I am very much against publicly visible likes and would probably not post very much at all if Cohost had them (I really am posting into the void for the most part; there is no universe where I will hit the good side of herd behavior engagement regularly, because that requires at least moderate engagement). But I actually do not see a problem with optional visible likes on the user side, and I feel kind of weird about comments that are like, "No, it's bad for you" because it's actually none of my business if people like to see their numbers, and it's also none of my business why they want to see them.
I really like captainharrie's take on this; it's IMO very similar to Tumblr, and one of the fun parts about how it works over there is that opening the little interaction window and scrolling through the likes, tags, and comments actually makes the number less significant because you're seeing the engagement itself.
If the idea of Cohost if to get big, they need visible likes, the biggest problem with don't having any visible number is a couple of things
1. herd behavior, this can be bad, but can be good too, if you are a small artist and some of your post is getting lots of likes, ppl are seeing that there is lot of likes, they will be more willing to go see that, numbers atract number, lots of ppl are trying to use the plataform to work too, so a "measurement system" is great for this, this is aplyable to likes and followers too, i think there is no harm in seeing this, and even can be a toggleble feature!
2. Not seeing any likes in your post, even if you have received lots of notifications about it is kinda demotivating to be honest, feels like youtube dislike, is there, but does nothing.
These feature don't need to be based on algorithms, just simply click = +1 the platform will not have a long life time or growth without numbers.
I really like Cohost, to me this is the only negative thing about it.
This last commenter above me has the right idea.
Echoing the sentiment that while I appreciate Cohost's number-free approach, as an artist it would be nice to have a way to view likes on your posts without any number attached to it.
A simple "View interactions" option for post creators which opens up a little window showing things without any numbers involved would go a long way for making things feel less like posting into a void, without creating a numbers game:
> If like addiction is that much of a problem for you, and you would not be able to practice self-control to prevent yourself from falling victim to it, then you would sign up for a social media account on a site that tries to get its users addicted to engagement. The fact that you chose to avoid that already means that you would be able to continue to do the same.
It's really not that simple. I don't need to forbid myself from going to stores or restaurants where alcohol is served, but I *do* need to not have alcohol in the house. There's different thresholds at which the floor becomes too slippery, so to speak. And I think that even if users with this problem still sign up for sites that prey on their need for engagement, that doesn't mean that having a site where they can't fall back on those bad habits is pointless - it can still be a reprieve. If anything, that's part of Cohost's whole mission, with being a fourth website instead of The Next Big Site To Replace All Sites.
If like addiction is that much of a problem for you, and you would not be able to practice self-control to prevent yourself from falling victim to it, then you would sign up for a social media account on a site that tries to get its users addicted to engagement. The fact that you chose to avoid that already means that you would be able to continue to do the same.
Meanwhile, artists and other creators who are trying to make sure their posts get in front of as many eyes that want to see them as possible will find this site hostile by design to them. Heck, even people who are just trying to make others laugh or enjoy a goody story or learn something are being disserved by the opacity in terms of overall response to one's own posts. The current feeling of the site is _very_ isolating, because once your memory fades about which posts got a lot of notifications in the moment, all you have to look back on is... nothing. Most content is not worth commenting on even if you enjoy it, so people tend to just leave likes that do nothing of value.
In fact, the current system is probably worse than having no like button at all, because it still will feed into notification addiction, but it doesn't let you use those numbers to learn anything about the other people on the site and what they like, they're just transient little dopamine hits which aren't healthy for you. That this does not seem to be a problem for you tells me that you would be fine if there was an option to be able to see total likes on your own posts–you would be able to leave it alone, since you're already doing fine with the current useless like system that has mostly demerits and few merits.
if this feature existed, i would turn it on instantly, and then proceed to have endless ammo to beat myself up with for each post not reaching the same level as my most popular ones. "It's an option" doesn't mean you get the best of both worlds for two different groups – there's a significant portion of people here who would enable it, because their brain forces them to, and then have their life worsened because of it.
I'm sure someone has said this in here but if this is something that's very requested and popular and all that all I ask is that you PLEASE make sure that if you do implement it, please also implement a toggle setting for it. If you could also make said toggle Off by default, that would be amazing. I'm sure I'm not the only person that loves the lack of numbers on this website.
"Number of comments" is far from an equivalent or useful metric. People comment way less often than they push a like button. Often times, a post I'll make gets lots of likes, 0 comments. With only comments as a litmus, that falsely flags loads of posts dead in the water. People need *evidence of engagement* to stick around on this site.
My posts not showing the number of interactions with them, coupled with what I believe to have been a bug with the notifications tab when I first got started, led me to believe that no one had been interacting with my posts or my replies to their posts, when in fact, that was not the case. Discouraging popularity contests is fine, but I agree with the previous users who said that the current experience feels very isolating (coupled with the lack of the ability to @-mention people or DM them, it really does feel like shouting into a void.)
And to be honest with you all: post authors should be able to get, if they want them, easily digestible metrics for number of likes, number of shares, etc. so they can see what content people are engaging with more. This is particularly important for artists and other professionals, but even for someone like me who just wants to post funny jokes or share cool information, knowing what people are most interested in helps me make better posts.
I know there is a balance to be struck between making people get addicted to the validation of post engagement and these concerns I've mentioned, but surely we are not at the correct spot right now. As always, we can curb unhealthy behavior by making things like this be behind an option in one's user settings.
I agree, based on what I'm hearing from some people I've recommended cohost to in the past, some would really want the option to see a number of likes on a post they made. there is a solid "I want to see number go up" impulse that people have, and it gives a little boost whenever people see it.
this absolutely should not include likes on other people's posts; you want to discourage people from comparing each other's likes easily. the number going up should have a good effect; the actual number should be almost meaningless.
most problems I see from earlier comments seem solvable by making sure it's an option and not something people are just stuck with having on all their posts, and by fostering a community that discourages like-comparisons and that understands how little this number actually matters. the latter is purely a social issue, and not something that tech-side solutions can really do much about!
myself, I like just seeing the mango pop off in the corner of the front page, and seeing that people liked a thing I made. I likely wouldn't turn the number on at all. but I want to encourage friends struggling with their art and sketch posts on a certain other site to come here instead, and this is one barrier I've heard mess with people more than once.
where's the 'if this happens, cool; if this doesn't happen, also cool' button
I'm not sure what the point of likes is ( as it currently is here), seeing some of the responses here.
There already exists a publicly viewable popularity metric labelled in raw numbers: No. of comments.
If the goal is to remove 'the numbers game' of traditional media, then by all logic that should be removed as that is a direct indicator of engagement.
If on the other hand that is intentional, how would adding viewing likes/sharing change anything? From what I understand, the timeline/feed isn't sorted by engagement. That is nice for the reason that those who despise this kind of 'numbers poisoning' can turn off all metrics and even the ability for others to like their own posts without compromising the service of the website.
(I also think this makes likes much more genuine than most other platforms where this feature is manipulated to in turn manipulate the algorithm heuristics.)
It is of my opinion that allowing authors to view likes directly would benefit a feeling of community without engaging in the toxic comparison that traditional social medias are infamous for and what feels like the primary driving stigma behind engagement metrics.
hikari-no-yume
When someone likes my post, I only find out about this via notifications, and I can't see it on the post itself. I assume it's hidden from posts in general to avoid popularity contests, and that seems perfectly reasonable to me, but for when I'm viewing my own posts, it'd be nice to have cohost help me in remembering which or how many of my friends liked a post.
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