"Test, Testing, Downvotes, not dislikes" - Twitter expands downvote test worldwide

[Lightwreather]

Summary

If you’ve seen the option to downvote replies on Twitter, you’re not alone. The experimental feature, which Twitter started testing last year, is now being shown to a global audience, says the company.

 

Quotes

Quote

“We learned a lot about the types of replies you don’t find relevant and we’re expanding this test—more of you on web and soon iOS and Android will have the option to use reply downvoting,” Twitter said in a tweet.

In Twitter’s current test, a selection of users will be offered the option to upvote and downvote replies to a tweet. Only Twitter itself and the user who cast the vote can see the downvote—neither the user who posted the reply nor the one who posted the parent tweet can view them. Upvotes are translated into likes and displayed to everyone.

Twitter said that it’s using the test to gather feedback on what users find useful—in other words, data collected during the test is probably being used as training data for its ranking algorithm.

The company offered other details in a reply tweet:

    Some key notes about this experiment:

    1. This is just a test for research right now.
    2. This is not a dislike button.
    3. Your downvotes are visible to you only.
    4. Votes won’t change the order of replies.

(Twitter may say that downvotes are “not a dislike button,” but it’s all but certain that some users will interpret it that way.)

 

My thoughts

Well, apparently Twitter is introducing a downvote button.... but it's not meant to show dislike? I'll admit I'm rather confused, I can't think of any other reason for why there would be a downvote button (apart from spam but they have their own thing for that). That being said, knowing twitter, I have feeling that this is going to misused quite a lot. But then again, this does not show the dislikes nor is it going to change reply orders, so the only thing I think this can be used for would be to increase user retention on the platform, but this has the negative side effect of the echo chamber. Well, we're gonna have to wait and see how well this plays out, but I for one am not holding my breath for a positive outcome

 

Sources

ArsTechnica

TheVerge

Twitter

[Doobeedoo]

Oh even more hate and drama talk to be stirred, nice.

[duncannah]

So, it has the same purpose as the dislike buttons on YouTube comments. I'm opposed to having a dislike button on Twitter myself, so this isn't actually bad

[PCGuy_5960]

If this feature is added, every single post on that platform will have more downvotes than likes.

[DildorTheDecent]

Twitter should add reactions. See someone posting unsubstantiated nonsense? Mark their content as "funny" and walk away.

 

Normies will seethe.

[Gamer Schnitzel]

1 hour ago, Doobeedoo said:

Oh even more hate and drama talk to be stirred, nice.

Do you know how many children adapt completely absurd and stupid idealogy because they think their hero is popular and everyone agrees with them? Finally idiotic opinions will be downvoted and kids who see them will realize that the majority of people disagree. Kids naturally are obsessed with agreeing with "popular" people because they think they speak for the masses. How do you think did Hitlerjugend work? Twitter is essentially a platform to groom children into believing garbage. This is an extremely good change. If you are too sensitive and cry over downvotes try using your brain and stay clear off the platform. You don't need an account on every single website on the internet.

[Lightwreather]

11 hours ago, Gamer Schnitzel said:

Finally idiotic opinions will be downvoted and kids who see them will realize that the majority of people disagree.

Problem with that:

13 hours ago, J-from-Nucleon said:

3. Your downvotes are visible to you only.

 

[Kisai]

On 2/4/2022 at 9:12 AM, J-from-Nucleon said:

Summary

If you’ve seen the option to downvote replies on Twitter, you’re not alone. The experimental feature, which Twitter started testing last year, is now being shown to a global audience, says the company.

 

Quotes

 

My thoughts

Well, apparently Twitter is introducing a downvote button.... but it's not meant to show dislike? I'll admit I'm rather confused, I can't think of any other reason for why there would be a downvote button (apart from spam but they have their own thing for that). That being said, knowing twitter, I have feeling that this is going to misused quite a lot. But then again, this does not show the dislikes nor is it going to change reply orders, so the only thing I think this can be used for would be to increase user retention on the platform, but this has the negative side effect of the echo chamber. Well, we're gonna have to wait and see how well this plays out, but I for one am not holding my breath for a positive outcome

 

Sources

ArsTechnica

TheVerge

Twitter

Have you ever seen the the kind of garbage people throw at anyone with any kind of fame? People are downright harassed until they quit the platform.

 

Perhaps the downvote on the comments is intended to bury low-quality/harassment from other people replying so the person who actually made the post doesn't get a dogpile of notifications, and it self-moderates like ... slashdot. Slashdot.org 's moderation has always worked rather well, unless someone posted something that was flamebait in the first place.

 

But this is not the same as youtube dislikes where people just downvote out of spite, though I imagine comment wars may in fact create spiteful downvotes among fans vying for their e-celeb's attention. So I do predict this being short-lived. Most other sites discovered people use downvote mechanisms to harass and humiliate people.

  

[adarw]

23 hours ago, PCGuy_5960 said:

If this feature is added, every single post on that platform will have more downvotes than likes.

yea lol, btw your signature isn't readable in dark mode!

[Arika]

Looks like they are going to path of reddit down vote button. 

"It doesn't mean dislike, you down vote if it doesn't contribute to the conversation"

 

Which is not how it ever actually gets used.

 

It's also 100% pointless if

On 2/5/2022 at 4:12 AM, J-from-Nucleon said:

Your downvotes are visible to you only.