Desperate for growth opportunities as its stock price wallows at near record lows, Twitter, Inc. may be about to radically shake up the service, at least according to one report Tuesday.

Re/Code claims that the microblogging come messaging service is considering shaking up perhaps the one feature that has defined it from the day it launched: its 140 character limit.

What form it takes, however, is another matter: the report claims that Twitter is building “a new product” to introduce longer form sharing, but then goes on to note that it’s unclear what this means; could it mean something that allows users to view longer tweets within Twitter, say by clicking on an extended view option, or could it mean a new standalone product that works separately from Twitter but uses Twitter logins?

In addition to the removal of the 140 character limit, the report also claims that Twitter is considering re-assessing how Twitter measures its 140-character limit by removing links and usernames from the tabulation of 140 characters for each tweet.

Interim Chief Executive Officer Jack Dorsey is said to be keen on the idea, with one source telling the site, “People have been very precious at Twitter about what Twitter can be and how much it can be evolved…having Jack come in and say it’s okay makes all the difference in the world.”

Brevity is the soul of wit

Twitter’s 140 character tweet limit has been arbitrary from the start and was based around the service being compatible at its launch with mobile phone SMS messaging back in the days before everyone owned a smartphone, a reason that is no longer in play.

That said, for long-term Twitter users there’s something endearing about the limit, and you can no better look to Polonius in Hamlet with the full quote “Therefore, since brevity is the soul of wit, and tediousness the limbs and outward flourishes, I will be brief..”

Would, or could Twitter hold its current appeal if it turned into to long-winded gasbaggery like a service such as… say… the one provided by Medium, Inc., which happens to share the same founders as Twitter does?

There is some merit in excluding usernames and links in the character count as it’s not a radical change, but Twitter should tread lightly with anything larger than that.

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