I’m not really sure why Elon Musk is so annoyed by clutter in the main X feed, but for some reason, he wants to cut out as much as absolutely possible, in order to make it a more “clean”, simple UI.
Which might be more attractive, I guess, but…
Musk’s latest suggestion along this line is to remove the date/time markers from the main X feed, so that you just have a clear, scrolling row of posts, with the main post itself being the focus.
As reported by Fortune:
“The proposal of removing date stamps would be limited to the timeline of posts on X, according to the source. If a user clicks through on the post, the date of when the post was created would then be visible. Musk has told staffers he believes the change will improve the user interface of X.”
Which is along the same lines as Musk’s push to remove all function buttons and engagement counts in-stream, which would leave posts looking like this:
iOS users can now enable this display, by deactivating engagement buttons and performance data on posts, as an optional setting, while they can also switch on X’s side-swiping functions to interact with posts, as opposed to tapping manual buttons.
At one stage, X was looking to implement this for all users, at Elon’s request, but it now seems to have eased back on that push, making it an optional UI instead.
Under this new proposal, however, X would also be looking to remove the time/date indicator, along with the function buttons and performance counts.
Which would leave the main feed looking something like this:
That would actually make regular X posts look very similar to X ads, which also don’t include a time/date stamp.
And honestly, I think that it would increase engagement, because people wouldn’t have the context of time to know how fresh posts are in the main feed. So X could show you a post from days ago, and your instinctive reaction would be to the content itself, not to the date that it was posted, which might increase your tendency to react. Because maybe you’d feel less inclined to react to an older, less timely update, feeling like you’d missed the boat or trend.
But as Fortune points out, it could also lead to more misinformation being shared in the app:
“Some X staffers believe removing the dates will make the platform needlessly “confusing” and will likely make issues of misinformation on the platform worse. Historically, most users of Twitter, and now X, only casually scroll on the platform, rarely clicking through on individual posts. The absence of dates from the timeline would likely leave most users without vital context about information they are seeing.”
So you could see a post from days or weeks ago, and react to that as if it’s recent news, while older updates could be more easily re-shared, and viewed in a different context, based on current events.
Essentially, as the X source notes, it would add a level of confusion in the app. But then again, if it elicits more response, maybe it’s worth trying?
It does instinctively feel like a backwards move, but as noted, Elon is reportedly “obsessed” with revamping the UI of the app. It’s also worth noting in this context that Twitter was long criticized for its lack of innovation, and its hesitance to try new things.
Musk has shown that he has no such qualms, and maybe, a more plain X feed, even without timestamps in the main timeline, could drive more interest.
It’s hard to say without experiencing it, and no one’s going to do so unless X makes it happen.
