Twitter has changed its default egg profile picture after the social media giant admitted it had noticed a pattern between accounts which used the image and those which carried out abuse on the site.
The simple image, which had been in use since 2010, is to be replaced by a neutral silhouette which Twitter says has been designed to look empty or like a placeholder in order to encourage users to personalise their accounts.
“We’ve noticed patterns of behaviour with accounts that are created only to harass others – often they don’t take the time to personalise their accounts,” Twitter said.
“This has created an association between the default egg profile photo and negative behaviour, which isn’t fair to people who are still new to Twitter and haven’t yet personalised their profile photo.
“The new default image feels more like an empty state or placeholder, and we hope it encourages people to upload images that express themselves.”
RIP Twitter Egg 2010 – 2017 pic.twitter.com/AyRC4LtSFI
— T9 (@Thafnine) March 31, 2017
Twitter has been frequently criticised for the amount of abuse and hate speech that appears on the platform. Earlier this month, the Home Affairs Select Committee told Twitter – along with Facebook and Google – that the companies had a “terrible reputation” for acting upon reports of abuse and offensive material posted to their sites. However, Twitter has also recently revealed it shut down more than 375,000 accounts in the second half of 2016 because of violations to the site’s terms of use surrounding extreme material.
