Following the example of apps like Discord, Twitter is testing a feature that allows you to create audio chat rooms. The new feature was discovered in October by developer Alessandro Paluzzi, who shared images of the new feature on his social media profile.

https://twitter.com/alex193a/status/1311936881656029185

According to Paluzzi, the icon for the tool – called Audio Space – would be placed above the floating “new tweet” button. From there, the voice chat room would be available in two modes: open to any user on Twitter or limited to the profiles you follow. There appears to be no limit on the number of invites – although the Android Community site speculates that the number of invites would be reduced, as it would be easier to manage.

Extension plans are a frequent topic on Twitter. In addition to Fleets – which have a similar function to Stories on Instagram –, the platform has, for some months now, allowed voice publication for iOS users, restricted to audios up to 140 seconds. It is also now available to users sending direct audio messages. Therefore, opening a chat room on Twitter – similar to how it works on Discord, for example – would be a natural step towards the trend.

Why audios?

Twitter executives are defending the launch of audio tools on the platform as a way to promote racial and social inclusion. In the words of Dantley Davis, the company's head of design, in an interview with Protocol, in September: “Audio Tweets were an experiment designed to help people use their voices to express themselves on Twitter.” He explains further: “People on the design team were seeing that voices from Black communities on Twitter and beyond were not being heard in an emotionally compelling way, just because of the constraints of written language.”

So they set out to “create a tool for these voices to resonate and connect with a broader population,” Davis said. At the same time, the new resource created an accessibility issue, especially for users with hearing impairments. In response to the criticism, Davis says that a team involved in product development and engineering is considering the issue in the next steps of the project.

Through which channels you reach those people, classic and out of the box. Android Community.