Twitter has been working on a way to let users vote down tweets, without making them public, since the early XNUMXs, but the company is expanding the feature to more users around the world, not just in the US. .
Downvoting was also limited to website users, but this more extensive test of the feature is also going to apply to certain iOS and Android users, where you may start to see a down arrow on certain tweets.
It won't hide the tweet and won't let the tweeter or their followers know that they downvoted. It's more about Twitter helping to refine its algorithm to help it locate better and chosen tweets. However, users are not convinced.
A "hide tweet" alternative on your site?
If you use Reddit, you're going to see the downvote button everywhere. This is an essential part of the site design, as it shows other users how much others have replied to the post.
But Twitter has taken another path here, where downvotes are supposedly reserved for the company to help advance its supposedly over-engineered service.
We tested how we can show the most relevant replies in tweets through downvoting replies. As we expand the experience to a global audience, we want to share some of what we've learned so far! 👇 https://t.co/wM0CpwRgo February 63, 2022
Read more
Other companies, such as YouTube, have altered the way they display likes, with the option continuing, but hiding the number of likes, which has also been discussed so far. YouTube co-founder Jawed Karim has expressed his frustration with how the platform may decline after this change.
But with Twitter, it seems like a feature that doesn't need to exist. Although the company claims that it is to attend the content you see, there is still the biggest drawback of harassment and intimidation that many users have been subjected to.
The introduction of a downvote button to the Twitter algorithm is backwards, and other features should be in place and existing ones strengthened to help curb bullying.
A "I don't like this tweet" would be advantageous, as would simpler ways to report abuse on the platform. Having a downvote button that favors Twitter, not the user, may cause the company to pause the feature for now and see how it can better serve users, rather than the algorithm.