Because to me, they seem like de facto "Agree and “Disagree” buttons, whether or not it was the intent.
Lemmy has a higher NAFO troll bot to human ratio than reddit. The larger communities are moderated by CIA supportive of mainstream disinformation media, as is reddit. Though there is less zionist-supremacist moderation on Lemmy.
Zero anti-war presence on Lemmy for instance is in a way a much stronger groupthink mentality here than on reddit. The exception is there doesn’t seem to be a supreme zionist supremacist mod capable of site ban.
Groupthink happens, to answer your question.
Groupthink happens, to answer your question.
I agree with this guy.
Practically yes, despite the way that they ought to be used.
It’s such a shame. Lemmy should be a place where we collectively share ideas and debate. Comments should only ever be downvoted if they’re off topic, hateful or misleading. However, in reality people get downvoted mostly because someone simply doesn’t like or wholly agree with the comment.
It’s still better here than reddits awful circlejerks but not by much and we should be weary of devolving to that state.
Just to let you know, you posted your reply 3 times. I downvoted the other 2 (consider deleting them).
Yes I noticed, sorry, bad internet connection, I have deleted them now.
Shouldn’t be but they tend to be.
Sometimes people just straight up use them as agree/disagree buta lot of folks struggle to admit that an argument in favour of something with which they disagree can still be a worthwhile argument.
I see the upvote and downvote count as an overall room temperature/vibe check.
Whenever votes are good everything’s chill, otherwise if approaching <50% happiness then I recheck/reflect and look for where I could’ve done better.
You can’t please everyone however most can still avoid making fools out of themselves by trying to learn and improve from past mistakes.
There are no up or down vote police. You use them as you like.
deleted by creator
Nobody’s going to upvote shit takes, obviously.
If someone’s being an asshole or an idiot, I’m going to downvote them.
If someone says something that needs saying, or that’s interesting or funny, I’m going to upvote it.
For posts, upvote means I want more of this, that’s some good content. Downvote means I want less of this, that’s some bad content.
For comments, upvote means good point, good joke, excellent addition to the conversation. Downvote means bad point, bad joke, poor addition to the conversation.
Now I admit I have a hard time upvoting a comment that adds a good point to the discussion, but I personally disagree with.
I do wish we had a way to separate good/bad content from agree/disagree. I know Reddit defaulted to hiding downvoted content, a default that I found reasonable. However using Lemmy, that wasn’t the default, and I’ve grown to prefer seeing all content. Don’t get me wrong, I see some garbage, and I see stuff I disagree with, but I think it’s useful.
I still like the old slashdot method where there were categories you could give to a comment. Was this insightful, or was it funny. I think the method has merits but I am not sure how well it scales as it is more complicated and requires the people moderating to give serious thought to WHY a comment is good or bad.
An upvote should be for quality content/discussion. This might be a well researched comment, a good joke, or just something that leads the discussion in a meaningful or interesting way. Generally, things I think should be valued or shared. There will obviously be bias, but my opinion isn’t the basis of my decision. I try to upvote good-faith or thorough arguments I disagree with.
Downvotes are for low-quality and unhelpful content that I think shouldn’t be spread. This doesn’t have to be irrelevant or against the community rules, but often is. Things I might downvote include overused reposts, unnecessarily rude or insulting comments, low quality comments (IE someone trying to argue a well cited comment with an anecdote and nothing else), or spam.
They are “hell yeah” and “fuck no” buttons.
Not quite. Upvote means “I agree I like butt licking” and downvote means “I agree I like butt sex.” Easy to confuse the two.
Now, just to be clear, does this apply to both the upvoter/downvoter and the comment being left or just the upvoter/downvoter alone?
Just upvote and downvote. The comment is more like what style of licking and butt sex. To add context.
I down- and upvoted this comment.
If they were, they’d be called Agree and Disagree buttons.
The buttons control post visibility, so the question to ask is: do I want to boost this posts visibility? And then the crowd vote decides if the post is controversial which also boosts visibility.
This is the only real answer, regardless of how people actually use the buttons
They are just buttons, and you have volition. If you use the down arrow as “agree” and up arrow as “I hate your family” it still works. The aggregate of community usage of buttons give them meaning.
There are many ways people use them.
The way I use them and I wish everyone did is:
Upvote = I agree with this, this is what I would have posted too if I had seen the comment earlier, this is extraordinarily funny or insightful and I want more people to see it
Downvote = I think this doesn’t meaningfully contribute to the discussion at all, it would have been better if it hadn’t been posted, others shouldn’t have to read it
The vast majority of things doesn’t fall into either of these categories, so I neither upvote nor downvote them; if I merely disagree with something, I write a counterargument but do not downvote.
I think there’s a shorter way to say this.
Upvote means promote. I think this should be seen.
Downvote means demote. I don’t think this should be seen.
Yes, but a lot of people “don’t think this should be seen” simply because they disagree with it, no matter how much of a good-faith on-topic post it is. That was a main point.
Which is what I’m kinda getting at. It’s always going to be up to the individual. Unfortunately there’s no way to force any kind of consensus.
It really depends on where you use them.
In some communities I’ll use upvotes as a way to track which posts I’ve seen.
In news communties I always downvote tabloid sources and clickbait headlines, regardless of content.
But when it comes to the comments, it’s mostly an agree/disagree button.
