Twitter finally rolls out a ‘mute’ button for annoying users

13 May 2014

It had to happen eventually, didn’t it? Twitter has finally introduced a mute button for annoying users and which allows you to only see the tweets and retweets you want to see.

It’s not quite a kill-switch for trolls unfortunately (we’re stuck with those creeps) but it does allow you to gain some clarity and perhaps more positive Twitter-action.

“In the same way you can turn on device notifications so you never miss a tweet from your favorite users, you can now mute users you’d like to hear from less,” explained Paul Rosania, product manager at Twitter.

“Muting a user on Twitter means their tweets and retweets will no longer be visible in your home timeline, and you will no longer receive push or SMS notifications from that user.

“The muted user will still be able to fave, reply to, and retweet your tweets; you just won’t see any of that activity in your timeline. The muted user will not know that you’ve muted them, and of course you can unmute at any time,” Rosania said.

It’s an interesting development that could perhaps make Twitter a more productive place and less distracting. Who knows? Effectively it gives users more control over the content they see and an ability to filter out the noise.

Twitter said it will be rolling out the mute feature to all users in the coming weeks.

How it works:

·         To mute a user from a tweet on your iOS or Android device or on Twitter for web tap more and then mute @username.

·         To mute someone from their profile page, tap the gear icon on the page and choose mute @username.

Mute button image via Shutterstock

John Kennedy is a journalist who served as editor of Silicon Republic for 17 years

editorial@siliconrepublic.com