[kennysmoothx]

Twitter has changed a lot, particularly throughout this past election cycle.

Once twitter made the change to showcase News in the "Moments" section of their platform a few years ago, Twitter content started getting very politicized and more news-centric.

I really like twitter, and ultimately what you see on your TL is directly who/what you follow, however Twitter's change to try to be a "live news conversation" has really changed the feeling of Twitter and politics are really dominating most of the conversations on Twitter at this moment.

[pluma]

The worst part, as a non-American, it's always implied you should care and take action but there's practically nothing you can do or actually have to do so you're left feeling guilty, miserable and unfulfilled.

This was already pretty much the case before but coupled with the rise of outrage culture and the politicisation of Twitter, it's like a constant emotional drain. I find myself having strong opinions on topics I don't care about and have no stake in, just because people on the Internet should at each other, telling everyone they're a bad person if they aren't upset.

[mschuster91]

> and politics are really dominating most of the conversations on Twitter at this moment.

I believe this to be societal. Many people simply want to get likes & RTs - which are easy grabs if you post e.g. a photo of Trump blindly looking into the sun, or whatever. People like to hate Trump, people like to laugh, so naturally they will post stuff that makes people laugh about Trump, therefore they all get likes & RTs, while your feed remains a firehose of "dump Trump" and memes.

[dasil003]

It's really the perfection of the Skinner box, where you carry this device around in your pocket, and you can get instant dopamine hits, and it even feels justified on some level because politics is truly important. But ultimately it is a waste of time because it adds nothing to the political dialogue except increasing polarization.

[maxerickson]

I don't think it had anything much to do with the Moments feature.

[kennysmoothx]

Twitter's trending tab was quitenssential in starting specific conversations on twitter.

It's what highlights particular events such award shows; and what starts site wide conversations by making a hashtag popular. The trending aspect of twitter was (and still is to some degree) what got everyone on twitter talking and engaging on the same topics.

The trending tab slowly turned into the Moments tab, and instead of just highlighting hashtags they also highlighted current events and news (the most popular ones being political at the moment)

Now instead of engaging people in popular hashtags twitter is engaging them in currents events(news), and this what dominates the majority of conversations. So I do believe the Moments tab had a lot to do with the change in tone on the platform.