Not every platform on the fediverse has a downvote system, but those that do (Lemmy, piefed) are heading down a bad path, imo. Downvoting is one of the worst features of reddit, leading to dogpiling, group think, and silencing of minority viewpoints. I do see the value of it, on the surface, and if you want to enable it for yourself to allow certain posts to be downvoted for your own information, I think you should be allowed to do so, but having it set as default for all posts just leads to a toxic and conformist environment, which is what I thought the fediverse was trying to get away from.
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Then go use a platform that’s doesn’t use them. Bye.
Discouraging Fediverse participation isn’t a helpful solution to disagreement.
There are Fediverse platforms without downvotes.
Are you stating fact based on research and analysis, or are you venturing an opinion?
@rabiezaater@piefed.social not all instances enable them. I think Piefed can restrict them in some manners (local users only, or something), and in NodeBB you can disable them completely.
It’s not an all-or-nothing proposition, if you think downvotes are not good, run a software (or join an instance) that doesn’t have them enabled.
I believe Piefed let’s you restrict downvotes to people that are subscribers. I think that’s a good solution to idiots downvoting from all just because they’re not interested in or understanding the post and/or the community it’s in. I also wonder if people even understand that they’re not training an algorithm, just dragging people’s posts down.
I just hate when I’m having a rational, sourced argument with someone, and they downvote every single one of my replies, to show me that they disagree.
I know that, that’s why we’re having this discussion.I find that a good thing. It’s a bright red flag that tells me to direct my attention to other people who are able to behave themselves.
It’s good that exceptional-level bigots have a way to visibly out themselves as bigots!
To be fair, you accumulated most of the downvotes (I see) in a single post and the attached comments. You got two things at the same time: the unpopularopinions community tends to be harsh. From my experience I’d say you get way more downvotes there, than in other communities. And secondly, you picked one of the two super controversial topics. Brace for downvotes if you post about AI. Or Israel. Dunno if the latter toned down a bit, or if I’ve unsubscribed from enough communities since.
It’ll be better with almost all other topics.
Not sure if I’d go straight for “silencing”. I mean the post and most comments are still there. So it’s just that you got a lot of backlash. But I can still read what you wrote. And you got quite some engagement. But I get what you mean.
And down-votes are a bit weird. We never agree if they mean bury the content somewhere at the bottom. Or if it means " I disagree with what you wrote". That just gets lumped together. And some people use them sparingly, some hand out a lot of downvotes. Which I guess could be fine if they’re used to for the frontpage ranking to sort the posts. But the way we use them doesn’t really give them the right weight.
And by the way, I’m not sure if I like up-votes either. You’ll get 300 of them for re-posting a meme. And 3 upvotes for coming up with really good advice to someone’s question.
We never agree if they mean bury the content somewhere at the bottom. Or if it means " I disagree with what you wrote”.
I think this is a huge point and one thing I think is nice about Slashdot: you can indicate a reason for your vote.
I would like to see more finely-grained feedback than just “no”. Particularly as it forces the voter to justify why they’re downvoting.
Some posts/contents are bad because they’re spam, abusive, or against the rules, or in the wrong place - downvoting these is useful crowd-sourced moderation, particularly for things that don’t warrant a mod report.
Some are just indisputably wrong and it’s a useful signal that the poster is talking rubbish. Then there’s the grey area.
Sometimes it’s just that the poster’s opinion is unpopular, and people are downvoting to suppress views they disagree with - I think that’s not a good thing for a discussion and encourages echo chambers. I like the idea of one of the downvote options being “I disagree” and that basically not doing anything.
I really like the ability to downvote. It enables me to say “this was badly argumented and a waste of my time” without spending too much effort for that. I’d write it anyway, but probably using impolite words that would be worse for the Fediverse than my downvotes are.
I dont remember where I’ve seen the stats, but I make about 10 upvotes per one downvote. I strongly believe at least my downvoting behaviour does more good than bad for the Forumverse.
When I was looking for a good instance for myself, Blåhaj seemed like an excellent fit, but when I noticed the downvote button was missing, I changed my mind. I would be annoyed if that feature disappeared altogether.
At least on PieFed’s Matrix chat there has been very constructive conversations about whether and how to allow downvoting. To my eyes, the solutions they came up with seem very good.
Not that I’d remember off the back of my hand what the hell they decided in the end. Maybe someone will tell? :) @rimu@piefed.social @wjs018@piefed.social
Downvotes are to put a comment towards the bottom of the page for being irrelevant to the post, not to tell someone you disagree with them.
According to who?
Also, what’s the difference? If I down vote you to bury your comment for being irrelevant, poorly worded, bad faith, etc. or down vote you because I don’t like your comment, the result is the same.
The only scenario where I see disabling downvotes as a good idea is when upvotes are disabled as well.
So you either:
- have only number of views (no up/down votes) so people don’t chase virtual points
- or there are both of them so that when combined they result in a fair rating.
Upvoting without downvoting doesn’t show if people like it, nor whether it is good or bad. It only shows that it reached a lot of people and is popular. And that can be achieved with views alone.
I mean it’s a mixed bag… I get the idea of nothing should be removed, blocked, downvoted etc… as the ideal of free speach.
Right up until you look at every platform that explicitly avoids it and goes full “We’re all about free speech!”.
IE huge problem is, the first people to jump to those platforms, are the ones that have been banned for good reason from everywhere else. Which of course means… nazi’s come in droves Reasonable people that either have less borderline, or perhaps no borderline thoughts get there… see 500 posts from nazi’s, and head for the door imidiately, until it just turns into a nazi echo chamber.
Why should downvotes be against free speech? I think downvotes are part of the expression of opinion.
Much as people would like them to, both upvotes and downvotes mean very little. I learned this on reddit but it seems equally true here.
I’d probably do less blocking if I could downvote instead. Not sure if that’s good or bad.
I don’t think downvotes are necessary for every type of post. Art and information are personal, so if you don’t like it you should just move on.
I think opinion pieces, advice or just wrong information are the exact reason why downvotes are needed.
Advice with a lot of downvotes appears to be wrong. A news source with a lot of downvotes appears to misleading or false. If you post your opinion, downvotes show people disagree with your point of view.
It works for me, and if you disagree, feel free to downvotes this comment. I don’t seem it as a personal attack.
Edit: fyi, I upvoted your post as like the engagement on this subject.
