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Twitter offers its Blue subscribers early access to new features

The company's subscription service adds experimental features like longer video uploads and pinned conversations.

Andrew Blok Editor I
Andrew Blok has been an editor at CNET covering HVAC and home energy, with a focus on solar, since October 2021. As an environmental journalist, he navigates the changing energy landscape to help people make smart energy decisions. He's a graduate of the Knight Center for Environmental Journalism at Michigan State and has written for several publications in the Great Lakes region, including Great Lakes Now and Environmental Health News, since 2019. You can find him in western Michigan watching birds.
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When Twitter Blue rolled out in Australia and Canada in June, subscribers gained access to exclusive features for the equivalent of $3 a month. Now those subscribers are getting early access to experimental features from the new Twitter Labs, the company said in a  Twitter  thread and blog post on Wednesday.

Labs currently allows users to pin conversations at the top of their direct messages and upload videos up to 10 minutes long, though what's available is set to change.

"Labs features change over time and may become available to all Twitter accounts, be removed or only released to Twitter Blue subscribers," according to a blog post from Twitter.

Twitter Blue subscribers already can organize their bookmarks into folders and transform threads into easy-to-read text in reader mode. They can also use an undo tweet button, which gives them 30 seconds to review a tweet before it publishes. It's a feature some Twitter users have long wanted. 

While other features are yet to be announced, there will be more. "We'll update you as we build, so check back often," Twitter Blue said in a tweet announcing Labs.

Labs adds another draw to the subscription service, which could become an alternative revenue source. Twitter hasn't revealed a timeline for rolling out Twitter Blue beyond Australia and Canada.