Julia Boorstin:

Twitter is upgrading its mute feature — instead of just allowing users to mute accounts they don’t want to see tweets from, now users can mute words, phrases and notifications. That means instead of getting a notification when you’re mentioned in a hateful conversation, there’s no indication it’s happening.

To prevent those abusive comments from being posted in the first place, Twitter is upgrading its tools to allow users to directly report different types of conduct that violates Twitter’s policies — anything that specifically “targets people on the basis of race, ethnicity, national origin, sexual orientation, gender, gender identity, religious affiliation, age, disability or disease.”

More specific reporting will make it easier for Twitter to process complaints faster, and more quickly help the person experiencing the abuse.

It’s really frustrating that Twitter is implementing these changes after the election. CEO Jack Dorsey said the company was looking into changes months ago. Obviously, these things take time, but today’s changes couldn’t have come soon enough.