It's a bit of an unwinnable battle. People will always use it as disagree button
Earnest question- what is it supposed to be used for? I don't downvote people very often, but I think I've only ever seen it used express approval or disapproval so that the score reflects community sentiment
How is it supposed to be used?
In addition to what others said, in comments the down vote is meant to be used on comments that don't further discussion in good faith.
I used to subscribe to that idea, but I've since changed my mind. If the far majority use upvotes to mean agreement, then me upvoting a controversial, but well structured, opinion will likely be viewed as agreement as well.
It's a nice idea to think the voting system is meant to promote discussion, instead of homogenise opinions in a community.
when a post doesn't fit the community purpose or is generally inappropriate
Isn't that where you use the report functionality?
I guess that's usually also the basis on which I disagree with someone 😅 most of the time if I'm downvoting someone it's because I think they're being unkind, which I consider being inappropriate
Thanks for sharing your perspective with me :)
I always thought a downvote was just a silent "Booooooooooo!"
That's what it should be, a "booo!" for lazy and willfully ignorant comments.
In practice most people downvote any take they disagree with, no matter if it was expressed well, written respectfully, and contributes to the conversation.
I think this kind of voting system intentionally places the content people want to see (i.e. agree with), at the top which increases active users.
But it doesn't stimulate healthy debate and definitely doesn't encourage going against the mainstream.
Slashdot had a more interesting system that let only a select number of people rank quality and set a post category (like funny, informative, etc).
I think it's a nice sentiment, but you can't change emergent behavior just by saying "this is wrong"
This is wrong.
I'll stop using the downvotes as a disagree button when everyone else stops using upvotes as an agree button.
I actually think up- and downvotes are inherently asymmetrical in this respect.
Upvoting things you agree with is fine and a main use of the function. Why then is downvoting things you disagree with wrong? Because the purpose of voting is visibility, you upvote things you want people to see, like arguments you agree with, and downvote those you don't think people should see.
Now if you believe in having an open discussion you don't want to suppress posts just because you disagree with them. Disagreeing is fine, so downvoting is reserved for posts that detract from the conversation.
Two wrongs do not make a right
Yes they do.
As a rule of thumb I downvote any post that mentions being downvoted or complains about the reaction to a post or comment.
I will give this whole thread a pass, though 🙂
Apparently it's the button you press to get banned from a community.
ASK ME HOW I KNOW
How I know?
So stuupid 😆
Well, just add a 'disagree' button so there's no confusion.
That's just the Uber disagree button now.
Downvotes are definitely a disagree button and anyone denying it is just coping or lying about their own usage of it. Reddiquette was the worst thing that ever happened to internet culture
A lot of those are joke downvotes, well mine was.
I downvote anyone complaining about downvote out of principle.
I'll also down vote anyone using up votes as some kind of metric for their post/comment being inherently right/good
Mine wasn't.
Communities trying to have alternate meanings for upvotes/downvotes must keep in mind that people scrolling posts across communities won't generally notice the community and if they do they won't read the rules and will vote however they want. Trying to force them to follow some silly community specific process is tilting at windmills and bitching about it is embarrassing.
Fr like if you don't like the way people are using the downvote feature why make a post whinging about it and not just make your account on an instance that has it disabled???
aren't they the instance admin themselves?
Even funnier tbh
Indeed, and this is a pinned post on Ye Power Trippin' Bastards. Posters ask if their bans were justified. Downvotes bury the post, preventing an audience from making their opinion about it.
Because it has a legit use. It's just also used to create an echo chamber.
If you believe that people can be just a little responsible, it's better to have it around.
Sadly one can't disable downvotes per community
Yeah if the problem is specific to a community I see how the software's limitations could be an issue. I'm still unsure of what you were hoping to achieve with the post though.
Idk, it can be kinda exhausting but I guess I kinda just operate on the assumption that strangers online are gonna act like a bunch of insufferable contrarians (I'm not always above that sort of thing myself).
I disagree
I couldn't even post an album there because the instance apparently sees external imgur albums as image spam or something stupid.
That's not true. What kind of error are you getting?
It is true, you can literally check for yourself. And there is no error. I didn't even see it as removed from my side on mbin, like with a mod removal, and thought it wasn't federating as there was neither upvotes, nor downvotes, nor comments, until I checked the modlog on your instance.
https://lemmy.dbzer0.com/modlog/961853?page=1&actionType=All&userId=7088902
We disabled downvotes on hexbear and it honestly made for much healthier discussion
That's actually surprising to me, because I'd think that down voting whack stuff would make things better overall. What was happening? It's not like people know who it was, or were down votes done out of spite?
I also couldn't help but notice some super conservative instances I've seen have down votes disabled.
My perspective is that without them bad takes get called out, and if the poster is redeemable they can engage with constructive criticism and learn something from the replies
Rather than people downvoting and moving on which can lead to resentment on a posters behalf if they don't understand why a position of theirs may be getting downvoted
Downvotes were disabled because posts that touched on trans issues were routinely downvoted, often by the same users. Those users were purged and downvotes disabled to good effect.
Uninformed posters are given information if they are sincere.
Malicious posters get dunked on before getting banned.
It has worked very well in my opinion.
Oh no, what would an online community look like without a downvote button?
Facebook. It would look like Facebook.
