According to TechCrunch, YouTube announced on Tuesday that it will begin testing major changes that may eventually become its video platform. It will try to hide the number of “dislikes” in the video from the public view.
The company stated that it will conduct a “small-scale experiment” and will try a number of different designs in which the dislike count will no longer be displayed, but none of the designs will completely remove the “dislike” button itself.
đź‘Ťđź‘Ž In response to creator feedback around well-being and targeted dislike campaigns, we’re testing a few new designs that don’t show the public dislike count. If you’re part of this small experiment, you might spot one of these designs in the coming weeks (example below!). pic.twitter.com/aemrIcnrbx
— YouTube (@YouTube) March 30, 2021
The company announced these tests on Twitter, but then further explained in a post on a community forum that the goal was not to remove users’ ability to signal dislike of videos – creators can still get videos from YouTube Studio.” Likes and dislikes are counted, and dislikes will still help drive YouTube’s recommendation algorithm. Instead, YouTube stated that the idea of ​​trying to hide the number of “dislikes” is based on feedback from creators.
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“We heard from creators that the number of likes from the public will affect their happiness and may prompt targeted likes to creators’ videos,” the announcement read. “So, we are testing designs that do not include visible like or dislike counts in an effort to balance and improve the creator’s experience while still ensuring that audience feedback is considered and shared with creators.”
YouTube showed a potential design being tested. The design simply showed the same button layout, but the word “Dislike” appeared under the icon under the thumb instead of a disliked number. The company pointed out that if users see these changes when they login to YouTube, they will not be able to opt-out of the test-users can only share feedback.
But it should be noted that YouTube has not promised to cancel the number of “dislikes” for everyone. The feedback from this test will help inform YouTube whether, when, or how to release such a design more widely.
YouTube will not be the first company to try to remove metrics from social apps. Instagram has also been testing to remove Likes to make the experience feel more real instead of chasing influence. And Facebook this year also canceled the “Like” button on the Facebook page, using a more accurate “follower” measurement instead. However, in the case of removing only the number of “dislikes” but not the number of “likes”, the audience may misunderstand the true popularity of a video. The company told TechCrunch that these tests will be run globally on Android and iOS in the next few weeks while collecting a small amount of design feedback.
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