Elon Musk says that X plans to remove preview headlines from posts linking to articles, so that the previews show only the article's lead image and the URL

X, the social media platform previously known as Twitter, is planning a major change in how news articles appear on the service …

Fortune 2023-08-22 Kylie Robison

Context & Ripple Effects

This was an early step in X’s redesign of how outbound news travels through the service. The proposal was later implemented as headline-free link cards, confirming that the change moved beyond an informal statement.

The policy did not remain settled: X subsequently said it intended to restore headlines to link previews. That reversal makes the episode a useful case of the platform testing how much context it supplies around publishers’ links.

First-order effects

Article links on X would lose the publisher headline in their preview, leaving the lead image and URL to communicate what the destination is.
Publishers and users sharing reporting would need to rely more heavily on the accompanying post text to explain a link before a reader clicks.

Second-order effects

The reduced on-card context can make link posts less self-explanatory, increasing the importance of publishers’ social copy, imagery, and recognizable domains in earning clicks.
The later plan to bring headlines back suggests that link-card presentation is a meaningful product lever for X, not merely a cosmetic formatting choice.

Third-order effects

If platforms keep changing the amount of context attached to outbound links, publishers’ distribution becomes more dependent on platform-controlled presentation layers rather than their own headlines and metadata.
The broader structural question is whether social products optimize link sharing as an open referral channel or treat it as a feature to tune around their own engagement and creator goals.

The trend: This is part of a broader trend of platforms exerting finer control over the visibility and context of outbound content.

Discussion

@TodayInTwitter@mastodon.social @TodayInTwitter@mastodon.social on mastodon
This fucking guy is such a piece of work: he kills TweetDeck, deletes the block button, bans me from his website for calling him a “fucking idiot,” attempts to delete all media older than 2014, then removes headlines from link posts all in the span of a week. — What a guy. — …
@cspam@mastodon.cloud @cspam@mastodon.cloud on mastodon
How does he keep coming up with these genius ideas???? — https://fortune.com/... “According to a source with knowledge of the matter, the change is being pushed directly by X owner Elon Musk. The primary objective appears to be to reduce the height of tweets, thus allowing mo…
@timstevens.bsky.social Tim Stevens on bluesky
Tired: lamenting that people only read the headline. — Wired: Lamenting that people only look at the picture. [embedded post]
@caseynewton.bsky.social Casey Newton on bluesky
Perfect. Ship it!!!! [embedded post]
@malwaretech.com Marcus Hutchins on bluesky
They test things before pushing to prod? [embedded post]
@intelwire.bsky.social J.M. Berger on bluesky
What is even the fake value proposition in this? [embedded post]
@elonmusk Elon Musk on x
@xDaily This is coming from me directly. Will greatly improve the esthetics.
@elonmusk Elon Musk on x
If you're a journalist who wants more freedom to write and a higher income, then publish directly on this platform!
@kyliebytes Kylie Robison on x
I decided to cut it because clutter — I can explain it here. On mobile, articles look like this now (left). On desktop, they still look like how they have always looked (right). Elon thinks articles take up too much space. He wants to eliminate any text below the image. [image]
@lum_ Scott Jennings on x
Twitter to get even more useless: news story links will now only have a picture, no headline or description, because Lord Elon of Musk thinks they “take up too much space” Get out. Get out now. https://fortune.com/...
@lexnfx Alexei Oreskovic on x
And just like that... @kyliebytes's scoop is confirmed by none other than Herr Musk himself. https://fortune.com/... [image]
@lauraloomer Laura Loomer on x
Oh, really? That's not what you told me on Saturday...
@kyliebytes Kylie Robison on x
(if this text was not here, all you would see is this image with no context, no headline, no description — but it would be a clickable article) [image]
@yashar @yashar on x
I think this may lead news orgs to put headlines onto main images
@rmac18 @rmac18 on x
My dude sent a process server to my place of work in an attempt to depose me for reporting on him https://twitter.com/...
@tomcoates Tom Coates on x
@elonmusk No serious journalist is going to take you up on your offer. And since you ban people you don't like on a whim and steal people's handles when you want them, they'd be foolish to trust you for a second.
@beijingpalmer James Palmer on x
incredible how he comes up with a dumber idea every day, the man has melted his brain with a cocktail of bad divorce and worse drugs
@dandrezner Daniel W. Drezner on x
It's legit impressive how every single move Musk has made on this site worsens the experience for most users.
@pattymo Patrick Monahan on x
Preview of every news article's banner image going forward [image]
@mcwm Mike Murphy on x
this is up there with making the ads so much harder to spot and 10k character tweets
@jen_mcfadden Jen McFadden on x
He's really just trying to drive this place into the ground. Does he hate news orgs that much? https://fortune.com/...
@daveleebbg Dave Lee on x
Just don't write about, y'know
@kyliebytes Kylie Robison on x
@elonmusk @xDaily Hey there, author of article here. Why not leave the headline how it is without the description, like it is on mobile? There has to be a better way than just the image with no context. Also, any comment on how advertisers feel about this decision?
@annevedingell Ann-Eve Dingell on x
As a writer, any time someone says anything like this, ethical alarm bells go off. When @elonmusk says this, an ethical laugh track goes off. Let me translate: “If you want to write shit no actual journalistic outlet would publish? Do it here. Ruin your career as a journalist.”
@parismarx Paris Marx on x
no real journalist is going to trust you of all people
@edzitron Ed Zitron on x
Yeah I mostly watch the news for the aesthetics
@iwriteok Robert Evans on x
another brain genius move that already has advertisers pissed. Probably for the best in the long run, if it drives more of them away
@kronykal Kron on x
“Just don't complain when I make arbitrary decisions at 3:30 in the morning!”
@whstancil Will Stancil on x
Twitter is an incredible natural experiment illustrating what happens when you give a very stupid man total, dictatorial control of a very complicated entity. Previously in history you had to inbreed royal families for several generations to conduct this kind of experiment
@kyliebytes Kylie Robison on x
Scoop: X/Twitter, is planning a major change in how news articles appear on the service, stripping out the headline and other text so that tweets with links display only an article's lead image, according to material viewed by Fortune. https://fortune.com/...
@jason_kint Jason Kint on x
Caution flag waved. [image]
@ivanthek @ivanthek on x
It appears that the lunatic ideas are coming from an all-you-can-eat buffet.
@karaswisher Kara Swisher on x
We had a lucrative monthly deal in place with former Twitter management and two major advertisers to try to monetize my weekly Spaces, which we had been experimenting with. Then new owner Elon spooked advertisers with his shitty tweets & empty threats and they fled. So hard pass.
@beijingpalmer James Palmer on x
well guess it's time to replace all our article banner images [image]
@cit_uprising @cit_uprising on x
Its amazing how bad this guy is at this. People will just take screenshots. https://fortune.com/...
@killedbygoogle @killedbygoogle on x
Elon wakes up every day and is like, “How can I make this world worse for everyone?” https://fortune.com/...
@erinkwoo Erin Woo on x
devastating news for every college newspaper that uses the same quad pic over and over (good scoop)
@yashar @yashar on x
@elonmusk @xDaily For those who are confused, I'm assuming it'll look something like the image on the right. As opposed to the way it is now like the image on the left. [image]
@kyliebytes Kylie Robison on x
I was going to include this in the article but, @film_girl mentioned there's literally Wordpress plugins to do this. We could all go the @semafor image route, too!
@jeffsharlet Jeff Sharlet on x
This isn't small. This is disastrous for journalism, particularly independent journalism, which means democracy.
@kwalkertweets Ken Walker on x
Displaying tweets with links in a shallower format was something my favorite third-party Twitter clients used to do better than what's being described here. https://fortune.com/...
@kyliebytes Kylie Robison on x
Without text, tweets will only show an image with the URL overlay, which could have major implications for publishers who rely on social media to drive traffic to their sites as well as for advertisers. https://fortune.com/...
@michaelehayden Michael Edison Hayden on x
Musk is making it harder to make *news* to go viral. Bullshit can go viral but actual reporting with editorial standards, forget it. He wants to replace journalists with news performers like Ian Miles Cheong, Andy Ngo and Tim Pool.
@xdaily @xdaily on x
NEWS: X is changing how news links show up on the timeline. It will strip out the headline/text so links display only an article's lead image. [image]
@lauraloomer Laura Loomer on x
Except if you're Laura Loomer. Then @elonmusk will tell you to “find your own advertisers”. This is such a lie.. 👇🏻 I have published stories that have destroyed a $250 million presidential campaign and as a result I have been demonetized. Meanwhile I uploaded my content to...
@mollyjongfast Molly Jong-Fast on x
This would be a bit more meaningful if he hadn't spent the last few months railing on journalists
@petersterne Peter Sterne on x
Musk is doing absolutely everything he can to drive journalists off this platform.
@phil_lewis_ Philip Lewis on x
Elon Musk plans to remove headlines from news articles shared on X, so that tweets with links display only an article's lead image “It's something Elon wants. They were running it by advertisers, who didn't like it, but it's happening” https://fortune.com/...
r/EnoughMuskSpam r on reddit
Elon Musk wants to get rid of this headline
@jef@mastodon.social @jef@mastodon.social on mastodon
@Techmeme Let's see... Nope, not fixed yet. A few images show up again, most still don't. Maybe it's a cache thing and the rest will show up soon.
@support @support on x
Over the weekend we had a bug that prevented us from displaying images from before 2014. No images or data were lost. We fixed the bug, and the issue will be fully resolved in the coming days.
@mattbinder Matt Binder on x
old images are still broken on X the Oscar selfie may have been fixed but this all-time classic from the mind of Melania Trump is still not back up [image]
@hekirkpa Heather Kirkpatrick on x
Don't worry everyone the Ellen Oscars selfie will be preserved it's going to be ok
@karissabe Karissa Bell on x
Twitter says it's fixing a “bug” that nuked photos from before 2014
@paulg Paul Graham on x
Phew, it's just a bug. https://twitter.com/...
r/AnythingGoesNews r on reddit
Elon Musk admits X ‘may fail’ after glitch deletes Twitter photos
r/inthenews r on reddit
Elon Musk admits X ‘may fail’ after glitch deletes Twitter photos

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