Twitter ready to go beyond 140 characters

In case you missed it, Twitter is ready to move beyond its 140-character limit for each tweet. In a blog post, the company said it will soon provide for expanded tweets that will allow for “interactive experiences” within the current format.

Twitter is designating select organizations – ranging from the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal and  BuzzFeed to TMZ and the WWE – expand their tweets that reference their content.

Here’s how Slate’s tech writer, Farhad Manjoo, describes new process:

“For instance, if I link to an article from the Times, my followers will now see a little button on the tweet labeled “View summary.” If you click that, you’ll see hundreds more characters: The article’s headline, the author’s byline and Twitter handle, the publication’s Twitter handle, a photo from the piece, and even a short snippet from the article. Here’s what an expanded tweet will look like:

“How many characters is all that? Twitter has posted guidelines for sites looking to create these in-tweet ‘media experiences,’ and they specify exactly how much more expansive the new tweets can be. Headlines in supersized tweets can be 70 characters long. Snippets can be 200 characters long. And that’s on top of the main tweet, which can be 140 characters long. Add it all up and you get 410 characters! I can already picture the billboard. Expanded Tweets -- fortified with 270 more characters!”

You can read more here.