Twitter to let users follow interests as well as people

Twitter users will be able to follow a small number of interests by the end of the year in the same way they follow people, the company said Tuesday.

The feature will be rolled out internationally as the one-to-many messaging platform prioritizes being an online venue for conversations rather than a pulpit for one-way broadcasting to the masses.

“We are basically rewriting the entire conversation service,” Twitter product team leader Kayvon Beykpour told reporters during a briefing at the company’s San Francisco headquarters.

“We are rebuilding that infrastructure, and it is nearly complete.”

The company also highlighted ongoing efforts to make sharing thoughts on the platform safe and easy.

Twitter has always let users follow accounts but a new feature, set to debut by the end of this year, will let users opt into following certain sports teams or categories on a curated list.

For example, sending or interacting with tweets about a team might prompt a query over whether the user wants to “follow” that team or be kept in the know about what is being said on Twitter on the topics.