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Facebook Is Testing a Dislike Button (thedailybeast.com)

Posted by BeauHD on from the not-satisfactory dept.

Ever since the inception of the Like button, Facebook users have been asking for a "dislike" button. Today, Facebook is testing a "downvote" button with certain users in the comment section of posts within Facebook groups and on old Facebook memories content. The Daily Beast reports: The feature appears to give users the ability to downrank certain comments. This is the first time Facebook has tested anything similar to a "dislike" button and it could theoretically allow for content that's offensive or relevant to be pushed to the bottom of a comment feed. In 2016, citing Facebook executives, Bloomberg said a dislike button "had been rejected on the grounds that it would sow too much negativity" to the platform. It's unclear how widely the dislike button is being tested. Facebook regularly tests features with small subsets of users that never end up rolling out to the broader public. Most users currently are only able to either Like or Reply to comments in a thread. The downvote option could have radical implications on what types of discussions and comments flourish on the platform. While it could theoretically be used to de-rank inflammatory or problematic comments, it could also easily be used as a tool for abuse.

12 of 146 comments (clear)

  1. This is incendiary by postbigbang · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Like a grenade. You thought Facebook was bombastic before? Watch the fury when you can thumbs-down something. The cesspool will get deeper still. This doesn't do anything but start fights.

    --
    ---- Teach Peace. It's Cheaper Than War.
    1. Re:This is incendiary by Baron_Yam · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Unfortunately, negative social interaction is more engaging than positive. The users will be less happy - hell, some will be downright miserable - but they'll be more engaged, more addicted to getting likes and getting a rush from watching 'enemies' get a dislike.

      See: Reddit. You will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy than a social networking site with this kind of unlimited feedback system.

    2. Re:This is incendiary by un1nsp1red · · Score: 3, Interesting

      The difference is facebook is (ostensibly) limited to the people with whom you are *friends*. With reddit, anyone can up/downvote you. Facebook doesn't have the anonymity. I doubt the impact would be remotely comparable.

    3. Re:This is incendiary by Wycliffe · · Score: 5, Interesting

      The difference is facebook is (ostensibly) limited to the people with whom you are *friends*. With reddit, anyone can up/downvote you. Facebook doesn't have the anonymity. I doubt the impact would be remotely comparable.

      Which is exactly why facebook should have anonymous dislikes and anonymous disagree buttons.
      Most people already live in an echo chamber but that echo chamber is magnified because very few people
      are willing to call their friends out when they post stuff they disagree with. By being allowed to
      anonymously disagree with a post you could signal to a friend that you really didn't like their racist
      or otherwise inflammatory post. They would know one of their friends disagreed with it which might give
      them pause but they wouldn't know which friend. It also might encourage people to prune their
      friend lists more often.

    4. Re:This is incendiary by shanen · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Is there a kernel of insight there? Hard to tell on so few words, but it doesn't matter since I never see a mod point of any sort.

      You [postbigbang and the similar authors whose comments I've seen so far] didn't offer anything like a constructive suggestion. My basic suggestion (explained at more length below in my initial reactive comment on the story) is that the negative side should call for more effort. The negative sentiment should be less freely expressed than the positive to tilt the scales in favor of positive interactions. (Ditto earned public reputations.)

      --
      Freedom = (Meaningful - Coerced) Choice != (Speech | Beer^2), and sad sock puppets' bad mods avail them naught.
    5. Re:This is incendiary by mfh · · Score: 3, Insightful

      The users will be less happy - hell, some will be downright miserable - but they'll be more engaged,

      You're right. However, users can choose not to participate on Facebook.

      Personally, FB is an addressbook. As long as my addressbook can't downvote my ACCOUNT, who cares?

      I don't post much and if I post something that I'm interested in and people downvote, I will ask them what's up because they are people I know. If their explanation is sketchy or rude, unfriend. Problem solved.

      Good riddance to bad rubbish.

      People really need to start growing up and taking their own responsibility regarding their behaviour and mood. If your mood is bad, why is it bad? Are you worn out from running on the FB treadmill of clicking and being possessed by your friends list?

      Every human being knows if they are getting sick from toxic things. FB's toxicity is SLOW. It won't kill you right away but it could if the depression or anxiety from whether you will get accepted or not gets bad enough.

      Dopamine is what FB is after. It's proven that a 66% negative exposure will double the high you get when you get one upvote or comment.

      But FB has had downvote installed for YEARS. It was just internal. If they say they didn't have it then why are so many user posts never seen by ANYONE?

      Once the downvote feature is live, the FB feed can go back to realtime posts from all friends. Users could then just lower visibility on friends they care less about.

      --
      The dangers of knowledge trigger emotional distress in human beings.
    6. Re:This is incendiary by lister+king+of+smeg · · Score: 3, Funny

      See: Reddit. You will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy than a social networking site with this kind of unlimited feedback system.

      Oh you naive summer child. I take it you have never been to /b/ before.

      --
      ---Saying gnome 3 is better than windows 8 not so much a compliment as it is damning with light praise.
  2. Where is the button... by toonces33 · · Score: 4, Funny

    I click to say that I dislike Facebook?

  3. Be careful when you wish for symmetry! by shanen · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I actually think that each of the subjective dimensions should be symmetric (on Facebook and even here on Slashdot), but the playing field should still be tilted in favor of the positive side. You want to make it easier for people to do and be good. In a simple implementation, clicking "Like" can be easy, while clicking "Dislike" can involve an extra step to say why.

    However I think that Like-Dislike is basically a weak and almost meaningless dimension. In terms of meaning, I think you can argue that it should increase the general weight of a comment's positive ratings, but on its own there is little meaning to it. Therefore I think the better dimensions of sentiment should have clear meanings. Dimensions such as true-false (or informative-disinformative or valid-invalid) or funny-unfunny (to me). For example, if you say a comment is false, then you would have to indicate which part was false and why. (And if it turned out you are lying, then YOUR own reputation should suffer. More symmetry.)

    (Bells and whistles in dimensional thinking for sentiments: I also think the dimensions should be able to evolve over time, and that the dimensions of earned public reputation should age to encourage people to act better and see their reputations gradually improve. People with earned negative reputations should be easier to filter against, thus allowing them to be as negative as they like for the (negative) benefit of people who actually want to spend their time that way. Also, a person who has an earned reputation in a particular dimension should get extra weight, as with a rating from a proven funny person (based on reactions from other people) counting more heavily in rating another comment as funny or unfunny.)

    The clumsy, ad hoc, and poorly considered dimensions of Slashdot's moderation are an excellent example of how NOT to do it. Take that "troll" dimension, for example. (I wish someone would.) What is it supposed to mean? I think that the dimension may have a catchy label, but it lacks meaning. Some combination of "negative politeness" and "negative truth" combined with an earned reputation for "negative agreement"? (I think the general meaning on today's Slashdot is that a sock puppet has a mod point to burn, but that might be jealous projection since I never get a mod point.)

    --
    Freedom = (Meaningful - Coerced) Choice != (Speech | Beer^2), and sad sock puppets' bad mods avail them naught.
    1. Re:Be careful when you wish for symmetry! by Kjella · · Score: 3, Interesting

      The clumsy, ad hoc, and poorly considered dimensions of Slashdot's moderation are an excellent example of how NOT to do it. Take that "troll" dimension, for example. (I wish someone would.) What is it supposed to mean?

      Well, they boil down to +1 or -1 anyway so whether you use troll or flamebait or offtopic or overrated hardly matters. Those who tend to abuse it the most always pick overrated anyway. I think trolling is pretty well defined, but to each his own. Personally I'd probably just disconnect them and have mod points basically be "more people should see this" or "less people should see this" and have the rest be like a popular emotion-vote. It'd probably have to be a mix of descriptive - this post is informative / insightful / important / crazy / trolling / flamebait / crap and reactive - this post makes me feel happy / sad / angry / afraid / disgusted / surprised / excited etc. and actually I'm thinking maybe that is two dimensions.... a post can both be insightful and make me feel happy/angry/sad.

      --
      Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
  4. YouTube has had dislike buttons forever by qzzpjs · · Score: 3, Insightful

    And I haven't really seen any bad abuse there. The dislikes are usually very small compared to likes. I actually dislike social media sites that only expect you to like everything.

  5. It already exists by mlawrence · · Score: 3, Funny

    I have been using the "Angry" or "Laughter" reaction when I disagree with something.