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It doesn't look like they're removing dislikes at all, but rather hiding the count of dislikes from viewers of the video (in a test).
This seems rather user-hostile. The downvote count is useful for identifying videos that aren't what they claim to be. And how about DIY videos that give terrible advice? A big downvote ratio will get most people's attention in a way that critical comments may not.
Companies are only interested in user behavior that increases engagement. Everything else is on the chopping block.
No, the real issue here is too many of the "right" things are getting downvoted. So when The White House, Disney or the Academy disable downvotes on part or all of their videos but other wide swaths of videos don't need to disable downvotes, the contrast causes them to stick out like a sore thumb.
It calls attention (also known as engagement) - but not the kind of attention those who run social media companies want. Attention that is counter to the desired narratives is unacceptable. So here we go with the lame excuses that are all the sudden relevant when they weren't when the like/dislike stuff was instated decades ago?
Give me a break.
It's quickly getting to the point where being exposed to youtube at all just opens you up to a ton of intentional manipulation from an organization who's entire product is manipulating people for pay. It's probably best to completely avoid all of it.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Smells political alright. The Biden admin disabled comments on all official The White House channel videos pretty quickly into their administration. Most videos have a tremendously high dislike to like ratio, the most recent is 3.4K dislikes to 205 likes. I don't know who they expect to consume their Youtube content but it apparently isn't the establishment's voter base. This is another brick in the wall that is Yout…
You think Youtube is removing dislikes because of white house vids that average out less than ~25000 views each?
Next, IMDB only allows ratings between 8-10.
You can see the agenda pushing and manipulation on such films as Ghostbusters (2016).
Earlier quoted context omitted.
lol - YouTube and most social media is no longer for us plebs. It's all about pushing propaganda, and unfortunately plebs mass rejecting politically motivated BS is too problematic. Instead of trying to engage/change minds it's just easier to pretend "problems" like people having the temerity to call BS don't exist. Double plus good.
Even "pushing propaganda" is a bit higher minded than social media seems to be. It's all about the money. ALL about the money. How do social companies make money? They sell ads. How do you make more money selling ads? Either you show more ads (increase ad density, or increase eyeball-time-on-platform), or you make more money per ad (I used to see plenty of scam sites - new Kobota tractor for $1500, free shipping, dom…
BTW - there is no better driver of traffic (engagement) to something than a good like/dislike war. This has zero to do with money or they wouldn't be touching it.
Honestly, it seems like there's no easy win here. I think people for and against this both have good arguments. For example, getting rid of dislikes could mitigate the effects of synthetic brigading campaigns. On the other hand, keeping them could in certain cases give a better view of the organic reaction to a video. I don't spend every day trying to solve these problems so I don't have a strong opinion about what t…
Synthetic brigading is what exactly? Bands of synthetics downvoting videos to bring about downfall of humanity? Or do people's opinions count less if they are organized?
This seems rather user-hostile. The downvote count is useful for identifying videos that aren't what they claim to be. And how about DIY videos that give terrible advice? A big downvote ratio will get most people's attention in a way that critical comments may not.
Companies are only interested in user behavior that increases engagement. Everything else is on the chopping block.
No more critic, no more negativity, just kool aid and fake positivity as this is good for business when every one pretend to live in a fairy world...