Remove visible likes and take away all references to them from badges and user profiles

FxllenCode · May 31, 2021, 3:49pm

As a Roblox developer and devforum user, it is currently frustrating to sort through all of the clutter that has become in many different categories and topics, such as #waywoc or development discussion. A large chunk of this is because users are chasing “likes” and want the attention of other users. (See this great post about punishing users who reply to the troll topics as well).

The users make responses to these troll topics in a way that is simply to gather likes from their following. This is frustrating as it bumps the post back to the top, and thus more people see it. Why do people do this? It’s natural instinct to want attention, and thus people make topics and replies for no reason other than getting attention and likes. Unfortunately, that means certain users want to have this forum be similar to social media, while this is simply not the case. Here is a great article on why people want these likes in the first place:

But this is a developer forum, not social media. There is no reason to show the actual amount of likes a user has gotten along with promoting people stat farming by having badges regarding likes, such as these:

What good do these badges do other than promote people to abuse the system. Obviously, this is not the case with all forums, but considering our forum has a younger average age than most forums, many of the users still want to get likes.

I also believe it is unneeded to show likes on a user’s profile:

Why does this information matter? This is a forum strictly about development, specifically Roblox development. There is literally no need to show the amount of likes a user has gotten; if you truly care about badges and likes, go use some other social media, the devforum is not a social media platform.

I am not suggesting likes be removed, as that would cause more posts like “me too!”, but instead making it so you cannot see the actual number of likes a reply or topic has gotten. This is already possible with some CSS and possibly a plugin.

Mockup

Thanks to my ~~amazing~~ terrible HTML skills, I removed a bit of the CSS and deleted the number part off of the like area on discourse meta:

The user still liked the post, but the number doesn’t show.

I believe this will improve my experience on the developer forum as there might be less clutter, but especially less replies to clutter topics, which are usually made to gather likes and of course bump the post to the top.

Thank you.

Crazedbrick1 · May 31, 2021, 3:55pm

Likes are useful for showing if people agree with something. How will people know if someone agrees with something now?

Ty_Scripts · May 31, 2021, 3:59pm

A couple of months ago I’d have disagreed with this, but the problem really has been getting worse lately. Not only has there been like chasing and stat farming, but I’ve been noticing lots of off-topic posts and replies that rack up tons of likes. I feel this behavior would be discouraged if like count was hidden.

However, there is another problem with this. Lots of “Is this against ToS?” type questions in game design support might have incorrect replies with a low amount of likes, and a correct reply with a high amount of likes. With likes hidden, it will be harder for the OP to know which reply is correct. (Easily fixed by showing screenshots of the rules, but that’s a bit beyond the point…)

FxllenCode · May 31, 2021, 3:59pm

This is indeed a major problem:

This one isn’t even too bad; if you give me 10 minutes I can find ones with 10+ likes and more and more replies coming in.

FxllenCode · May 31, 2021, 4:01pm

Maybe OP can see the amount of likes but not the user who does this? That is something I did not think about, but I think these ToS topics are a problem in itself.

Why would I need to see that? I could care less if I got no likes or I got twenty likes, that shouldn’t be an issue.

Crazedbrick1 · May 31, 2021, 4:05pm

Without having people knowing who liked the post makes the like feature useless. If this feature becomes a thing, the heart will just be a button that’s only useful for OP.

FxllenCode · May 31, 2021, 4:06pm

The original purpose of a like feature is to prevent “me too!” posts. When you heart a post, you get the satisfaction that you are heard. You do not need to display how many likes are there or (especially) how many likes you as a person had.

Crazedbrick1 · May 31, 2021, 4:09pm

So how will people know if the community agrees with a statement now? Messaging the person who posted it?

Conejin_Alt · May 31, 2021, 4:10pm

I don’t see how that’s useful except for the original poster of the topic, your opinions towards a post should not be dependent from other people opinions, if you agree with an opinion and want to give a heart, do it, if no one agrees with that opinion but you still want to give a heart, you can feel free to give a heart but don’t disagree with something that you agree just to be in the “majority”.

FxllenCode · May 31, 2021, 4:10pm

Why is it important to know how many likes exactly are given? I can agree with what you say without liking the post, especially without showing the exact number. If the community agrees with the post, they can still like it? It’s not useful to everyone else, and especially yourself.

This is something else I would like to prevent.

Crazedbrick1 · May 31, 2021, 4:12pm

Would having a rough estimate number be a good idea instead? Instead of 148 likes, the number will say 140+ likes.

How will people know if they liked it without a number?

GamersInternational · May 31, 2021, 4:12pm

I don’t personally fully agree. I absolutely agree with taking away references on badges and user profiles but I don’t particularly like removing visible likes, how will I know if people like my projects?

FxllenCode · May 31, 2021, 4:13pm

I shouldn’t care if I got 140+ or if I got 1+. That seems unnecessary.

This actually degrades your mental health, as you are now worried about getting too little likes. If you can’t see that number, there is no need to worry.

Besides, it doesn’t matter if people like it or not, it matters if they have feedback. If you want to get attention then go on twitter.

Discourse shows this for the OP:

blitzahon · May 31, 2021, 4:13pm

Just a little suggestion here: Instead of showing the exact no. of likes, it would be better to show an estimate of the no. of likes, just to show other users, that the post or topic is useful.

This method shouldn’t be applicable to those below an “n” number of likes.

For example, 50 people like a topic or post, then the number shown will just be 50+. It is to show that the information is useful.

This number would change according to the number of likes, if it has less than ‘n’ number of likes, then the number wouldn’t be shown.

Crazedbrick1 · May 31, 2021, 4:16pm

And it shows a number of the about of people like the post.

It matters for me. It’s better seeing people like my build than having people spamming “nice build” or something.

FxllenCode · May 31, 2021, 4:18pm

And my suggestion is to remove that?

That is against the rules anyway.

That is the behavior that should be fixed; I totally understand that it feels great to know people agree with you but at this point the maturity level of the forum proves that we cannot handle such power as it is constantly being abused.

Again, the devforum isn’t just for boosting an ego (don’t take this as a personal attack ) but it’s more for gathering feedback. If you want to show off work while gathering likes, use the #RobloxDev hashtag on twitter.

sjr04 · May 31, 2021, 4:22pm

I think they should keep it for feature requests and bug reports (maybe not bug report replies since those get turned into discord channels really quickly) since likes may possibly contribute to the priority the feature/bug has. But for other categories, not so much

SneakerDude2 · May 31, 2021, 4:32pm

Likes show, well, people like what you posted. It can help you get more feedback instead of bad posts. Here’s what I mean.

Let’s say you made a build and want feedback on it. You can put in your post that you strictly want only feedback, and if you like the build, then you can just use the like button to show it.

It’s important to see how many people liked your post because so you know how many people like the build. If it had 0 likes and a lot of views, then you’d know that people probably don’t like it and there’s stuff that can improved. If had 100 likes, then you’d know that it’s probably pretty good.

However, if other people couldn’t see how many likes a poster’s reply had, then it would make threads like waywoc and showcases less interesting. It’s honestly satisfying to me seeing how many other DevForum users like a post. It tells you that whatever the person posted is loved by the community, which is pretty nice to see.

Alternative Solutions

Enforce moderation on posts thirsty for likes.
Only remove likes given and recieved from statistics.
Making helpful posts a rule on the DevForum if it isn’t already.

TL;DR

The like feature is helpful in many ways. It helps people know how many people like what they make, what the community likes, and could potentially help you get more and better feedback if you ask for strictly just feedback. There are other solutions that would be a better approach to this issue in my opinion.

GamersInternational · May 31, 2021, 4:36pm

A fair point, mental health is becoming an increasing issue in the development community and we need to tackle it.

izNatt · May 31, 2021, 4:44pm

I completely agree. People should be able to like/heart a reply if they agree with a reply or topic. ROBLOX made a post that says that we should avoid other things like responding with a ‘thank you’ ect. A like simply puts that unnecessary sentence away. And as Fxllen said, if things really got out of hand with trolling on the DevForum just to get likes, it’s to be reported.