Any service only cares about engagement so the dislike was never really useful because the core of engagement is rage bait. The only way to truly downvote content is to not engage with it whatsoever. Ex. The only way to dislike Instagram is to not use the platform
The decision to kill the dislike button is very much strictly anti consumer and marks the beginning of the enshitification of youtube, especially the enshitification of the comment section. It use to be that if someone had the most dogshit opinion, they would be disliked into oblivion and nobody would see it. Now even the worst opinions imaginable will be pushed to the top if it can find 100 like minded mouth breathers, effectively normalizing it in the eyes of the average viewer. Same goes for whole videos too. I desperately wish we would come up with a real federated alternative to it, because right now its actively contributing to the decline of humanity.
PeerTube?
It became shit when googol bought it.
Does anyone know is there a reason why they got rid of dislike? I’d have thought they’d want it to help improve recommendations?
The main reason cited was that downvotes discouraged creators from naming and uploading content. There’s probably some truth to it. If I got served with a 10 minute tutorial video and a 60% vote ratio I’m probably not watching that very far.
Money… It looks better not to show dislikes and it puts users into echo chamber.
That’s pretty much all social media’s pipeline right now, just take a look at Bluesky and you’ll see aside from reporting a post/comment there’s no way to downvote/dislike.
Aside from complaining, make sure to do something about it. Otherwise there’s no point.
- Absolutely use uBlock Origin and Sponsorblock on all devices you watch youtube on.
- There’s a Return Youtube Dislike extension you can use. Bonus: you can use data from it to shame various’ companies videos, which is what youtube primarily wanted to avoid by removing dislikes.
- For creators mostly - there are other video-sharing websites you can post your content on (or even easily mirror your youtube uploads). Make sure to upload somewhere else too, so that more people can leave youtube forever.
Do whatever you can to harm youtube (or Google more broadly), as well as support alternatives. Memes and complaining by themselves are pointless, and solve zero issues.
You see them on SmarTube. But I imagine, like most voting on the internet, it snowballs from whatever tilt it initially showed. People be herds like that. They’ll dislike or disagree with something, but change that opinion once they see what “most” others think at that time. Even if it’s 2 Likes and 1 Dislike.
And that is a fantastic pathway for engagement and ad revenue. “Markets” or market segmentation, are just our fancy terms for herds.
Everyone is upvoting this comment so I must downvote to prove I’m not part of the herd
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This has always confused me.
I’ve never liked, disliked, rated, commented, or shared a Youtube video. Because I’m using Freetube, I technically don’t even subscribe anymore. Why are y’all so eager to maintain the algorithm? Does “disliking” a video feel like agency?
If you really wanna punish Youtube creators, watch their video for less than 30 seconds. That won’t count as a view, but I bet the algorithm clocks it as a dislike.
There are creators I follow who don’t make videos full time because the money isn’t there yet for them, but they make good videos. Sponsoring them on Pateron helps them financially, but doesn’t help them grow. if I can signal that this is good content and more people should see it, that helps the creator out and encourages more of that type of content to be created.
Just like I thought. You think it’s your civic duty to train Google’s algorithm in the hopes that it may favor the stuff you like.
You’re a model consumer. I’ll bet you pause the ads when you leave the room.
Yeah, you know, you’re right. Fuck me for wanting the people who make good content to be paid and recognized for their hard work.
You’re both idiots.
One guy doesn’t understand how video-sharing platforms work at all. The other is perfectly happy being a good little consumer for youtube, and doing nothing about it.
Yes, everything you do on youtube is beneficial for… youtube. Including watching with ad blocking and sponsor blocking. But it’s also beneficial for the creators, who may be very nice people, and who may deserve something for their work.
How about throwing your favourite creators an email with short instructions on how to mirror their content to an alternative platform, as well as reasons why you’d greatly appreciate it? Takes maybe 15 minutes the first time, and may actually lead to lasting change. Instead of pretending you’re acting on values and not convenience, while comfortably sitting on your lazy ass, watching everything burn or turn to garbage.
If either of you actually dislikes youtube and/or wants change to happen or alternatives to grow - move your butts and something about it. Based on the comments here, you’re both just contributing to the perpetuation of youtube’s enshitification, and google’s control over the internet in general. While arguing which side is worse. Dumb infighting, and even dumber reasons for it.
they actually changed the algorithm. it used to be preference based, but now its attention based. the people who want the dislike back want the older algorithm back because likes/dislikes used to matter, the shit would sink and the gold would float. ragebait wasn’t the norm back then.
