[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.