A Tweet was the former name for posts, on the social networking site X, formerly known as Twitter.

History

The Iconfactory was developing a Twitter application in 2006 called "Twitterrific" and developer Craig Hockenberry began a search for a shorter way to refer to "Post a Twitter Update." In 2007 they began using "twit" before Twitter developer Blaine Cook suggested that "tweet" be used instead.[1]

In 2011 tweet was added to the Merriam-Webster dictionary.[2]

In 2012 tweet was added to the Oxford English Dictionary.[3][4] Both its use as a verb and noun were added. This was notable as the Oxford English Dictionary normally waits ten years after the coining of a word to add it to the dictionary.[5]

Reception

The term was initially poorly received by Twitter who tried to minimize adoption of the term. It wasn't until 2008 that they began to use the term seriously.[1]

Retweet

Twitter

The "retweet" phenomenon began in March 2007, whereby an informal protocol slowly developed among Twitter users. Initially called an "echo" the first instance was by Narendra Rocherolle.[6] A month later the term "retweet" was first referenced.[7] In this protocol, a post by User A which was considered notable by another Twitter user, User B, was copied by User B and reposted under User B's account and prefixed with "RT @username", with "RT" meaning "retweet". The at sign had previously been developed as a means of replying to Twitter posts, while the hashtag protocol would later be developed by users within the same year to highlight important keywords which they wished to be indexed in a search engine.

In 2009, the "retweet" phenomenon would experience a major uptick in adoption by Twitter users in order to forward SMS posts by Iranian observers and participants in the events following the Iranian presidential election. In August 2009, Twitter officially began integrating the "retweet" mechanism by replacing the string "RT @username" with a retweet symbol emulating Tumblr's reblog symbol;[8][9] in addition, retweet buttons were added to all Twitter posts (alongside "reply") and, by August 2010, an official "Tweet button" was developed and launched by Twitter for external websites,[10] with Twitter-based application developer TweetMeme agreeing with Twitter to integrate the functionality of its own then-popular button into Twitter's official button.[11] In April 2015, the "quote retweet" (also known as "Quote RTs" or "QRT") was introduced, with users able to retweet a post with their own commentary added above the original content.[12] In August 2020, a "Quote Tweets" link was added under posts to allow users to see other users' quote retweets.[13]

In 2023, the Tweet and Retweet names were quietly retired in favor of the more straightforward "Post" and "Repost", as a part of Twitter's rebrand to X.

See also

References

  1. 1 2 Dickey, Megan Rose. "The Untold Story Of The Origin Of The Word 'Tweet'". businessinsider.com. Business Insider. Retrieved 27 November 2023.
  2. ↑ Reitz, Stephanie. "Merriam-Webster adds 'tweet,' other new words". nbcnews.com. NBC News. Retrieved 27 November 2023.
  3. ↑ Chang, Jonathan. "'Tweet' Now an Official Word: Oxford English Dictionary". abcnews.go.com. ABC News. Retrieved 27 November 2023.
  4. ↑ RODRIGUEZ, SALVADOR. "'Tweet' is now an official word in the Oxford English Dictionary". latimes.com. LA Times. Retrieved 27 November 2023.
  5. ↑ "'Tweet' added to Oxford English Dictionary". Aljazeera.com. Al Jazeera. Retrieved 27 November 2023.
  6. ↑ Rocherolle, Narendra. "Twitter / narendra: please twitter "echo" this". Retrieved 7 March 2007.
  7. ↑ Seward, Zachary (15 October 2013). "The first-ever hashtag, @-reply and retweet, as Twitter users invented them". Quartz. Retrieved 15 October 2013.
  8. ↑ Biz Stone (13 August 2009). "Project Retweet: Phase One". Twitter.
  9. ↑ Daniel Ionescu (14 August 2009). "Twitter to Bolster Tools with 'Retweet' Function". PC World.
  10. ↑ Carolyn Penner (August 12, 2010). "Pushing Our (Tweet) Button".
  11. ↑ Nick Halstead (August 2010). "Twitter Tweet Button". Tweetmeme. Archived from the original on 2010-12-17.
  12. ↑ "Twitter now rolling out revamped 'quote tweet' functionality to Android". 14 April 2015.
  13. ↑ "Twitter is now rolling out a new way to find quote tweets for all users". 31 August 2020.
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