Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube all want to erase the “popularity measure” created by themselves

Tram Ho

Facebook and YouTube are moving away from the popularity measure they invented.

Accordingly, Facebook is currently testing the feature of “likes”, which appear below photos and posts of users on this social network.

Engineer Jane Manchun Wong recently discovered this while fumbling with Facebook’s source code. Instead of showing the exact number of likes on someone’s post, users will only see one of their friends “and others” liked it. Posters can still see who has liked the button.

Facebook, Instagram, và YouTube đồng loạt muốn xóa bỏ thước đo sự nổi tiếng do chính họ nghĩ ra - Ảnh 1.

A Facebook spokesperson said that the company is seriously considering trying to remove the number of likes, but this feature has not been released to anyone to try at all.

Facebook didn’t specify why they did this, but before that, they had started to make similar moves on Instagram.

In the case of Instagram, the company’s argument is that showing likes may contribute to the phenomenon of worshiping someone on social networks, and potentially make users feel unhappy.

These changes came after longer discussions in the tech industry about how social networks and applications impact users’ emotions.

Many former key employees of Facebook and Google have expressed their regret for the products they have contributed to. Leah Perlman, the woman who helped design Facebook’s like button, said she noticed the constant announcements on social media that made her depressed. ” Have you seen that Black Mirror episode? I saw it about a month ago, and it haunts me every day. Because that future is not far away,” she said.

And Tristan Harris, former designer at Google, launched a movement for the digital addiction syndrome through his Time Well Spent movement.

But critics like to see those design changes tested more transparently.

Andrew Przybylski, an experimental psychologist at the Oxford Internet Institute, said that while the idea of ​​hiding likes is quite interesting, since they can make changes in mental health, they should not be tested. privately.

It is a very interesting idea but it is the kind of idea that lies somewhere in a gray area between ‘product’ and ‘health intervention’. Such types of research should not be conducted behind doors. close by the impact on the social and health of each user can be very large “- he said.

He further emphasized that that does not mean that just giving the results is enough. ” I want to know the pre-test plan, including the method, the goal, and the success criteria. If a major drug company says it’s about to change the label (or ingredient) of a painkiller but Without a transparent clinical trial process, the public will have the right to doubt any assertion, but don’t forget that even small changes to a widely used platform can bring about big impact. Companies like Facebook, Google, and game companies, therefore, should invite independent observers to test for interventions like these. “

YouTube is also reducing one of its popularity metrics this month.

In May, the company announced the release of the feature “to streamline public subscriptions”. This means that channels with a large number of subscribers will not display that number correctly.

Facebook, Instagram, và YouTube đồng loạt muốn xóa bỏ thước đo sự nổi tiếng do chính họ nghĩ ra - Ảnh 2.

YouTube’s argument also hinges on reducing competition among users, especially content creators.

The platform’s most famous content creator, PewDiePie, has recently been at the center of a battle to attract months-long subs with the Indian channel T-Series. Both competed fiercely for the number of likes thanks to a long campaign of PewDiePie fans, but eventually the Indian channel won and became the largest YouTube channel, with 111 million subscribers.

However, during the war, a series of YouTube channels and websites also had their own subscriptions to see how many subscribers each channel had. Those counters will no longer be available after this change.

In addition to creating greater consistency, this change addresses creators’ concerns about stress and mental health, particularly around tracking real subscriptions in real time. We hope this will help every creator focus on telling their story, and having less pressure on the numbers, “ YouTube said.

Reference: BusinessInsider

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Source : Trí Thức Trẻ