Twitter is working on a camera-first feature that will combine location-based photos and videos with “Twitter Moments”, a report by CNBC has revealed. This move is likely to make the platform more visual- than text-centric, building competition against Snapchat for advertising revenue. The product is in an early stage of development, without a specific launch date. Quoting unnamed officials, the CNBC report said that companies could sponsor events or place ads in between tweeted real-time photos and videos. The feature is similar to Snapchat’s location-based posts around specific topics, highlighted under the Discover tab. This seems to be in line with Twitter’s decision to invest in products that increase audience engagement, which will cause expenses to “more closely align with revenues". This was revealed by its Chief Financial Officer Ned Segal while announcing its quarterly results in February. At the time, CEO Jack Dorsey had said that Twitter will be doing more experimentation to make its timeline more “personalized and relevant” to people. There will be “a much more cohesive strategy” around events, like seeing sports scores during live games, Dorsey said. The social media platform has also partnered with NFL games to deliver live programming. Notably, last quarter (Q4 2017) was big for Twitter, as it finally registered a profit after 12 years of being operational. The company laid off 9% of its workforce in late 2016, and then sold off its developer business and shut down its video app Vine in its push to become profitable. Last year,…
