Twitter’s not a social network anymore; it’s in the news industry, at least that’s what its iOS app indicates.
Twitter appears to have moved its app in Apple’s App Store from the “social networking” category to “news” earlier this week. Journalist Cory Bergman spotted the switch on Thursday and posted a screen shot of the new placement on Twitter, which is where people get news.
Whoa looks like Twitter just switched from “social networking” to the “news” category in the App Store pic.twitter.com/Rm7ZoWgAj5 — Cory Bergman (@corybe) April 28, 2016
Twitter and Apple did not respond to requests for comment on who was responsible for the change and why it was made.
It appears that Twitter was the one responsible for the switch. Apple’s developer documentation shows that app makers can change their apps’ categories when they’re updating an app to a new version, which seems to be exactly what Twitter did.
Twitter appears to have made the change with its latest app update that was pushed out on April 27, based on data from mobile app analytics firm App Annie, which keeps a historical catalog of Apple’s App Store charts.
App Annie’s charts also seem to show why Twitter would have made the change. On April 26, Twitter ranked fifth among free apps in the App Store’s “social networking” category, trailing three Facebook-owned apps and Pinterest. Now, it tops the “news” category’s list of free apps. How much of a difference the new ranking in the new category will make remains to be seen, but after its rough latest quarterly earnings report, Twitter could use a win.
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