Twitter recently made a change in the appearance of users’ homepages that has now been made official. The micro-blogging firm removed the customized homepage wallpapers option available to the users, and in its place, a stark all-white background can be seen when viewing profile, notifications and the main timeline.
Why Twitter want to do this?
“We’re removing background images from the home and notifications timelines on web for all users,” Twitter told Mashable on Monday. Now, in place of a customized colored background only an all-white or “blinding white” (as many users are referring to it) background is available.
Logged-in users can see the background images publicly on the Tweet pages, list pages and collection pages only, the spokesperson said. The customized wallpaper option allowed users to change their background image on their profile which was also displayed as their wallpaper on Twitter’s website. The changes in the profile design of the users is not a new concept. Similar changes have been in place since last year, when the profiles of the users were redesigned.
But why would Twitter want to give a boring look to the profile pages? Although the company has not provided any information, it seems likely the micro-blogging firm wants to put other content on the user’s profile and timeline pages. Some users are even guessing that the company is clearing the way for advertisements.
No option to change back
Twitter users, as expected, are quite infuriated with the change. One user tweeted, “So Twitter has decided to change all the profiles to a white background, the same thing Myspace did right before they went down in flames.”
Users have no option to revert their customized background on their home feed or profile. According to Twitter, the old background can be viewed by “logged-in users…publicly.” The individual tweets and topic-based collection pages will also bear the customized backgrounds.
For these areas, users can make changes in the background image by using the “Design” tab on the left column under the main settings menu. There, the users can find the default background images or the tools to help them upload their own image.
As of 11 am EDT, Twitter shares were up 0.50% at $35.99, and year to date the stock is up a mere 0.29%.
