X (formerly Twitter) owner Elon Musk plans to remove headlines and description text from posts on the social media site, according to a report from Fortune, leaving only the article’s main image. Musk later confirmed the news in a reply to X News Daily.
“This is coming from me directly,” Musk wrote. “Will greatly improve the esthetics.”
According to the report, the paring down aims to reduce the space an article takes up, but the change could also be an attempt to reduce clickbait.
It’s the latest in a myriad of changes to the platform that have rankled longtime users and undermines legitimate news sites. Twitter became a hotbed for misinformation in 2020 with a horde of bot-powered accounts peddling false information about the coronavirus pandemic, and Musk’s acquisition of the platform has just caused more chaos. Removing context like headlines from posts for cosmetics could further weaken Twitter’s defenses against misinformation.
The social media site’s help center does outline several ways it aims to squash misleading information, but Musk has also previously advocated for less content moderation.
Musk, who purchased Twitter for $44 billion last year, and renamed X this past July, has made a number of suggestions for the social media site like adding an edit button and a premium tier. He also shook up the status quo of the network by removing a blue checkmarks that verified high-profile figures and instead began charging for verification.