Dislike Reactions

[YNM]

2 hours ago, DDE said:

The problem is that “flinching from” is often an irrational reaction.

Well, what would they do if they have to face it here ? Leave the forum ? One less job to do for the mods.

52 minutes ago, 5thHorseman said:

What if the only way to properly tell you you're wrong about dislikes is to dislike your post without comment, but I can't do that because it's disabled ?

PM.

[adsii1970]

On 1/1/2019 at 9:13 PM, 0111narwhalz said:

Anyone remember Green Iron Crown? The idea of negative reputation has already been considered, tried, and ultimately rejected.

Ah, the good ol' days! what fun that was...

One of the reasons this is one of the most active forums I am a member of is precisely there's no way to provide negative feedback and just disappear. This forum encourages dialogue which is always a good thing in my opinion.

 

[Snark]

10 hours ago, Gapone said:

Isn't this for this? (disliking people you not agree with)

The point is that if all you do is run around putting "dislikes" on anyone you disagree with, it's not helpful to anyone.  It's just unproductive venting that causes ill feeling and tends to lead to toxic flame wars, without actually informing anyone or helpign anything.

Debating opposing points of view is useful and constructive.  It's an important part of how we learn.  But it only works if people do it constructively, i.e. it's not about just yelling "NO!" at anything we don't like, but rather, to explain why we believe what we believe.  If you disagree with someone, actually disagree and explain.

Responding with "I disagree with what you just said, because <reasons>" is perfectly fine.  So is "Well, I prefer to do <other thing> instead, because <reasons>."  Those are great examples of how to respond to someone you disagree with, because people can see why you disagree, which in turn will help them decide whether you have a good point or not.

Whereas if all you responded with was "No!  That's dumb!" -- or by clicking a "dislike" button, if there was one, because that's essentially the same thing-- then that's completely unhelpful.  It doesn't tell anyone anything useful at all except that you're unhappy for some reason.  Why should they care?  Unless they're your personal friend, they don't know you.  Maybe you disagree for excellent reasons that they might agree with, if they understood-- or, maybe you're just an easily angered person who's venting for no good reason.  There's no way to tell.

So far, I've seen a lot of posts from you in this thread where you are basically saying "I want this"-- which is fine, except that I haven't seen anything from you explaining why you want this, i.e. why you think it's necessary.  If you dislike something, you already have a way to address that:  you can make a post, in which you address the thing you dislike and explain why you dislike it.

So, can you help us understand?  i.e. why do you think you need a "dislike" option for the forum, instead of doing the usual thing, which is to make a post where you state your opinion and its rationale?

11 hours ago, severedsolo said:

The forums are supposed to foster discussion, some of the most interesting discussions I've ever had were with people I disagree with - but simply "disliking" a post doesn't foster discussion. If I'm wrong (in any post, not just this one), tell me why i'm wrong (I most likely won't agree with you, but I'll at least listen to what you have to say)

^ This!

11 hours ago, severedsolo said:

I can see how only getting "likes" may reinforce your viewpoint - if 20 people "like" your post, but only one person bothers to refute it, it may make you feel like you are in the majority - even if that wasn't the case.

I can see how that would be a concern... but my observation has been that it doesn't work out that way.  Why?  Because "likes" actually work in both directions.

Let's say that I make a post, and 20 people agree with me.  What happens?  I get 20 "likes", and I go "whoa, I'm popular".

But suppose 20 people disagree with me.  What happens?  In practice, what usually happens is that someone will go ahead and make a post in which they express their disagreement and/or displeasure with what I wrote... and then the other 19 people give "likes" to that post.  Which is just as strong a "negative feedback" signal as if those 20 people were able to "dislike" my post-- but (this is an absolutely crucial distinction) it's actually constructive.

If I made a post and then got 20 "dislikes", that is not helpful to me or anyone at all because it doesn't indicate why people dislike it.  Whereas if someone actually posts constructive criticism (no matter how harsh), and then people jump on board and give likes to that... well, now that's something that actually contributes in a constructive way to the discourse.

So yes, I can see why someone might be concerned about this, but in practice it works out fine-- and considerably more helpfully than it would if we just had a pile of "dislikes".

4 hours ago, 5thHorseman said:

What if the only way to properly tell you you're wrong about dislikes is to dislike your post without comment, but I can't do that because it's disabled?

But that isn't the only way.  If you're wrong, I can just write a post that explains why I think you're wrong.  Achieves the same goal, without the unproductive venting.

(By the way-- I can't completely tell whether your post was meant seriously, or you were making a tongue-in-cheek joke.  I've responded here as if it's seriously meant.  If, on the other hand, you were joshing-- please do be a careful, here.  Lots of folks don't have English as their first language.  It can be very difficult to tell the difference between irony/satire and serious intent, even when everyone does speak the same language.   So, please be careful-- there's othing wrong with making jokes, but just try to make sure that it's super obvious when doing so.)

[sumghai]

I agree with the prevailing opinion that implementing a dislike button would be a bad idea for this community, as the feature would be abused and cause divisions in the community.

Another forum that I frequent, Sufficient Velocity, has implemented a wide range of post reactions (e.g. Like, Funny, Insightful, Informative) but also left out all the negative ones (Dislike, Picard Facepalm, WTH?) for the exact same reasons above.

[Geonovast]

3 minutes ago, sumghai said:

(e.g. Like, Funny, Insightful, Informative)

I would welcome a broader range of positive ones.  I think it would be neat to distinguish reactions from people between Like (I thought that was neat), Helpful/Informative (I learned something!), Thank You (Appreciation for helping on an issue), etc.

I'm also fine leaving it the way it is, which it's been made pretty clear that's what's happening.

But I'd sooner see the reaction system turned off altogether before the negative ones get turned on.

[sumghai]

32 minutes ago, Geonovast said:

I would welcome a broader range of positive ones.  I think it would be neat to distinguish reactions from people between Like (I thought that was neat), Helpful/Informative (I learned something!), Thank You (Appreciation for helping on an issue), etc.

While I quite like SV's wide range of positive reactions, at the moment I personally don't think the same system would work well for the KSP Forums.

Some particularly sensitive users may actually take offense at what proportion of positive reactions they receive. For instance, a user may post something intended to be funny, and receives mostly Funny reactions as intended and desired. However, one or two other users may respond with just a Like or an Informative response, leading to the poster internally panicking "What? Wasn't what I said funny enough for them?".

Limiting the KSP Forum post reactions to just "Like" would eliminate this sort of problem. Any other reactions, people responding to the OP can articulate through post replies.

32 minutes ago, Geonovast said:

But I'd sooner see the reaction system turned off altogether before the negative ones get turned on.

Agreed.

Hopefully, this won't come to pass, since my understanding is that the "Like" reaction feature is the analogue of the old Reputation system.

[Superfluous J]

9 hours ago, YNM said:

PM.

 

5 hours ago, Snark said:

But that isn't the only way.  If you're wrong, I can just write a post that explains why I think you're wrong.  Achieves the same goal, without the unproductive venting.

(By the way-- I can't completely tell whether your post was meant seriously, or you were making a tongue-in-cheek joke.  I've responded here as if it's seriously meant.  If, on the other hand, you were joshing-- please do be a careful, here.  Lots of folks don't have English as their first language.  It can be very difficult to tell the difference between irony/satire and serious intent, even when everyone does speak the same language.   So, please be careful-- there's othing wrong with making jokes, but just try to make sure that it's super obvious when doing so.)

It was in fact a joke. I thought "I just blew your mind" was enough but it was not, so sorry about that one.

[Harry Rhodan]

On 1/7/2019 at 9:22 PM, sumghai said:

Some particularly sensitive users may actually take offense at what proportion of positive reactions they receive. For instance, a user may post something intended to be funny, and receives mostly Funny reactions as intended and desired. However, one or two other users may respond with just a Like or an Informative response, leading to the poster internally panicking "What? Wasn't what I said funny enough for them?".

It's actually much simpler: a "funny" reaction has a good tendency to become a sarcastic dislike.

[StrandedonEarth]

When it comes to the  "Thread to Complain About Stuff", there are some posts I don't want to "Like" because it seems wrong to "like" somebody's bad news or bad luck story. I thought about having other reactions like such as "Sympathize" or something along those lines. Similarly, probably a majority of my "likes"/"rep" (wow, when did I shoot past 4k?) came from jokes, memes, and one-liners I've posted, I thought there could/should be a "Ha Ha" reaction.

Once I thought about it some more, I realized those were still open to abuse, mostly by using them when not appropriate. Serious posts getting funny reactions could lead to the bad feelings this forum works so hard to avoid, and users finding themselves bombarded with reactions that amount to "sucks to be you" probably wouldn't stick around long. So I agree it's for the best that we stick with what we have, and understand that that's all we have.

[Vanamonde]

Writing out one's response is also effective and acceptable.

[StrandedonEarth]

31 minutes ago, Vanamonde said:

Writing out one's response is also effective and acceptable.

But... but... that might take effort! Sometimes I just wanna click and move on!

Just ask my wife. You want me to communicate? You're so funny!

Edited January 13, 2019 by StrandedonEarth

[GDJ]

31 minutes ago, StrandedonEarth said:

Just ask my wife. You want me to communicate? You're so funny!

Yeah.....sometimes this is accurate.

[Gapone]

Okay, it's time do disable the reaction system! (I am serious. (trust me (please)))

[Fraston]

Maybe on threads you could have an option to “disable reactions”

Not a bad idea..

On 12/24/2018 at 1:09 PM, Vanamonde said:

Those options are off and will stay off. 

And should stay off forever. I don’t like dislikes in any way...

[KSK]

On 1/13/2019 at 2:36 PM, Gapone said:

Okay, it's time do disable the reaction system! (I am serious. (trust me (please)))

It doesn't sound as though you're taking much notice of the feedback you've been getting from the moderators:

On 1/7/2019 at 6:16 PM, Snark said:

So far, I've seen a lot of posts from you in this thread where you are basically saying "I want this"-- which is fine, except that I haven't seen anything from you explaining why you want this, i.e. why you think it's necessary... 

Instead I'm seeing that since almost nobody liked your idea of including a 'dislike' button, you now want to get rid of the system altogether. Which seems more than a bit petty at first sight. Am I being unfair? Quite possibly - but if you don't bother to explain why you want something, then people will jump to their own conclusions.

[linuxgurugamer]

On 1/13/2019 at 9:36 AM, Gapone said:

Okay, it's time do disable the reaction system! (I am serious. (trust me (please)))

 Why? Just because you don't like the way something is working doesn't mean it should be throwing away. 

You haven't given us any reasons for why you want these changes

[Gargamel]

On 1/13/2019 at 9:36 AM, Gapone said:

Okay, it's time do disable the reaction system! (I am serious. (trust me (please)))

I disagree completely.  

I am totally against any system other than a single reaction, but I am on a number of other forums that do not have a reaction system, and I often find myself wanting to add that simple little reaction to a post. 

I could see renaming it from "like" to "react" though.   I often just want to use it to acknowledge a post, in particular when someone has answered or corrected one of my posts.  Often a written out response isn't necessary, just a simple nod towards the poster will do.  

But the best solution, IMO though, is just leaving it as is.  We're a happy functional little community, and a lot of our culture is based on the single like system.  To change it now would alter the way the community works, and I don't think it needs changing. 

I am for removing the "rate the thread" option though.  What one person finds as an idiotic or meaningless post/thread, might have some useful benefit for others, so rating the thread has no real benefit, especially since you can't see it until you are actually in the thread. 

[Geonovast]

17 minutes ago, Gargamel said:

I am for removing the "rate the thread" option though.  What one person finds as an idiotic or meaningless post/thread, might have some useful benefit for others, so rating the thread has no real benefit, especially since you can't see it until you are actually in the thread. 

I'm on board with this.  I would not miss that system at all, and it in effect can cause the exact situations that are trying to be avoided by not having a dislike reaction.

[Gapone]

But we certainly need more reactions, otherwise they would just be named "likes".

[kerbiloid]

Spoiler

A "Thanks for your like" button

And "Lik'em all"

 

Edited February 7, 2019 by kerbiloid

[Gapone]

Wow they added a downvote!

[Superfluous J]

Ha ha it seems to work the same as a "like." At least, Gapone went from 84 to 85 rep when I "downvote"d him.

Edited April 1, 2019 by 5thHorseman

[Green Baron]

Cool :-)

[Gapone]

Not cool. Also I think it's only for April fools.

But it would be funnier if the likes were REPLACED by dislikes.

Edited April 1, 2019 by Gapone

[Lisias]

1 hour ago, Gapone said:

But it would be funnier if the likes were REPLACED by dislikes.

I just hope they remember to zero the databse at midnight - judging by where this thing is going, I will end up with negative reputation by night.  

 

2 hours ago, 5thHorseman said:

Ha ha it seems to work the same as a "like." At least, Gapone went from 84 to 85 rep when I "downvote"d him.

Spoiler

 

 

Edited April 1, 2019 by Lisias
It's trap!