Facebook's 'Downvote' System Begins Rolling Out Wider In US (arstechnica.com)

Facebook is reportedly rolling out its "downvote" button to a wider group of users in the United States. "The feature began appearing on the service's mobile app without a formal company announcement -- and we only found out about it by browsing on our phones," reports Ars Technica. From the report: The feature appears to currently be limited to "public" posts. Should your account be flagged for this week's test, every comment in a thread will include a numeric value and small up- and down-arrows connected to that number. Upon the first display of this Reddit-like change, the Facebook app will offer guidance: "Support comments that are thoughtful, and demote ones that are uncivil or irrelevant."

This is in addition to the site's long-running "emotion" interface, which lets users tap "like" or emoji-styled buttons. These icons and numbers still attach to posts as they've done for years. Now an additional value based on up- and down-votes, appears as well, and these values are separate. Meaning, if you tap the "like" button and down-vote on the same comment, those actions don't cancel each other out. As of press time, these up- and down-vote numbers are not visible if your account is not flagged for the test. We have not yet seen this feature go live on any versions of the Facebook Android app.

Comments

one site to rule them all

[thoughtlover]

Slashdot's moderating system is still, IMHO, the best example of a way for a community to not only moderate discussion, but use tags to clarify why a person voted for a post... I love the Funny and Troll mod options, but Under/Overrated are hugely important, too.

Re:one site to rule them all

[blahplusplus]

Slashdot's moderating system is still, IMHO, the best example of a way for a community to not only moderate discussion

It really isn't because you will have young generations downvoting older generations. As someone who lived through the great MMO scam of the 90's, where companies rebadged RPG PC games as mmo's to fleece a gullibly videogame public to get them to pay for the same RPG game monthly. They proved that the average person is an idiot. I saw dedicated servers paired back and videogame software stolen and taken hostage by videogame companies like valve and that greedy prick Gabe newell and kids worship this guy on the internet, any badmouthing of valve, EQ and world of warcraft as having been propaganda to get the young kids used to buying games they don't own gets downvoted to oblivion. Then the kids wonder why loot boxes and games are literally being destroyed because they are too stupid to understand when you buy software you don't fully own and control the corporations will rob you blind. The millennial generation is just as stupid and irrational as previous generations. Digital natives my ass. The fact that dedicated servers are long gone and held back because of these kids is disturbing enough on its own.

So as an old codger watching these kids lick the balls of videogame corporations while videogame history is literally being destroyed and there won't be "good old games" anymore because now they can just shut off the server and destroy the game is pretty fucking disgusting.

Re:Who wants social media

[serviscope_minor]

The internet was fun as it protected and expected US freedoms. Freedom of the press. Freedom of speech. Freedom after speech. Remove that and social media becomes any other failed nations "internet". With extra censorship, reporting, bans.

The US constitution never guarateed the right to not have people say "piss off we don't want you in this private club any more". In fact the constitution protects that freedom.

Forcing internet forums to host people they don't want is strongly anti-freedom.