Twitter Updates End Card Information for Completed Spaces, Adding Context to the Conversation

Twitter is improving its audio Spaces presentation yet again, this round with the introduction of a new Spaces end card on desktop, which will provide additional info about the Space when the live broadcast has finished.

Completed Spaces haven't offered any specific information in-stream till now, except the title and host.

When you press on the ‘Space Ended' button (on the web), you'll be led to a new detail card that shows when the Space finished, who hosted the event (along with their profile picture), and a list of speakers who participated.

In the end card, only speakers are listed, not listeners, which could raise a whole new set of privacy concerns. In this case, the list of speakers is all most people will care about, and it may also be used to direct users to other profiles connected to the core issue.

It's a useful improvement that adds more meaning to the Spaces display, which could aid with discovery and engagement in future talks based on the same (e.g. by following other speakers to tune in to future events).

Discovery is still a difficult aspect of Spaces since, although there are many Spaces broadcasts going on all the time, you will not be aware of them if you're not following the related people. This drastically limits the reach of Spaces material and interaction with the audio broadcasting tools.

The inclusion of a separate Spaces tab, which would enable direct links to in-progress audio discussions while also promoting relevant Spaces based on your particular interests, seemed to be an attempt by Twitter to solve this.

However, with this week's release of Communities, Twitter appears to have reversed course, with the Communities button now taking over the role of the Spaces tab in the revised interface.

Which certainly makes sense. If more people sign up to follow topics that interest them, Twitter will be able to display relevant Spaces on those topics within that tab, with Twitter providing Topic Tags for Spaces last month to support this process.

That would also be comparable to how Facebook and Reddit intend to promote their audio rooms offerings, by putting them in groups and subreddits that people are already viewing, rather than hosting them in a separate section.

In this regard, Facebook is expected to have the most benefits, as it can showcase related audio rooms within groups that currently have 1.8 billion monthly users. Facebook can see which users are already involved in each discussion and offer them audio rooms that are relevant to them, but Clubhouse and Twitter are still attempting to sort through the numerous ongoing conversations and showcase the ones that are interesting to each person.

Many Clubhouse users have observed that it's become much more difficult to locate entertaining rooms since the app was released to all users, while Twitter currently has no Spaces discovery feature at all, other from utilizing search techniques to find live broadcasts, as previously stated.

It appears that Twitter has either found suitable Spaces discovery via algorithm matching challenging, or that the match-up with Communities just fitted to the extent where using the Communities tab over the Spaces tab made more sense. Or it's still putting both to the test.

It's unclear, but provided that the Communities preview is the latest and that it attempted to resolve the discovery problem, which will be essential for optimizing Spaces adoption, it appears that's where things are moving - which, if Communities proves to be a success, could be a far better method to go in this regard.

However, this puts Twitter at a disadvantage in regards to discovery, especially if Facebook perceives audio rooms as having potential and wants to promote them even more. If Facebook wants to surpass Twitter in the audio social front, it likely could - but the public characteristic of Twitter could also prove to be beneficial for audio broadcasters that aren't as easily accessible for those with smaller followers on Facebook.

This could indicate that, in the end, both Twitter and Facebook get equal results from their audio social tools. Unfortunately, Clubhouse appears to have faded, though it is still garnering popularity in India and may find a sustainable path onward.

However, if Communities work and the concentration on topic-based discussion is successful, Twitter Spaces might become the audio social leader - at least until Facebook determines what to do with the concept.

And, sooner or later, these new Spaces cards will probably include links to download Spaces audio for broadcasters who want it, which might be another way for Twitter's drive of creator monetization.