You Might Be Able To "Clarify" Old Tweets In The Future, So That's Reassuring

If you use Twitter, there's one major thing that you're probably aware of: You can't change your old tweets. From the moment you type your thought out in 140 characters or less and hit the "Tweet" button, there's basically no going back. Sure, you can delete your tweet entirely — but then, you'll lose your message for good. It's a tricky system, to say the least. However, those of you who constantly ask yourself if you can edit old tweets on Twitter might be interested in what Jack Dorsey reportedly said about the platform on Valentine's Day. By the sound of it, you might be able to "clarify" your tweets in the future.

That's right: According to Recode, Dorsey (Twitter's CEO) spoke in San Francisco at a Goldman Sachs event on Feb. 14 about what it'd be like to "clarify" old tweets. Apparently, this is what he said:

The other thing that we’re seeing more broadly within the culture right now in this particular moment is people quote-unquote ‘being cancelled’ because of past things that they’ve said on Twitter or various other places in social media. There’s no credible way to kind of go back and clarify or even have a conversation to show the learning and the transition since.

It sounds to me like an editing feature of some sort might be in Twitter's future, but nothing was confirmed. Elite Daily reached out to Twitter for further clarification on Dorsey's statement, but did not hear back by the time of publication.

Still, I think it'd be awesome to have the option to go back and "clarify" a tweet — whether that includes actually editing the written portion of it or not. Apparently, Dorsey was already brainstorming ideas about how it could happen, and talked more about the dreamt-up concept during the Goldman Sachs event. In my opinion, it seems like the feature would utilize a clarification method rather than an editing method, which would be just as convenient.

Again, he didn't say that this was going to happen — but here's what he did say, per reports from Recode:

How do we enable people to quickly go back or to any tweet, whether it be years back or today, and show that original tweet — kind of like a quote retweet, a retweet with comment — and to add some context and some color on what they might have tweeted or what they might have meant.

Apparently, Dorsey continued and stated, "By doing so you might imagine that the original tweet then would not have the sort of engagement around it. Like you wouldn’t be able to retweet the original tweet, for instance. You would just show the clarification, you would be able to retweet the clarification, so it always carries around with it that context."

In other words, it sounds like the feature would make it possible to explain why you tweeted something in the past without actually editing it. After toying with the idea, Dorsey stated, "Not saying that we are going to launch that but those are the sorts of questions we are going to ask," according to Recode.

With that being said, don't get your hopes up for a tweet-clarifying feature just yet. Sure, it would definitely come in clutch — but you'll have to stick with deleting your questionable tweets until you're able to clarify them. Sigh.