Not sure anywhere in this thread anyone discussed limiting freedom of speech (which has zero legal status on a private platform). I think the discussion is more nuanced - something along the lines of "do we want to mimic society's psychological toilet (FB) or do things differently?
The forum already has an auto-dislike button. The zero reply thread. I get that, er, from time to time...
There's also the replies to read ratio. You can see 1000 people read some post; maybe a few were moved to reply.
Then there's posts that seem to generate their own energy, like some sort of nuclear chain reaction, with the simple OP having little if anything to do with resulting magnitude of that phenomena.
Such activity doesnt necessarily make for a good thread, though most thick ones can still be educational in places; you can encounter mention of something you've never heard of before, amongst the stuff you're heard too many times.
I'd say beware of introducing too many "charms". Next thing you know, there'll be gold, silver and diamonds, helpful, THIS! and "satisfied seal" icons - the whole array - instead of just "like" and "reply".
There's also the replies to read ratio. You can see 1000 people read some post; maybe a few were moved to reply.
Then there's posts that seem to generate their own energy, like some sort of nuclear chain reaction, with the simple OP having little if anything to do with resulting magnitude of that phenomena.
Such activity doesnt necessarily make for a good thread, though most thick ones can still be educational in places; you can encounter mention of something you've never heard of before, amongst the stuff you're heard too many times.
I'd say beware of introducing too many "charms". Next thing you know, there'll be gold, silver and diamonds, helpful, THIS! and "satisfied seal" icons - the whole array - instead of just "like" and "reply".
That is the equivalence of thread star ratings from the old forum, saves time and frustration roaming around on whatever social forum, and I hope we will get back those stars.
YouTube dislikes are still there, but hidden, for Firefox like browser one need this extension:
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/return-youtube-dislikes/and the same extension developed for Chrome like browsers:
https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/return-youtube-dislike/gebbhagfogifgggkldgodflihgfeippiThe dislike visibility on YT was hidden very much for political reasons and not out of some humane necessity, welcome to DPRK of West.
For the likes/dislikes, while the likes in particular have a useful role in helping training and optimizing the search engine algorithms on this forum to pick out the best posts, I am not so sure the dislikes will do besides hanging out poor posts, and people.
In actuality, the likes/dislikes aren't even necessary to be visible more than for the search engine algorithms.
I have not really made up my mind on the likes/dislikes although I can see its advantages, and disadvantages, but if the likes are there to stay, should the icons really display all the names, what happens when there's 10-20 names or more? I think that is cumbersome and interrupting ones mind flow by forcing one to stop up reading through and register all the names, and then make up the count, pesky details but micro-stress is not good and with get already way too much an overdose of that any time we enter the internet.
Many forums add instead a digit count next to the icon indicating how many likes a post have received, something like +2👍, which is also much quicker to register when skimming through the forum, and to get the names of the members behind the likes one would have to either hover over or click on the icon, I would prefer that.
How about, instead of a dislike or thumbs down, an option beside the like button that is simply "? Question" button.
I.e. the "? Question" button would indicate that you question the conclusions, question the methods, question the claims, etc.
The human mind tends to react quite negatively to feelings of social dislike/disapproval, but the small amount of ambiguity of a "? Question" button would give space for the poster to either elaborate/affirm what they are saying, or for the person pressing the ?Question button to post a question or to correct the original poster.
E.g. If someone started a thread saying that they have their speaker cables soaking in a tub of olive oil 24/7, I would "? Question" button that post. I suppose I couldn't absolutely verify their claims unless I tried it myself and did both subjective and objective measurements (who knows, maybe olive oil changes the dielectric constant of the cable and results in some type of minuscule interaction with the output stage of their amp, lol), but if enough people pressed the ?Question button on the post there would be cause for seriously questioning the validity of their claim.
I.e. the "? Question" button would indicate that you question the conclusions, question the methods, question the claims, etc.
The human mind tends to react quite negatively to feelings of social dislike/disapproval, but the small amount of ambiguity of a "? Question" button would give space for the poster to either elaborate/affirm what they are saying, or for the person pressing the ?Question button to post a question or to correct the original poster.
E.g. If someone started a thread saying that they have their speaker cables soaking in a tub of olive oil 24/7, I would "? Question" button that post. I suppose I couldn't absolutely verify their claims unless I tried it myself and did both subjective and objective measurements (who knows, maybe olive oil changes the dielectric constant of the cable and results in some type of minuscule interaction with the output stage of their amp, lol), but if enough people pressed the ?Question button on the post there would be cause for seriously questioning the validity of their claim.
You mean enough bias for seriously questioning... Ones attitude going into the idea would be pre-biased. With exceptions, of course.
My speaker cables sound nice and vivid after a good soaking in Balsamic vinegar.
Funnily enough, after getting used to class D amps, I had trouble getting bare wires to connect to a class A amp without mincing them.
Personally I would prefer it if the "like" button vanished without trace, and never re-appeared.
Having that button tempts people to write what they think will be popular, rather than be honest and true to themselves. Not only that, at this point it's well known to the medical community that the dopamine hit we get from seeing that people "liked" our posts, makes online posting more addictive, and leads to reduced happiness the rest of the time ("They don't love me any more!")
-Gnobuddy
I am yet to be convinced a dislike button would make a positive impact, and think it might be a catalyst for negative outcomes.
