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Twitter is testing a whole heap of new features

Social networking site Twitter is working on a whole host of new features. 

First off, the company is testing letting Android users mute notifications for between one and 12 hours. “You know when someone’s phone goes off in the theater? Or in a presentation? Or at the movies?” the company wrote in a tweet. “Don’t be that person. We’re testing a way to temporarily snooze notifications on Android, just in case you go viral at an inconvenient time.”

It’s a strange feature to prioritise – or at least the use case feels niche. Surely people who are going into presentations or movie theatres will just put their phone on silent? Perhaps a more likely scenario that Twitter doesn’t want to highlight is if somebody ends up as the subject of an unwelcome internet pile on and wants a break from the heckling.

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In another test, Twitter is letting some users follow topics rather than just people. The company is starting with sports, but plans to expand this to celebrities, TV shows and more. If you follow a topic, you’ll see some curated extra tweets from those you don’t follow included alongside those you do. Useful if you’re the only one of your friends interested in Championship football, say.

Elsewhere, it looks like Twitter has a few more things in the kitchen which are almost ready for show time. At a press event attended by Mashable’s Karissa Bell, the company lifted the lid on some of the upgrades you may or may not see over the next few months. The ability to search direct messages could be extremely helpful to some, while there will also be Live Photo support, and you’ll be able to reorder photos in the app soon, too.

Anyone holding out for the long-rumoured edit function is disappointed. Apparently it’s “not anywhere near the top of Twitter’s priority list,” despite being constantly tweeted at the official account when other changes are unveiled.

Are these changes for the better? Let us know what you think on Twitter (of course): @TrustedReviews.

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