@wumpus, I’ll kindly ask that in the future, you not create threads and make them appear as though I created them, especially not with titles this stupid.
PS - Discourse lets you “move” posts? WTF? I certainly hope this is not a function that any random poster has.
Nah, he just abusin’ his admin powers again :)
It was simply a matter of wanting to see them in action. I didn’t know if they would bother me, if I wouldn’t notice them, or if I would even come to appreciate them. To be honest, it’s not a feature I use very often. The only social media I use that has likes is Twitter, and it’s a feature I almost never touch, and furthermore think is lazy. But I was open to seeing how they felt on the forum.
Interesting point, but I disagree. Replies are entirely a function of navigation, not approval.
But more to the point, if you’re posting because you crave approval or attention, it’s my feeling you’re doing it wrong. That’s not what this forum is for. Not that there’s anything wrong with craving approval or attention, but it shouldn’t be the primary reason for typing something on the forum.
Thanks for points this out, sinnick. I agree with you and I moved the posts back into their original thread.
Wumpus, I appreciate that you’re trying to keep things discrete and easy to navigate and search, but it’s important to me that we let posters determine things like where their posts go, what their threads are titled, and so forth. Moderators moving posts and breaking out new threads is one of those features that would be hugely helpful in a larger community, but for the most part, we don’t really need it here.
-Tom
This made me laugh.
This is a profound misunderstanding. These are conversations, so any response – whether it is a written response, or a nod / wave / thumbs-up, is a part of the conversation.
Talking to someone (or to a group), and expecting them (or anyone in the group) to talk back to you in return – or acknowledge what you said with a simple nod – is that “craving attention”?
Now if you want to argue that every post is in fact not an implied conversation, but more of a speech or editorial, where people should not need a response, or care if there are any responses… that’s an interesting philosophy, I guess, but rather anathema to what forums traditionally exist for: dialog, interaction, and back-and-forth conversation.
Fine, I have deleted my posts on the handling of anchor links as they are all now wildly off topic here in this topic; others should do the same since it’ll be completely unintelligible with the holes in the conversation.
Or if wildly unintelligible is what you’re shooting for, you go girl.
So are “minimal encouragers” in physical social interactions, actually a part of the conversation? Certainly they are. A minimal part of the conversation…with potential.
However, I would argue that this is where the analogy breaks. Because in a real, physical interaction, a minimal encourager supports the flow of conversation, and can also be expounded upon in the moment, and even challenged. Whether it’s an “uh-huh” or “Yeah, I agree,” or simply a nod, in the moment I can say, “Hey, Jeff. You just agreed with him that Prometheus is a great movie. Why do you think that?”
And thus the conversation moves forward, and I’ve folded you into the conversation.
Likes, however much I might like them, do not do that. I don’t think I have ever seen a single instance where somebody Liked a post and another person in the “conversation” noted that and said, “Hey Christien. You liked that post about how Forever is the best of all Judy Blume’s books. What’s up with that?”
Likes do not further the conversation the way minimal encouragers do in a social situation, because nobody gets folded into the conversation based on a Like. People use Likes instead of making a response. Which keeps them out of the conversation.
So I don’t think the analogy works. While it’s fine for people who don’t wish to contribute in that way–it’s okay to be a lurker, after all–to just hit like, it’s not the same thing as being in an actual conversation.
-xtien
Yeah, this bugs me too. Ideally any button or link that results in a major shift in activity or location should leave a breadcrumb that the Back button respects. Most other sites and apps work like that – if I’m buying a flight and have the date picker open, Back just closes the picker; if I have the keyboard open on anything, Back closes the keyboard without affecting anything else; in Google Music, if I have the settings menu UI open covering 80% of the screen, Back closes it without navigating further.
Yeah, thats a really weird thing to do. Isn’t it about time Wumpus got his moderating rights removed here?
I mean, its one thing to be an annoying ass, but with the power to move and delete at a whim, and actually doing so over and over? That’s not a good thing.
Maybe, you’re thinking of it from a limited viewpoint? I like a tweet on Twitter for many reasons, but the most relavant reason here is that it’s a good way of saying “I agree” or “thank you”, but I don’t want to waste your time with a reply. It’s the equivalent of a “Thanks!” email. I really don’t want an email thanking me for whatever info I just provided, but I still appreciate the thought. Likes are perfect for that, I am not getting interrupted with something, but if I want to look, I know my post was appreciated.
I personally really dislike when I am following a thread for a game I am interested in, see it has a new post, and it’s only an agreement/great post reply. Likes are a way of saying thanks without the spam. As it now, if someone provides a useful post or answers a question I asked, I want to say thank you, but I don’t want to waste everyone’s time with it.
Great. Now I have to go and look up what anchor links are.
-xtien
Thats me as well @LeeAbe, but I honestly don’t see that issue propping up much on this board. What I do see instead, is tons of people just posting Gifs in a thread, without any relevance to the topic at hand ,and thats much, much worse in my opinion. Its like shouting nonsense at people having a discussion.
Of course, it also makes the forum much harder to browse at will, say, at work, or other places like public cafees and the like.
I don’t think you – or Tom – have followed the analogy through. It is a room with dozens, or hundreds of people. Only one person can reasonably talk at a time. The others are listening, nodding along as they go, saying “um-hm” and so on. As you listen, you nod. That is a part of listening, and a part that provides active feedback from the entire group without being as invasive (or not-scalable) as talking.
People do not use likes “instead of” making a response, they use likes to encourage those that are speaking, and as a form of active listening. Which is particularly effective in large groups, when finding a turn to talk – or something that has not already been said – can be challenging.
You and @thraeg have the “power” to delete your own posts, too. That is why I suggested you exercise it in this scenario.
As for moving, I like to organize in the very specific case of discussions about Discourse so I can properly follow up on them. Having 25 posts about an arcane aspect of Discourse buried in a three month long (so far) 2200 post utterly unrelated topic about likes being globally enabled or disabled is … pretty much the polar opposite of “stuff I can find and follow up on later”.
Agreed, it’s not a problem, but there are multiple times a day I want to tell someone thanks, or good thoughtful post, but don’t want to bump the thread to do so. I really liked having a way of saying so.
I like this as an idea, as I believe in the idea of active listening as you, as I believe in the idea of active viewing of a play or a movie. But those two things have very different results. The former lends energy to the experience, because it is taking place in real time and the performers feed off of the energy of the audience. The latter adds only to me, or perhaps to the people around me. It does nothing for the actual thing that has been created. It is a solid. A play is liquid or gas. And that’s the difference between a post and a real-time physical conversation. One is formed. And one is forming.
Regardless, there is simply no evidence to support your assertion that “they use likes to encourage those that are speaking.” I like it as an idea. Sure. But there is simply no evidence to support it. It’s just your interpretation of their intention. Which is all well and good, but, again, not supported by anything actually.
My assertion that they click “Like” instead of actually contributing to the conversation because it’s easier is just as valid. I think you would have to allow that.
You’re right. In a living room of hundreds of people, or dozens, only one can talk at a time. But a few extra people nodding on the periphery hardly adds to the conversation. Again, I’m fine with Likes. It’s nice to have the validation every now and again. But let’s please not pretend that they actually add to the conversation in the way that me, being in an actual living room with you, and saying, “Yes. That!” actually adds to the conversation. Likes don’t do that. They are a substitution for actual input. And one, again, that is not followed up upon.
Which point I thought was great in my post, and which point you ignored.
And this…
I’m sorry, wumpus, but this is absurd as a counter-point. Because it makes my point. On a forum conversation, there is always a chance to find a turn to talk, unlike in a real physical conversation. I can quote what I actually want to respond to…and make my point…when I get my turn to talk…maybe days or hours or minutes later. Which is not how real conversations work. Real conversations are like a river.
These are like an ice floe.
-xtien
For someone with a million strained analogies about how forums are just like [OTHER FORM OF COMMUNICATION], you appear shockingly unaware that conversations often naturally drift, wander, and digress from the stated topic before eventually finding their way back. Qt3 has never had a rigid “stay on topic” rule. Deleting your posts and telling others to do the same is transparently sour grapes, deliberately making this part of the conversation confusing and hard to follow because you didn’t get to organize it the way you wanted.
Moving posts is a disruptive and annoying experience for anyone reading the thread (as I found out earlier today when Discourse just silently refused to load in any more posts because they had been moved, and then had to re-skim old posts in their new location to catch up to what I had already read). As for a way to track things to follow up on later (without inconveniencing everyone else in the process), I hear that the latest beta version of Chrome is testing out an experimental new feature called “bookmarks” – maybe check that out.
You still can, there’s the PM function. It also helps by allowing you to be more nuanced in your appreciation. Perhaps, if you want to show support for someone writing on a difficult topic, “like” isn’t alway the best response.
There is, in fact, evidence!
Here’s a poll from another, very active Discourse instance, where they voted on why they use likes – and they used likes so much, in fact, they lobbied for us (rather annoyingly, to be honest) to keep increasing the like limits. Which we did based on trust level multipliers.
This is a multiple choice poll, and it was public anyway (I deleted the avatar “who voted for what” sections because you wouldn’t know these people, and a sea of tiny avatars is just noise to you anyway) but my votes are noted in blue, so … that’s why I, personally, like stuff. I guess my only outlier is “mad feels” but damn it, I get the feels sometimes.
Reading this list just makes me feel good, because freakin’ empathy for my fellow man feels good. And that’s their own, self-represented ideas of why they like stuff, not mine in any way.
I disagree; imagine sitting in a room where every participant is stone cold motionless, until such time as they speak. That’s… super alien, because we expect some ambient active listening engagement as we talk, which is exactly what likes are.
Reply metrics did not decline during the period that likes were enabled here. Here’s post count by date, from 2017-01-15 to today… I’ve inverted 2017-04-15 to 2017-05-15, the period when likes were enabled.
Perhaps I ignored it because the data doesn’t support it? Likes have always been an improv “Yes, and…” mechanism, and it works. I’m tired of throwing around that Meryl Streep quote, but when it comes to empathy, less is not more. More is more. Watch the damn movie already if you don’t believe me.
Anyways:
I’ll be muting this topic, not out of spite at all, but because we made a fair decision as a community and no further discussion is really necessary.
(I will be following up to delete the likes from the database, though, because we really need to clean that data up… we can’t have phantom likes from a one month period hanging around for a decade. That just offends me from a data cleanliness perspective.)
