“New Twitter” aims to keep users on the site

Yesterday, Twitter announced some changes to the way users will interact with each other on the site, as well as improved multimedia functions that will allow you to watch videos and view photos right on Twitter.com.

The Twitter timeline will remain the same, however, underneath each tweet, users will see more context and embedded media. When you click on an individual tweet, a details pane slides out to the right to reveal content. Other new features include:

Infinite scroll — You no longer have to click “More” to view additional tweets.
Integrated media — Now you can view photos and videos on the site. Twitter now has partnerships with DailyBooth, DeviantART, Etsy, Flickr, Justin.TV, Kickstarter, Kiva, Photozou, Plixi, Twitgoo, TwitPic, TwitVid, USTREAM, Vimeo, yfrog, and YouTube.
Related content — Click on a tweet and see replies, other tweets from that user, map of geotagged tweets and more.
Mini profiles — Click a Twitter name and see a user’s bio and recent tweets without leaving the timeline.

Something also to keep in mind: If you’re a business or individual with a customized Twitter background, you’ll want to reconfigure it to accommodate the smaller real estate for your photos and text.

According to the Twitter blog, these changes will be rolled in a “preview” version over the next several weeks. During this time, users can toggle back and forth between the old and new versions, which many people have said they prefer, as opposed to Facebook’s “just deal with it” strategy for changes.

Now, you might be thinking, “How many people could possibly be affected by these changes? I use Tweetdeck to chat with other users.” Well, Twitter recently shared a breakdown of the top 10 Twitter applications by unique users. As you can see, Twitter.com is still the clear frontrunner.

Many people have weighed in on the changes, with Mashable calling it the “Facebookification of Twitter,” and The Washington Post’s Rob Pegoraro pointing out that it still makes users “guess what page awaits behind somebody’s shortened Web link.”