Making the dislike count private across YouTube • Hacker News Board

Re: Making the dislike count private across YouTube

#291

Post by Mountain_Skies » Wed, Nov 10, 2021, 7:17 PM UTC

kiryin wrote: post #164

I wonder what likes and dislikes are even for. They don't generate income for channel owners afaik, nor do they affect the recommendation algorithm for users, also afaik. Only views "matter." Especially if the other half gets hidden now, they should just get rid of the whole thing. It doesn't seem to provide anyone with anything, except useless bandwagoning

Try finding reviews for older fitness equipment. 90% of them are generated by scripts pulling images and text from Amazon and image search. The other 10% are either old commercials from when the product was released or long term owners of the product doing real reviews. None of these videos get very many views so that's not a useful metric. The automated videos probably only get viewed for a minute or so before they exited but that's enough time to register a view. The automated videos tend to accumulate dislikes from people angry they got tricked into watching. Now that signal is gone and actual product reviews will no longer be able to rise above the automated ones by having a favorable Like/Dislike ratio. Because these reviews are for old products, even the legitimate reviews have only a small number of views and doesn't serve as a useful way to separate the clickbait from the actual content.

Re: Making the dislike count private across YouTube

#292

Post by noisem4ker » Wed, Nov 10, 2021, 7:17 PM UTC

kingTug wrote: post #226

louissan wrote: post #110

I find this pathetic. As if the removal of the "dislike button" helps in any way, shape or form to create a more "inclusive" environment. This reeks of the silencing of what is perceived as dissident voices, is all. I've personally never hit a like or dislike button in my life, never will ... but found it interesting as a viewer to see the ratio. Even knowing this ratio is probably at least partially the outcome of b…

I haven't hit the like button since 2013 when I learned that it was publicly visible on my google account.

The activity feed is no more, I think, and liked videos only end up in a private playlist now.

Re: Making the dislike count private across YouTube

#293

Post by newsclues » Wed, Nov 10, 2021, 7:17 PM UTC

subsubzero wrote: post #55

This still seems like a huge disconnect to what people use youtube for vs. what google thinks it should be used for. Google wants youtube to be all network and brands making content. ie. a future version of what TV is now. What actual people want is creator made videos(diy/review/podcast videos and everything else that make youtube wonderful). This disconnect has been happening since google bought youtube and this re…

Business vs consumers.

Re: Making the dislike count private across YouTube

#294

Post by louissan » Wed, Nov 10, 2021, 7:17 PM UTC

Barrin92 wrote: post #199

louissan wrote: post #110

I find this pathetic. As if the removal of the "dislike button" helps in any way, shape or form to create a more "inclusive" environment. This reeks of the silencing of what is perceived as dissident voices, is all. I've personally never hit a like or dislike button in my life, never will ... but found it interesting as a viewer to see the ratio. Even knowing this ratio is probably at least partially the outcome of b…

as the post itself points out this has nothing to do with dissident voices but with preventing dislike attacks and 'ratio-ing' as is common on websites that have these mechanisms in place. Downvote bombing content if anything distorts discourse and makes it harder to figure out what people actually think. There's a reason this very website caps downvotes at -4. What I find cringeworthy is this keyboard warrior mental…

Oh I could not give a dead flying flamingo about likes and dislikes on YT.

It's the intent behind all this that I find repulsive. As someone justly mentioned above, this all comes down to uninterrupted flow of content towards (less) able to resists psyches.

End result: $++;

Re: Making the dislike count private across YouTube

#295

Post by JadoJodo » Wed, Nov 10, 2021, 7:18 PM UTC

> Our experiment data confirmed that this behavior does occur at a higher proportion on smaller channels.

Why not simply hide the vote count (either way) until a certain threshold of votes is reached? This could be set higher for channels that are just starting out. Below a certain vote count, I personally don’t see much value anyway.

Re: Making the dislike count private across YouTube

#296

Post by trts » Wed, Nov 10, 2021, 7:18 PM UTC

The dislike button on YouTube videos is one of the few remaining signals that what you are seeing is propaganda.

It hadn't occurred to me that this would happen (although it seems obvious) and it is unexpectedly frightening to me.

I suppose the fallback will be videos with comments enabled, where people can 'like' a comment who is saying something common sense and reasonable in response to the content.

Re: Making the dislike count private across YouTube

#297

Post by adminscoffee » Wed, Nov 10, 2021, 7:18 PM UTC

nickjj wrote: post #67

Bummer. I often use like vs dislike ratios as a gauge on whether a video is worth watching. If I see a 3,000 up / 48 down video on a topic I'm interested in there's a really good chance the video is great. I'm a small time creator (~13.5k subs) and don't care at all about upvotes or downvotes being public. There's only been a handful of videos out of hundreds that received more downvotes than expected because the vid…

that's exactly what i do, i think youtube is messing up big time. this is almost as bad as onlyfans trying to go completely wholesome

Re: Making the dislike count private across YouTube

#298

Post by renewiltord » Wed, Nov 10, 2021, 7:20 PM UTC

The interesting thing about this is that I'm clearly occupying a different demographic for YouTube. Brigading isn't a big deal for the kind of content I watch, but people often upload fake videos. I have an extension that displays the like/dislike ratio on recommended videos and search results and that helps filter out fake uploads.

By fake uploads I mean reuploads that do not contain the actual example. For instance, I might want to watch a Brahmos or Oniks launch (I find the way the missile orients itself very entertaining) and there'll be a bunch of videos which are 'reaction' videos. They'll use a thumbnail of the content but mostly be some guy talking about the content. Or for a football goal, it's some guy recreating it in FIFA. I don't want to watch these things and the dislike bar warns me of the stuff.

This is a pity.

Re: Making the dislike count private across YouTube

#299

Post by CamelCaseName » Wed, Nov 10, 2021, 7:20 PM UTC

alex_c wrote: post #161

This change is very upsetting. Ever since becoming a parent, I've been baffled by a mystery. I noticed that - unlike most other popular content - children's videos on YouTube almost always have roughly a 2:1 like to dislike ratio no matter what channel or type of content. Why? Where do all the dislikes come from? Is it from kids mashing touch screens at random? Parents taking what small revenge they can at being subj…

My uneducated guess is that children's videos are a highly competitive category, and that buy disliking competitors, you can raise your own status.

Re: Making the dislike count private across YouTube

#300

Post by dmonitor » Wed, Nov 10, 2021, 7:21 PM UTC

josefresco wrote: post #165

louissan wrote: post #110

I find this pathetic. As if the removal of the "dislike button" helps in any way, shape or form to create a more "inclusive" environment. This reeks of the silencing of what is perceived as dissident voices, is all. I've personally never hit a like or dislike button in my life, never will ... but found it interesting as a viewer to see the ratio. Even knowing this ratio is probably at least partially the outcome of b…

From the article.. "What we learned from the experiment: Those in the experiment could still see and use the public dislike button, but because the count was not visible to them, we found that they were less likely to target a video’s dislike button to drive up the count. In short, our experiment data showed a reduction in dislike attacking behavior 1. We’ve also heard directly from smaller creators, and those just g…

If nobody can see the dislike number, what is the point of disliking a video? It doesn't make the video less likely to appear on feeds. Having the number makes disliking a video feel like you've actually done something rather than just piss in the ocean.