How Has The Removal of The Dislike Button Affected YouTube?

The world’s largest video-sharing platform, YouTube, in November 2021 made a major change to its platform by hiding the dislike count on all videos. This move has sparked controversy in the online space and left content creators questioning its impact on their channel and how they will receive the audience’s feedback on their content going forward. This change has sparked debates about how YouTube should manage its content and whether taking away the rating system of videos actually creates more positive feedback for the site or not. Why Did YouTube Take Away the Dislike Count? The CEO of YouTube, Susan Wojcicki, pointed out that while most users engage positively with YouTube videos, some still use the dislike feature abusively. This misuse can include targeted harassment campaigns against certain videos or creators, as well as using the dislike count to manipulate public opinion. YouTube’s decision to hide the dislike count is meant to protect users from this kind of behaviour. The negative implications of ongoing online harassment can be massively detrimental to creators, especially for those who are less established. However, some have expressed concern that hiding the dislike count could enable inaccurate information to spread on YouTube. Wojcicki addressed these concerns by explaining that viewers can still engage with videos through comments and likes and get an accurate sense of how popular a video is. Many platform users believe a different story as to why YouTube took down the dislike count. The most popular opinion is that they don’t want to repeat the dislike count on YouTube Rewind. YouTube Rewind 2018 had over 19 million dislikes, making it the most disliked video on the platform. Going hand in hand with this, many major corporations (especially those with the funding to pay for YouTube ads) tend to be quite unpopular on the platform, with companies such as game developer Activision previously garnering massive amounts of dislikes when releasing new products. Many of these companies go beyond just using YouTube for adverting means and tend to have partnerships with the platform across other fields. Naturally, YouTube doesn’t want to sour these relationships by making their platform a negative space for these companies with many believing that the removal of the dislike button isn’t intended to improve functionality in any way, but rather to appease sponsors. Benefits of Removing the Dislike Count YouTube states that the removal of the dislike count can help combat cyberbullying. Since the feature was introduced in 2009, there have been many instances where people would use it to harass or spread negative messages about certain individuals or groups. This had a huge impact on how people perceived YouTube as a whole, making it seem like a place for trolling instead of meaningful discourse. By removing the dislike count, users now have to resort to more civil means in order to voice their opinion and engage with content creators. The removal of the dislike count also helps improve YouTube’s algorithm, allowing it to better identify which videos are genuinely popular and worth promoting on the platform. Since dislikes were primarily used for trolling instead of providing meaningful feedback, YouTube could not distinguish between genuine dislikes and those intended as a form of harassment. With this feature gone, YouTube’s algorithm now mainly relies on watch time to determine what type of content viewers are interested in seeing, which has resulted in an overall improvement in the quality of content produced on the platform. Negatives of Removing the Dislike Count Removing the dislike count means that viewers can no longer effectively voice their displeasure with certain videos. It is likely that this will lead to some creators creating content without any regard for whether or not viewers actually enjoy it, as they won’t be able to see how unpopular a video is. The lack of a visible dislike count also means that people can easily downvote and discredit any opposing opinions on the platform, making it harder for dissenting voices to be heard. While the removal of the dislike button has made it easier for the algorithm to identity what’s popular and what isn’t, the opposite can be said for the viewers. Before, a user could look at both the like and dislike counts to get an overall sense of how well-received a video was. Now, with only likes visible, the results can be skewed in favour of more positive reactions without any indication otherwise. This could lead to exaggerated popularity for some videos while masking potential criticism from viewers. Certain video types, primarily those offering tutorials or other forms of guidance, are those most severely affected by this as the like/dislike ratio clearly illustrated the credibility of a piece of content. Identifying which video has the most likes isn’t always the most clear-cut way to discern a helpful tutorial as even the most liked videos can be hiding a huge amount of dislikes due to the difference in viewership figures. Contact Our Experts for Digital Marketing Strategy Get in touch with our team of Digital Marketing Strategy specialists who have the knowledge and know-how to fully optimise your social media and website, allowing you to enhance the number of leads and conversions your business gets.

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