Retweets Are Trash
Acouple of months ago, I made a small tweak to my Twitter account that has changed my experience of the platform. It’s calmer. It’s slower. It’s less repetitive, and a little less filled with outrage. All of these improvements came about because I no longer see retweets.
When I joined Twitter, in late 2007, it was still a new medium—and a fun one. I felt as though we early users were discovering its potential, and creating its shared language. At its best, Twitter could feel like your “dream community,” as the writer Kathryn Schulz put it, filled with interesting people who were interested in the same things you were.
The retweet began as . People would write “Retweet” (or “RT”) and paste in another person’s post. This was cumbersome, but it also
