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Facebook, and perhaps all social platforms, should introduce a “dislike” button. If even only experimentally.
Let me explain why— a thread... 1/15
Let me explain why— a thread... 1/15
Don’t get me wrong: a like button was a really great invention for Facebook and Facebook shareholders. Indeed it was even copied by many other social media companies 2/15
Think about it— a super easy action users could take to positively reinforce a friend’s photo or status, it allowed for an order of magnitude increase in little red notification bubbles. 3/15
It increased engagement. Up and to the right! This is likely directly aligned with Facebook’s success. 4/15
However, I submit, it is also its downfall. It is now a system with no circuit breakers. A like button creates a singular direction for content to go in— it can only go up, liked and then liked more. 5/15
The content doesn’t have to do any REAL work to go up and to the right, it can ONLY go up and to the right.
Likes and more likes. Notifications! More likes! Shares! Even more likes! 6/15
Likes and more likes. Notifications! More likes! Shares! Even more likes! 6/15
The net effect on the brain: small microdoses of heroin.
Now, a microdose of heroin sounds scary but it’s actually not all that bad. Positive reinforcement isn’t bad on its own. It is the lack of a negative reinforcement that is dangerous. 7/15
Now, a microdose of heroin sounds scary but it’s actually not all that bad. Positive reinforcement isn’t bad on its own. It is the lack of a negative reinforcement that is dangerous. 7/15
That microdose of heroin is no longer hard to achieve, say with deep thought and insight, but rather vanity and ease.
Resharing a meme is easy! Creating memes is hard. Creating good memes is even harder. 8/15
Resharing a meme is easy! Creating memes is hard. Creating good memes is even harder. 8/15
Because it lacks a negative feedback loop the microdose soon becomes a macrodose. It's so easy to share a meme and get likes it morphs into addiction. 9/15
What are possible solutions?
1. We should introduce a “dislike” button
2. A global view of shared images with discussion and aggregate likes/dislikes
Effectively we should nudge Facebook to be more of Reddit. Reddit is a community where Facebook is an echo chamber. 10/15
1. We should introduce a “dislike” button
2. A global view of shared images with discussion and aggregate likes/dislikes
Effectively we should nudge Facebook to be more of Reddit. Reddit is a community where Facebook is an echo chamber. 10/15
Imagine your politically opposite friend shares a meme on Facebook. You don’t like this, but you have no way of safely saying so. 11/15
With a dislike button you could now share your thoughts. Or maybe there could be options for the dislike to be anonymous? Maybe you could make anonymous comments? 12/15
Or maybe you decide to look at the global view of the shared meme and see that actually, globally, there are very few dislikes (which is an aggregate across all shares) and realize there is a deeper meaning to glean. 13/15
You look at the meme with a renewed curiosity and open eyes.
Social media is here to stay. It’s not going away. There is nothing to fix, it just turns out it’s not quite complete. 14/15
Social media is here to stay. It’s not going away. There is nothing to fix, it just turns out it’s not quite complete. 14/15
We just discovered a new, digital, natural order of macro human psychology and we are in the very early process of trying to understand it.
We should be experimenting. 15/15
We should be experimenting. 15/15
