Twitter has launched a new community-based pilot programme called Birdwatch that allows people to identify information in Tweets they believe is misleading, and write notes that provide informative context. In this first phase of the pilot, notes will only be visible on a separate Birdwatch site. On this site, pilot participants can also rate the helpfulness of notes added by other contributors.

"These notes are being intentionally kept separate from Twitter for now, while we build Birdwatch and gain confidence that it produces context people find helpful and appropriate," Twitter said in a statement late on Monday.

There will be about 1,000 users in the US to start with the Birdwatch programme. "Eventually we aim to make notes visible directly on Tweets for the global Twitter audience, when there is consensus from a broad and diverse set of contributors," Twitter said.

"We believe this approach has the potential to respond quickly when misleading information spreads, adding context that people trust and find valuable".

To date, Twitter has conducted more than 100 qualitative interviews with individuals across the political spectrum who use Twitter, and received broad general support for Birdwatch. All data contributed to Birdwatch will be publicly available and downloadable. As per Twitter's announcement, people valued when notes were in the voice of a community than that of a central authority, and that notes provided "useful context to help them better understand and evaluate a Tweet".

"Our goal is to build Birdwatch in the open, and have it shaped by the Twitter community," Twitter said in its announcement.

"As we develop algorithms that power Birdwatch such as reputation and consensus systems, we aim to publish that code publicly in the Birdwatch Guide," the company informed.

Additionally, notes will not have an effect on the way people see Tweets or Twitter's system recommendations.

With IANS inputs