The number causes groupthink. Higher numbers maker people more likely to upvote and the inverse for lower numbers. I like the "show the amount of each" feature here and think it alleviates some of the issues, but I still think up/downvotes are easily rigged and designed to give dopamine hits rather than be representative of the validity of ideas.
TBH now that I can see when someone downvotes me, which is still pretty rare here but used to be frequent on Reddit before they hid comment scores, it makes me introspective and self-critical, I think that part is good. We should know in real-time when someone doesn't like what you said. Negative feedback is one of the things I like most about the internet in general, I'm used to writing in newspapers where your critics have to go through a snowstorm of filters before you hear what they have to say. And sometimes it's just easiest for someone to tell you "no" without leaving a message. Of course I am curious what they object to but nobody's got time for every dumb thing someone says online. Maybe if we had other ways to downvote, like "this is incorrect," "this is something I disagree with," "this is going to get somebody killed," that sort of thing. Emojis instead of votes.
I am pretty sure that the people who downvote me on Reddit or elsewhere are the people I would have the most interesting and illuminating discussions with but we rarely ever get to that point, and that's 100% down to the voting system. It didn't used to be like this on the old message boards in the 90s and early 00s.
Honestly, it was mostly flame wars and 1000 post threads of two people just fucking savaging each other. I am not suffering from some nostalgia where I'm reminiscing about the good old days of online boards. They were just as shit as online discourse is now. But you didn't have this universal expectation that everyone is supposed to have good manners to each other. The mods in those days were Nazis but they'd only step in when the flame war was about to turn into an actual fistfight IRL, or when it just got too annoying for them to handle. There's a space in-between a good old-fashioned throwdown fight and people just being shitheads online that's gone missing in the last ten years or so.
The number causes groupthink. Higher numbers maker people more likely to upvote and the inverse for lower numbers. I like the "show the amount of each" feature here and think it alleviates some of the issues, but I still think up/downvotes are easily rigged and designed to give dopamine hits rather than be representative of the validity of ideas.
deleted by creator
TBH now that I can see when someone downvotes me, which is still pretty rare here but used to be frequent on Reddit before they hid comment scores, it makes me introspective and self-critical, I think that part is good. We should know in real-time when someone doesn't like what you said. Negative feedback is one of the things I like most about the internet in general, I'm used to writing in newspapers where your critics have to go through a snowstorm of filters before you hear what they have to say. And sometimes it's just easiest for someone to tell you "no" without leaving a message. Of course I am curious what they object to but nobody's got time for every dumb thing someone says online. Maybe if we had other ways to downvote, like "this is incorrect," "this is something I disagree with," "this is going to get somebody killed," that sort of thing. Emojis instead of votes.
deleted by creator
I am pretty sure that the people who downvote me on Reddit or elsewhere are the people I would have the most interesting and illuminating discussions with but we rarely ever get to that point, and that's 100% down to the voting system. It didn't used to be like this on the old message boards in the 90s and early 00s.
deleted by creator
Honestly, it was mostly flame wars and 1000 post threads of two people just fucking savaging each other. I am not suffering from some nostalgia where I'm reminiscing about the good old days of online boards. They were just as shit as online discourse is now. But you didn't have this universal expectation that everyone is supposed to have good manners to each other. The mods in those days were Nazis but they'd only step in when the flame war was about to turn into an actual fistfight IRL, or when it just got too annoying for them to handle. There's a space in-between a good old-fashioned throwdown fight and people just being shitheads online that's gone missing in the last ten years or so.
I just wish more people would comment with why they disagree rather than only downvoting.
Maybe my comments just tend to be too long...
It's because they know you're a lib
oh shit i've been found out! :screm-a: