Twitter Launches ‘Birdwatch’, New Approach to Curb Misinformation

The pilot will first be offered in the US, where users can write notes and provide informative context to a tweet.

(Photo Courtesy: Twitter)

Twitter has launched a new program ‘Birdwatch’, aimed at addressing the concerns around misinformation on the platform by allowing users to flag tweets that they believe are misleading.

The pilot will first be offered in the United States, where users can write notes and provide informative context to a particular tweet which will be visible on a separate site, the company said in a blog post.

“In this first phase of the pilot, notes will only be visible on a separate Birdwatch site. On this site, pilot participants can also rate the helpfulness of notes added by other contributors,” the blog post by Twitter Vice President of Product, Keith Coleman read.

Coleman further wrote that the notes are intentionally being kept separate from Twitter to gain confidence of users that it produces context that people find useful.

“We believe this approach has the potential to respond quickly when misleading information spreads, adding context that people trust and find valuable. Eventually we aim to make notes visible directly on Tweets for the global Twitter audience, when there is consensus from a broad and diverse set of contributors.”

Keith Coleman, Twitter Vice President of Product

In 2020, Twitter started attaching labels to tweets to address the growing concerns around misinformation on the platform. The tech giant actively labelled tweets by former United Stated President Donald Trump for spreading falsehoods during the presidential elections, and ultimately led to the suspension of his account earlier this year following the violence at Capitol Hill.

The company said that they have interviewed more than 100 people across the political spectrum who believe that this system will provide helpful context to understand the tweets. Further, all the data, which will be contributed to Birdwatch, will be made available publicly, the blog post read.

This is how Birdwatch will work.

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