(Photo: Justin Sullivan, Getty Images)
Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey used the social media network Saturday to deny a report that the site is planning changes next week to user timelines by organizing tweets using an algorithm instead of the standard, chronological order.
According to Buzzfeed, the change would tweak Twitter's algorithm to place tweets it thinks users want to see the most higher up on timelines. The report did not say whether users would be able to flip to a chronological order.
The news prompted the rise of the hashtag #RIPTwitter.
"Hello Twitter! Regarding #RIPTwitter: I want you all to know we're always listening. We never planned to reorder timelines next week," Dorsey tweeted Saturday afternoon in the first of a series of posts about keeping the network "real-time."
"Twitter is live. Twitter is real-time. Twitter is about who & what you follow. And Twitter is here to stay! By becoming more Twitter-y," he said in another tweet on his account @Jack.
Facebook uses a process where it moves "Top Stories" to the top of users' News Feed, but they have the option to switch to Most Recent updates. Such a change would be significant for Twitter, since the social network established itself as an important hub for live updates during breaking news events.
The change would have been the latest effort by Dorsey to spark growth in its monthly active user base. Twitter introduced Moments to highlight top stories trending on Twitter, and Dorsey has hinted at dropping Twitter's 140-character limit for tweets.
Twitter is in the middle of a major executive shakeup, which included the departure of four top executives last month.
As for how Twitter users reacted to the potential change, they didn't seem happy. The most popular U.S. trend on Twitter as of Saturday afternoon was #RIPTwitter.
Why would I want an algorithm to decide what it thinks I want to see? #RIPTwitter — Smitty (@Smitty329) February 6, 2016
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