside regular features like pinning a tweet and viewing analytics. Once clicked, users can then edit the entire tweet or delete it altogether. https://twitter.com/wongmjane/status/1521210790996447233 Wong also confirmed that the "Edit: soup*" line was done for "dramatic effect" and is not how the feature will function. However there's one small caveat to this long-awaited feature - as users will only have 30 minutes to use it before the tweet becomes set in stone. https://twitter.com/wongmjane/status/1521229356827246592 There have been concerns that an edit button could make it difficult to hold people accountable for what they put on social media. However, Wong's screenshots reveal an "edited" tag that enables users to view all previous versions of the tweet. https://twitter.com/wongmjane/status/1521217613388410880 It's not yet clear whether the edited versions will update in news articles or anywhere else where social media posts are embedded. Another tag reading “There’s a new version of this Tweet" will also update users on newer versions of posts. While you might assume that the news is down to 50-year-old SpaceX CEO Musk, who bought the social media platform on April 14, Twitter actually confirmed on April 1 that they had been working on the edit feature since 2021. https://twitter.com/twittercomms/status/1511456430024364037?lang=en-GB They also said that their idea was not inspired "from a poll", which could reference Musk's own Twitter poll entitled “want an edit button."