Twitter to free room for links and photos – report

SAN FRANCISCO, USA – Twitter plans to let people fire off links or pictures without eating into the 140-character limit set for posts at the one-to-many messaging service, Bloomberg reported on Monday, May 16 (May 17, Manila time). 

The change could take place by the end of this month, according to a Bloomberg report that cited someone familiar with the matter.

Twitter declined to comment, but the move would come as the San Francisco-based company strives to ramp up the number of users along with how much people communicate at the service.

Analysts have maintained that relaxing a 140-character limit set due to mobile phone text messaging constraints in place when Twitter launched in 2006 would encourage use.

And, as people increasingly communicate by sharing pictures, videos and links, making Twitter more conducive to that content would play into the trend.

Twitter last month released a quarterly update that showed little change in its user base.

In a key metric in the fast-evolving social media world, Twitter’s trend was flat. The number of monthly active users was 310 million, up 3% from a year ago and only slightly higher than the 305 million in the previous quarter.

Twitter changed the way it measures active users, no longer counting those who follow via SMS text messaging. The number reported in the fourth quarter including that group was 320 million.

Twitter announced separately it has added BET Networks chief executive Debra Lee to its board.

Lee has fired off thousands of tweets and has 67,400 followers at the service, according to her account @iamdebralee.

“Twitter has been and continues to be a transformative service for the media landscape and the world,” Lee said in a statement.

In a tweet, Lee said that she is “thrilled” to be on the Twitter board. – Rappler.com