First look at the new Twitter profile

This post was originally published at the LinkedIn blog Managed to get the first test done with the new Twitter profile. Here are my two cents about how it's changing the way I (and most likely many others) will be using Twitter from now on, what's changed and how it will impact my Twitter usage.

First of all, the new interface is such a replica of Facebook, that I wonder if MZ will be suing Twitter's butt sometime soon, seems like a total rip-off. In a good way, from user perspective. Here below you can see my new Twitter (test) profile. Look familiar, 'eh?

So there's a profile cover picture that's of full page width, even wider than in Facebook - nice! And the previous avatar picture is now placed similarly to that of Facebook. There's a short bio seen below the avatar, where you can also use hashtags that are clickable and thus searchable, too. The content as such is just like before.

Instead of the old layout where one could see the number of tweets, followers and followed, now in addition to these there is also a chance to see separately the tweets that contain a picture or a video. The favorites and lists are placed very differently, with lists having clearly less importance from Twitter point of view.

Some of the status updates are shown with significantly bigger font as if saying that they are more interesting or important ones. Looks like the updates that include a picture are the ones that are highlighted with bigger font. The wider layout in pictures looks great, that seems like a major upgrade to earlier layout. There are also separate views for "just" tweets and then the tweets and replies together. Additionally all the pictures and videos can be seen at the side bar separately.

The pictures and videos are lined nicely to a grid-like view when there's more than one posted, and that has a nice Pinterest kind of feeling. Looks like Twitter has done it's homework on competition.

So the difference in content is not that big, but the layout as such is significantly more picture-friendly, and the viewer gets slightly more information about the different content the account in question has shared in the form of pictures or videos.

But the stupidest thing happened when I opened the new account - Twitter automatically added me to follow a number of people (c. 30) without my (at least noticing) permission! And that's not cool! I didn't give it permission to access my address book, nor did it add me to follow people that I know from before, but seemingly random people and organisations. I only noticed this once having logged out and checking the profile via another account, and had to log back in to unfollow these accounts. And I also noticed that the same accounts were added to follow my account. I don't know why this was done, but definitely not cool, even if it's some sort of test or a bug.

All'n'all, it's an improvement, but the Facebook-likeness is a bit disturbing. Will most likely increase my Twitter usage, though, especially when sharing pictures and videos.

Do you find the new profile better or worse? Is it going to change the way you use Twitter?