Enable "Reaction" feature on forums

[Zeditha]

You know... after some more thought on the topic, I've realised... what would be the point?

I've been so focused on the fact that no, bad things probably wouldn't happen, that I forgot to think about if any *good* things might happen.

I can't see reactions fitting well in any of the forum sections. Sure, it might be 'fun', but the only place I can see any benefit is Suggestions, where condensing 'support' and 'no support' into a clickable icon might make reading easier.

 

I continue to doubt that this forum would severely cripple itself from having reactions available, but I don't think there's any real need for it, nor anything to be gained.

[RealWilliamShakespeare]

2 hours ago, Fuzzbucket said:

I hate it even worse now that I see those.... So what do you see - a string of under a much "liked" post ? Or one, and you hover and see a string of names...

 

People wanted "sad" to sympathise in general discussion when a pet dies... Which I rather feel is cheap as a response. If you really can't be bothered to post "sorry for your loss", just don't do anything. I know I would feel no better at all seeing a string of  under my post.

No, another user @KPOP provided this example of exactly how they'd look under the posts. This is an invision board with exactly the type of reactions TJ suggested.

https://invisioncommunity.com/forums/topic/443720-my-new-nice-landing-page/

It doesn't clutter the page, nor is it annoying. I really don't understand what the problem is with people assuming it'll be an eyesore, because it's just the tiniest detail - easily ignorable for those who don't want to see it. And I'm sure a lot of people would feel better knowing that people sympathise. I know I would. Plus, the entire point of reactions isn't just a cop-out for those who don't want to comment - I could leave a sad face and also leave a post saying sorry for their losses. It isn't one or the other. Fr, if you don't want to react to a post, just don't! I'm sure it'd be useful for a lot of people though.

[Alrexwolf]

1 hour ago, RealWilliamShakespeare said:

*SNIP* And I'm sure a lot of people would feel better knowing that people sympathise. I know I would. *SNIP*

 

This is exactly the reason this shouldn't be added. Because it also goes the other way. If people feel better knowing others sympathize (aka, when they get reactions), then they will feel worse "knowing" others do not sympathize (aka, no reactions). 

 

Like... the reason people want stuff like sounds like they want it because other social media outlets/forums/whatever have it and they want those likes/reacts/whatever here. However, is that really a good thing? Plenty of research suggests that stuff like this can lead to more anxiety and more  depression in people. Don't get me wrong or mix my words; I'm not saying likes on a forum for a pixel dragon game are going to cause anyone to have anxiety or get depressed - the point is that I don't feel these types of features becoming commonplace everywhere are needed or healthy. I, too, am someone who suffers with anxiety like many others here have stated. they do It's very, very nice to be able to come to a forum where I don't have that pressure to want likes or reacts or whatever. 

 

I like that this forum has the air of a more debate/conversation-driven place. And less a feel of a social media outlet. Perhaps it should just be considered my personal preference... but I can't help wanting what I want and speaking up in favor of no reactions/likes.

[FoxintheBox4]

I'm neutral about this feature.

[RainDear]

If the only forum this makes sense for is the suggestions forum and if you remove all negative icons, you have discarded the only possible use for it. If you can't give a negative vote for a suggestion, if you can only make positive reactions, it becomes useless as a barometer of user reaction to a suggestion. Beyond the variety of ways the reaction can be read - I you, I your idea, I the language you used, and on and on. You can never know what the reaction meant, and if you can't make a negative reaction to a suggestion it can't be used to "vote" on a suggestion. I already didn't like the idea, but I now see that it is useless.

[Shadowdrake]

(using Like as a catchall for positive reactions here)

 

Likes in Dragon Request: an acknowledgement that someone made a good idea, or drew something nice, or wrote a good description, but the liker has nothing more to say and doesn't feel like spamming/bumping the thread with their no-content post. Likes are less discouraging than posting work and getting no reply at all.

 

Likes in DC/general discussion/any other forum/etc: someone made a good point, or said something funny, or was informative, so on and so forth. Not necessary, just a fun thing sometimes.

 

Likes in RP: definitely not needed, imo, since rps are already all about acting and reacting. Likes seem a little too OOC to be used in RP threads, and it's probably not great having someone outside the RP decide to come in and Like things without saying a word.

 

Likes in Suggestions: needs to be allowed in all posts or none, not just the first post. Not all thread suggesters will keep track of the thread and edit their first post to match, so having a lot of Likes only on the first posts just encourages more people to just skim the beginning. Additionally, likers will probably not go back and check if an OP does edit their post, so unless Likes reset on edit the Like/post info correlation will be outdated, and same goes for negative reactions if there are any. In fact I would say Reactions simply don't belong in the Suggestions section, since it's serious debate and discussion with a high chance of high visibility posts being edited without warning.

 

Overall I would like a way to say my approval without leaving no-content posts everywhere. To be honest, if people quoted and said "like" or emoji'd everywhere they enjoyed a post the thread would be full of spam. Instead most people just don't say anything. A like/hugs/whatever button also allows people who are anxious about actually posting to still lend their support. Yes, I might get nervous about "reactions", but I already get nervous posting and waiting for someone to reply or not.

 

From my experience, the amount of likes a post has doesn't actually make it more visible or anything, so the number of likes on a post is mostly a survey of, you know, how many people liked it. Admittedly first and front page posts are more likely to get likes, but that's due to people who just glance in a thread and don't bother to read further, which has always been a thing and isn't much of a problem outside of suggestions.

[ArgentiAertheri]

Ok, I reallllly like that suggestion of hugs as a reaction. It’s a substitute for sympathy that solves the earlier “why is someone sorry I caught a CB gold?!”

[Ariento]

3 minutes ago, ArgentiAertheri said:

Ok, I reallllly like that suggestion of hugs as a reaction. It’s a substitute for sympathy that solves the earlier “why is someone sorry I caught a CB gold?!”

 

As the person who originally suggested the sympathy reaction, I approve 👍

[HeatherMarie]

4 hours ago, Shadowdrake said:

(using Like as a catchall for positive reactions here)

 

Likes in Dragon Request: an acknowledgement that someone made a good idea, or drew something nice, or wrote a good description, but the liker has nothing more to say and doesn't feel like spamming/bumping the thread with their no-content post. Likes are less discouraging than posting work and getting no reply at all.

 

Likes in DC/general discussion/any other forum/etc: someone made a good point, or said something funny, or was informative, so on and so forth. Not necessary, just a fun thing sometimes.

 

 

This is sort of exactly why I think Reactions are useless and don't want them here, honestly. I get a like in Dragon Requests: Does it mean that they like my actual dragon idea, does it mean that they like the drawing, does it mean that they like the description, does it mean that they simply saw my name and clicked like because I'm a nice person? 'Like' doesn't *say* anything. 'Like' can *mean* anything at all. Frankly I would *hate* it if I posted something that I wanted feedback on and instead just got a handful of meaningless 'likes'. 

 

Same with general discussion: Does a 'like' mean they agree with what I said, or simply understand what I said, or thought it was funny, or thought it was helpful, or.... What? Really, if you want to show someone that you appreciate their post, it's much more meaningful to actually *tell* them that then to use a very vague and generic 'like'. 

[Zeditha]

If you had posted a piece of work, would you rather get a 'bunch of meaningless likes' or no reaction whatsoever? Based on what you're saying, I'd assume the two would be equal, right? You wouldn't care. But a lot of people would vastly prefer the former. I don't think anyone is going to significantly prefer to have no reaction whatsoever, as no matter how open-endedly you view a like, no reaction at all is worse - did they even appreciate anything you did at all? Did anyone even see it?

And based on how this community generally reacts, I think that anyone with something more to say than 'like' is probably going to post that thought whether there are reactions or not. They may react as well, but that doesn't detract from what they say.

[Fuzzbucket]

48 minutes ago, Zeditha said:

If you had posted a piece of work, would you rather get a 'bunch of meaningless likes' or no reaction whatsoever? Based on what you're saying, I'd assume the two would be equal, right? You wouldn't care. But a lot of people would vastly prefer the former. I don't think anyone is going to significantly prefer to have no reaction whatsoever, as no matter how open-endedly you view a like, no reaction at all is worse - did they even appreciate anything you did at all? Did anyone even see it?

And based on how this community generally reacts, I think that anyone with something more to say than 'like' is probably going to post that thought whether there are reactions or not. They may react as well, but that doesn't detract from what they say.

 

Exactly. As I said earlier - a shed load of "likes" with nothing else - or "no support", or even "hugs" (who wants hugs from people one deesn't know anyway ? seriously... shades of those friends of one's parents one was supposed to LIKE being hugged by...) mean exactly nothing. Except that whoever couldn't be BOTHERED to tell me what they thought.

[RealWilliamShakespeare]

Agree with @Zeditha. I know I mentioned it earlier, and Zeditha literally just said it, but people who have something to say will say it - the ability to leave a reaction won’t make people not leave an expansive comment. I think it’s clear by now that I like to leave expansive comments - I’d leave reactions too. People can do both - it’s an additional feature, not a feature that takes away people’s words. But yeah, I’d rather people leave reactions to what I say than have none at all. 

[olympe]

Reactions may not take away people's words, but they just might make people content with leaving nothing but a reaction that can be interpreted in any number of ways. I'd rather not encourage that kind of behavior.

[HeatherMarie]

11 hours ago, Zeditha said:

If you had posted a piece of work, would you rather get a 'bunch of meaningless likes' or no reaction whatsoever? Based on what you're saying, I'd assume the two would be equal, right? You wouldn't care. But a lot of people would vastly prefer the former. I don't think anyone is going to significantly prefer to have no reaction whatsoever, as no matter how open-endedly you view a like, no reaction at all is worse - did they even appreciate anything you did at all? Did anyone even see it?

And based on how this community generally reacts, I think that anyone with something more to say than 'like' is probably going to post that thought whether there are reactions or not. They may react as well, but that doesn't detract from what they say.

 

Actually, yes, I would *much* prefer no reason whatsoever rather then meaningless likes. At least with no response at all I don't have to wonder what the heck the 'like' actually means! I don't like 'likes', simple as that. They don't make me feel good, they don't make me happy that someone 'liked' my post, etc etc. They make me anxious, because 'like' is so completely vague and open to interpretation that it makes my mind race with 'what does that mean, what exactly did they like, do they really like it or are they just going through the motions of liking tons of posts, did they actually even read it' etc etc. 

 

And while the community as a whole may not degenerate into just leaving likes instead of actual posts, some people will. People have already mentioned they'd rather leave a like then an actual post, which means that if they can leave a like and not a post, they will. Which that may not matter too much if the person's actual thought really is only 'yes, I like this', it's very easy to get into a habit of just clicking 'like' instead of actually taking the effort and brain-power to write a post. I'm guilty of that myself, honestly, even if I actually have something I want to say or add, sometimes I think about making a post and then go 'nah, I'll just like it'. I do *not* want that kind of mentality on this forum.

[Guillotine]

Let me tell you, on sites like tumblr and Twitter i HATE getting only likes on my work, because it means nobody cared enough to retweet or reblog and thus show other people what they liked despite the time I put into it. I feel like reactions would have the same effect--reactions not only give effectively no feedback, they also don't bump the thread, which means fewer people will see a thread.

 

I see no reason for reactions to exist in the space of this forum.
 

[Fuzzbucket]

IF this were to happen (god forbid), I hope there would be a way for us to choose whether we wanted our posts to be able to collect reactions. I would set mine to none.

[HeatherMarie]

7 hours ago, Fuzzbucket said:

IF this were to happen (god forbid), I hope there would be a way for us to choose whether we wanted our posts to be able to collect reactions. I would set mine to none.

 

Oohh good idea! Is that possible? I'd really really like if that was possible, if this did happen. 

[skwerl56767]

   Nope.

   These may be forums but we're not a big social media outlet. We don't need reactions to know what other people might think of our posts (as another way to put it, using the sympathy example, it's better to think that everyone who sees your posts is sympathizing with no confirmation of it, than to think that lots of people are seeing your post, but only the people who use the "React" function sympathize).
   I would possibly be okay with this feature if there was an opt-out option, like what Fuzzbucket proposed. The only, actual usefulness I could see of this feature would be in Suggestions, where you're encouraged to post your opinion and your reasoning for it rather than just saying "I agree", "Same", or "I don't like this", in order to show group support for a suggestion (the reactions would take the place of these one-liners). At the same time, I have yet to see that "rule" (assuming we even have it as a rule) ever abused on here, which wraps me back around to not needing this.

 

   As a psychological note, people who are more immature, lazy, or don't care that much tend to be more "vocal" on sites where what's considered being "vocal" is easy (like reacting to posts); granted, some people do use reacts as a quick way to respond simply because they have no time to actually post, but sadly those are in the minority. Yet if you think about it, people take Likes way too seriously on Facebook, but that's not even a problem here, so we have half the drama! On DCF, you don't have the option to be lazy; only "speak up" or "don't speak at all". I prefer it this way; it makes people actually write out their thoughts and think about what they're saying and what their views are, instead of granting them the chance to using a wishy-washy response that could mean anything under the right circumstances.
   On some forums this is fine, maybe even useful, but I don't think the React feature is fit for the majority of DCF's community.

[olympe]

Uh-oh, my mind just came up with another scary scenario:

 

Someone writes a post that's received very well, meaning they got lots of likes and kudos and so on.

Now, they edit their post to either say the very opposite of what was written there before, or use it to call someone out (or do something else that's harmful to someone else). And there are still 100+ likes displayed...

[RealWilliamShakespeare]

46 minutes ago, olympe said:

Uh-oh, my mind just came up with another scary scenario:

 

Someone writes a post that's received very well, meaning they got lots of likes and kudos and so on.

Now, they edit their post to either say the very opposite of what was written there before, or use it to call someone out (or do something else that's harmful to someone else). And there are still 100+ likes displayed...

That is... Incredibly far-fetched. I’ve never heard of anyone doing that. And I’m positive no one here would have any reason to do that. I’m think - forgive me if I’m wrong - that mods can see previous edits of a post? So if that was the case, we could report the post and the mods could see what was changed and obviously remove it. Even if mods can’t see it, they would obviously receive our reports about a fraudulent post or whatever and act accordingly. And just think - people can do that now, even without reactions??? A post that has plenty “agree, really approve, love this idea!” replies can be edited to make it look like people are agreeing with something different. It just doesn’t happen?

 

Just... I feel like everyone is reading way too far into this. PLENTY of places have reactions. And it never turns into some massive problem. Bullying isn’t tolerated here in any form, and I just don’t feel like a little reaction feature is going to turn this place into bully-central.

[TJ09]

2 hours ago, olympe said:

Uh-oh, my mind just came up with another scary scenario:

 

Someone writes a post that's received very well, meaning they got lots of likes and kudos and so on.

Now, they edit their post to either say the very opposite of what was written there before, or use it to call someone out (or do something else that's harmful to someone else). And there are still 100+ likes displayed...

Full edit history is available to mods, and edited status is IIRC displayed to everyone.

 

Reddit had this issue (get upvotes, edit comment), and the ability to point out that something has been edited shuts most of the bad uses down. Similarly, simply quoting something prevents edits from completely changing the context..

[HeatherMarie]

3 hours ago, RealWilliamShakespeare said:

Just... I feel like everyone is reading way too far into this. PLENTY of places have reactions. And it never turns into some massive problem. Bullying isn’t tolerated here in any form, and I just don’t feel like a little reaction feature is going to turn this place into bully-central.

 

That.... Is completely not true, though. It may be true for *you*, you see other places that have reactions and it hasn't turned into a massive problem. But it is completely untrue that it 'never' turns into a massive problem. People have already brought up the very clear and true fact that some people who use Facebook have gotten extremely depressed and upset because of reactions, or lack thereof, on their posts. I've seen it, I know it happens. I've also seen firsthand how much reactions can *change* a forum that didn't used to have the feature and then suddenly does. Is it *always* a huge problem, no of course not. But sometimes it is. I've mentioned in this very thread that I've personally seen a forum devolve into a massive popularity contest with people scrambling to 'like' every single post a friend makes and 'dislike' every single post a person they don't like makes. Even if there was no 'dislike' it can still greatly affect the atmosphere of a forum.

[Moonwick]

4 hours ago, RealWilliamShakespeare said:

Just... I feel like everyone is reading way too far into this. PLENTY of places have reactions. And it never turns into some massive problem. Bullying isn’t tolerated here in any form, and I just don’t feel like a little reaction feature is going to turn this place into bully-central.

 

Agree.

 

1 hour ago, HeatherMarie said:

People have already brought up the very clear and true fact that some people who use Facebook have gotten extremely depressed and upset because of reactions, or lack thereof, on their posts. 

 

5 hours ago, olympe said:

Uh-oh, my mind just came up with another scary scenario:

 

Someone writes a post that's received very well, meaning they got lots of likes and kudos and so on.

Now, they edit their post to either say the very opposite of what was written there before, or use it to call someone out (or do something else that's harmful to someone else). And there are still 100+ likes displayed...

 

So, first of all where are these 100+ likes supposed to be coming from? Every time I log on this forum there are like maybe just over 50 people online with around the same amount of guests, and a lot of them stay quiet. This isn't Facebook. This isn't Tumblr. This isn't a huge popular social media website with like millions of members. This is a forum for a website in which you collect dragons. Also, do you realize that there is a little thing at the bottom of posts to say that you edited it, right? We have moderators and a site admin for a reason. No matter what, there is going to be bullying anywhere, on any site. If someone's true intent is to bully someone, they will do it regardless of what their options are.

 

Look, I'm still not saying everyone needs to agree with adding a feature they don't think is useful. If you really don't want this kind of thing on here, that's fine and it's the whole point of this thread, because TJ wants to make sure this is something his community wants. However, as I skim through this thread, I see a lot of fearmongering for no reason. You can agree or disagree with an idea, but don't scare people into agreeing with you. 

[HeatherMarie]

@Valtrois  I am certainly not trying to 'scare' people into agreeing with me. I am simply expressing my serious concerns over such a feature, and outlining things that I have seen happen in other places that have 'reactions' and 'likes' and such. If someone thinks that is 'scary', that's not my fault, but I am not deliberately trying to create fear or anything. It is a *fact* that people sometimes react extremely negatively to likes or lack of likes. That's not fearmongering, that's a simple fact as seen on Facebook and on many different forums and sites around the internet. I personally do not want a feature on this forum that can lead to such increased negativity, the kind I have *seen* on other forums with similar features. 

 

Also, you are right, this isn't Facebook or Tumblr. This isn't a social media site. So, imo, it doesn't need reactions at all.

[Fuzzbucket]

And - at least one person has left DC completely because of treatment that upset them greatly on the unofficial discord here. Which has many fewer members than the forum, AFAIK.

 

(I know this from a sig and a PM,; I don't think it was in a thread...)