WeChat has undergone a major update, allowing article titles to be modified

Recently, WeChat public accounts have updated their functions to allow article titles to be modified. So the question is, the product design logic of WeChat public platform is a subscription model, so why is it changed to allow title modification?

Speaking of the content modification function of the WeChat public account platform, everyone should have a deep feeling that in the past, once the information was sent incorrectly, we could only delete the article, and the user would be prompted that the article had been deleted after clicking it. In fact, this design is very unfriendly. Of course, the article content editing permission has been released now, but it can only modify 20 words, and it does not support deleting pictures.

In addition, we also found that the title cannot be modified. Similarly, once the title is filled in incorrectly, this document can only be deleted. Fortunately, this inability to modify the title has become history. The latest announcement of the WeChat public platform supports modifying the title.

1. WeChat Official Account Platform Subscription Model

WeChat public platform is actually different from traditional information media platform in positioning. It is positioned as a subscription model from the initial design. That is, once we publish information, it is impossible to modify it. For example, when we send a text message to a friend, if we send the text message, we cannot modify the content of the text message.

Judging from the product positioning of WeChat public platform, this design logic is based on user experience. In essence, WeChat public platform wants to protect the reading rights of users, that is, once the information is given to me, what I see is first-hand information without errors. However, WeChat public platform ignores the sender's ability to control erroneous information. Therefore, once the information is wrong, the user will see the wrong information, or at worst, the article will be deleted.

However, in order to reduce this poor experience, the WeChat public platform launched the logic of modifying articles, but it is limited to 20 words. The thinking behind it is still to stick to the design mode of message subscription.

Therefore, many people do not understand why it is just a simple modification logic. However, the WeChat public platform has never satisfied users. In addition to the above explanations, it may be more of a product differentiation design thinking, because WeChat, which was born based on social networking, does not want to have an article push function like other content platforms.

2. WeChat public platform modification logic

Since the design logic of WeChat public platform is subscription mode, why should we change it to allow users to modify titles? My understanding is that the product design violates people's conventional usage logic to a certain extent. Why do we say that? Let's make a simple analysis.

1. People will always make mistakes

No matter how cautious we are, we will inevitably make mistakes in life, let alone writing an article. Even if we write an article and check it several times, there will still be errors. Even if there are no errors, there may be inappropriate words and we want to change the title. These situations actually exist. Therefore, after we make a mistake, we need a redundancy mechanism. This is just like program design, we regard addition, deletion, modification and query as a standard basic design.

2. Product design should be in line with user thinking

WeChat public platform has persisted for 12 years, but finally compromised with users because product design must conform to user thinking. However, compared with the frequency of content modification, title modification is also a high-frequency action. Title errors are secondary. The main reason is that the probability of changing the title is quite high. Unfortunately, only 3 words can be modified. What design logic is this based on? From my perspective as a product designer, I provide two references.

First point: Avoid article popularity recommendation mechanism

I wonder if you have noticed that the same article, with different titles, may enter the traffic pool of the WeChat public platform. I personally have this experience. I once wrote an article that was very popular. For some reason, I deleted it. Later, I modified the title and published it again. I found that the number of readers decreased significantly. From this perspective, I was thinking that the article being recommended to the traffic pool may be related to the title.

Second point: The title has been changed beyond recognition

If there is no limit on the number of words that can be modified in the title of an article that is pushed out, the user may see this title today and find that the title has suddenly changed tomorrow. From this perspective, the WeChat public account platform is also protecting the reading rights of users.

Final Words

Finally, let me briefly summarize the WeChat public account platform's control mechanism for modifying article content and titles. In general, the WeChat public account platform will definitely firmly support its own subscription model, but on the basis of not violating the user experience, they will try to adjust some positioning. Unfortunately, this kind of adjustment is difficult to meet the needs of users. I hope that the adjustment can be made more vigorously. In fact, it is enough to control the frequency of modification. For example, there can be an opportunity to modify the content and title once, and there is no limit on the number of words. I understand that this is also possible.