Twitter removes background wallpaper from user homepages

Right now, it’s unclear whether this is a choice on Twitter‘s part or just an annoying bug. Now, background images are only available where logged-in users will see them publicly (Tweet pages, list pages and collections pages). It does create a more unified look for the site – and perhaps a better sense of community presence by removing differentiation between the profiles – but it has probably upset many who woke this morning to find their background looking decidedly bland.

Twitter did not explain why it has chose to remove wallpapers. Also, if you go as far as trying to select an image to set as a background and save the changes via Edit Profile, the web portal will show you that it’s done.

After years of allowing its users to choose their own backgrounds for the browser version of Twitter the social network has removed custom background images from “home”, “notifications” and user tweet feeds.

Needless to say, users are furious.

Have you noticed the change in your account?

This new white-centric design isn’t entirely new. It is possible that it could begin selling full-page background adverts to companies, using your profile to promote new products. Removing background customisations could be the first step towards a new, more profitable Twitter. Speculation is rife that Twitter did not like the fact that colorful, busy, distracting background images would take people’s eyes away from advertisements, but it’s not clear if this is a contributing factor. As noted by TechCrunch, if you change your background image it will initially appear everywhere you would expect it to, but will gradually become limited to key pages.

Updated at 5:50 p.m. PT with context on Twitter’s last redesign of user profiles.