• Luci@lemmy.ca
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    7 days ago

    Apparently it’s the button you press to get banned from a community.

    ASK ME HOW I KNOW

  • Kusimulkku@lemm.ee
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    6 days ago

    It’s a bit of an unwinnable battle. People will always use it as disagree button

    • snooggums@lemmy.world
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      7 days ago

      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.

  • Cris@lemmy.world
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    6 days ago

    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?

    • HereIAm@lemmy.world
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      6 days ago

      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.

      • Cris@lemmy.world
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        6 days ago

        Yeah, that’s kind of the nature of communication I think, and ultimately votes are a form of communication :/

        If people understand them to mean agreement or disagreement, that’s the message they’ll recieve regardless of whether it was the message that you were trying to send.

        I guess if I wanna convey I appreciate someone’s contribution even though I don’t share their perspective I can always leave a comment; that seems like something I’d appreciate seeing in my inbox so maybe it’s worthwhile for me to make that a habit

        • HereIAm@lemmy.world
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          6 days ago

          Yeah that’s something I do sometimes as well. I usually just don’t vote on a comment as a third option for when I disagree with them, but don’t want to punish having a different viewpoint ^^

    • OpenStars@piefed.social
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      5 days ago

      This post does not present the requisite context, which is that this community is a bit special in comparison to others. Read the sidebar text where it explains more how the mod wants people to use it differently. On Reddit there were some others like that, e.g. CMV, and had different-styled icons to help people realize that - before the days where people just expected every single sub to function identically so that they could bother not reading the sub rules before posting or commenting in it.

      e.g.:

      Do not downvote posts if you think they deserved it. Use the comment votes (see below) for that.

    • kattfisk@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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      5 days ago

      It’s a tool for curating the content, upvote posts you want people to see, and downvote those you think should be hidden. So stuff that’s irrelevant, factually incorrect, pointless, inflammatory etc.

      Thinking that something should be hidden just because you disagree with it is problematic.

    • dch82@lemmy.zip
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      6 days ago

      when a post doesn’t fit the community purpose or is generally inappropriate

        • OpenStars@piefed.social
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          5 days ago

          I suppose it depends on how bad it is. e.g. if it’s a community for “videos”, and someone submits one with unmoving text that is basically an audio file, you could downvote it then for not matching.

          Some software - like PieFed and some Lemmy apps - have automated features that rely less on human moderator intervention and more community feedback, to either auto-collapse or even auto-hide replies with downvotes below user-set thresholds. You can ofc disable these, but if you want them… they are there for you. Also they are immediate, as opposed to waiting until a mod wakes up and finds time to render a decision on everything reported since the last time they checked in.

      • Cris@lemmy.world
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        6 days ago

        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 :)

    • AItoothbrush@lemmy.zip
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      6 days ago

      Ok but even if its for something else everyone else is still using it for that. And on another note, why shouldnt i use it to show disapproval?

  • Ricky Rigatoni@lemm.ee
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    6 days ago

    I’ll stop using the downvotes as a disagree button when everyone else stops using upvotes as an agree button.

    • kattfisk@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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      6 days ago

      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.

      • Swedneck@discuss.tchncs.de
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        5 days ago

        you upvote a comment saying they love cats
        you ignore a comment saying they don’t like cats
        you downvote a comment saying they hate cats because cats are evil
        and you report a comment saying they eat cats

  • Walk_blesseD@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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    7 days ago

    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???

      • Walk_blesseD@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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        7 days ago

        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).

    • Serinus@lemmy.world
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      7 days ago

      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.

    • zqps@sh.itjust.works
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      6 days ago

      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.

  • Z_Poster365 [none/use name]@hexbear.net
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    7 days ago

    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

    • chicken@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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      7 days ago

      Reddiquette was the worst thing that ever happened to internet culture

      I can agree that they end up being a disagree button in practice, but you’re saying they should be a disagree button?

        • chicken@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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          6 days ago

          Almost anything else or nonexistent. Maybe a way of filtering lazy, unhelpful, or uncivil comments. Downvotes being a disagree button just seems blatantly toxic. Expressing disagreements calls for using actual words.

          • dream_weasel@sh.itjust.works
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            6 days ago

            Not sure about that last bit. Do you know how many people are wrong on the Internet? Lemmy isn’t my job, yo: I can’t engage in a dialogue with with them all.

            • DarkNightoftheSoul@mander.xyz
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              6 days ago

              no. you might agree with someone saying, “this” but its lazy. “just google it” isnt helpful though you might agree with the sentiment. and someone might be making an argument you agree with, but being toxic and vitriolic. you should downvote those even if you may agree with them. it was called upvote and downvote because the feature would cause the comment to move up or down the chain to the top of the post or to be buried. disagreement downvotes are a fundamental misunderstanding and/or abuse of the system, thank you for coming to my ted talk.

  • Scott M. Stolz@authorship.studio
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    6 days ago

    It would be interesting to see how people would behave if you had both a “Disagree” and a “Low Quality” button. Would it make any difference, or would people who dislike it also hit the low quality button out of spite?

  • sik0fewl@lemmy.ca
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    6 days ago

    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 🙂

  • nucleative@lemmy.world
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    6 days ago

    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).