In a new experiment, Twitter has started displaying a Related Videos section when people are not logged in to the social network’s desktop web client.
Twitter appears to be using favorites as a signal to figure out which tweets with media to highlight under Related Videos, which shows up on the right side of certain tweets and Twitter user profiles.
As I followed a trail of Related Videos, by clicking on one and then another, I noticed that some of the tweets I was viewing were favorited by the user whose tweet or profile I was previously viewing. Sometimes Related Videos that Twitter was recommending to me had come from the user whose tweet or profile I was looking at before.
Eligible media for the new header include YouTube videos, native videos, and animated GIFs. Videos from the Twitter-owned Periscope and Vine services do not seem to be part of the experiment. Previously Twitter was reported to be testing out a “view more videos” feature.
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Twitter confirmed the experiment: “We’re continuing to experiment with our logged-out experience by placing related videos next to Tweets on the Tweet page,” a company spokeswoman told VentureBeat in an email.
Twitter has conducted several public-facing experiments in the recent months. Others include product and place pages, TV timelines, and the replacement of a star with a heart to favorite a tweet.
From a big-picture perspective, getting people to check out more media, especially those people who are not logged in to Twitter, could help Twitter advance its monetization efforts at a time when the company could stand to bring in more revenue.
Here are some more screenshots of Related Videos in the wild that I was able to spot on Twitter when I wasn’t logged in:
