The news was propagated by media outlets that Facebook is adding a “dislike” option to its social network, and was derived from a Q/A session with founder of Facebook Mark Zuckerberg. Following this news the social media was overwhelmed with public feedbacks. The people also reacted on twitter, the world of Tweets regarding this Dislike option was bifurcated as Criticizers, Appreciators and the Evaluators. Criticizers were those who wanted to denounce dislike option and they expressed their anger of Facebook incorporating a Dislike option. Appreciators were those who favored this update and applauded the Facebook to install this option ASAP. On the other hand the evaluators were those who were trying to assess implications of Facebook Dislike update on various spheres of life.
Some tweets of Criticizers showing reaction on misinterpreted update about Facebook:
I #dislike that Facebook is getting a #dislikeButton. We should not be encouraging public displays of negativity.
— Nathalie Gordon (@awlilnatty) September 15, 2015
#Dislike button is so ridiculous. It will just
cause more hate on social media and more
hassle ! #facebook.— Naina Baloch . (@NainaBaloch5) September 16, 2015
The demand of a “Dislike button” is not new, there were people in the past years as well who favored implementation of a “Dislike” option on Facebook. Therefore realizing this; Zuckerberg specially expressed that even if users supported a ‘dislike’ button, he didn’t opted to form a ‘dislike’ button since they don’t wish to convert this network into a forum where folks are polling up or down on persons’ posts.Following recent outbreak of a “dislike” option, there are still enough people who appreciated the idea of “dislike button”. These are mainly those who want to express their negative opinion, or those who want bigger engagements in the post. Some tweets of Appreciators who appreciated the update of “Dislike button”:
#Facebook #Dislike button will result in more engagement on your posts.
— Husnain Minawala (@HusnainMinawala) September 15, 2015
The third category, among the reactionary users, was Evaluators who were trying to assess the implications of Facebook “dislike button” on various aspects of E-commerce & personal lifestyles. Below listed are some of the Evaluators tweets:
Early thoughts about why I want the Facebook #Dislike button and how it impacts marketing #data: http://t.co/breKh3RuCX
— Christopher S. Penn (@cspenn) September 16, 2015
Mark Zuckerberg actually said ”What people really want is to be able to express empathy”. The Q/A about Facebook was organized at its head quarter in Menlo Park, California. Thirty one years aged world’s biggest Entrepreneur expressed that the button would be a means for persons to convey empathy. He told Facebook was near to make it ready for user testing. The expression of empathy was misinterpreted and people took it otherwise.
Empathy is actually the capability to recognize and share emotions of others. It actually has nothing to do with Dis-likeness. For instance a person shared his feelings in a post about death of a relative; anybody who wants to express concern cannot do it by “like” option which seems in-appropriate for that, so “Empathy” will fulfill the gap of such posts on social network.
Zuckerberg didn’t categorically explain about what form this empathy button will possess, but it appears it will probably be some shape of an “I’m sorry” button. This was similarly recommended by the person who inquired about “dislike button”, questioning “dislike” “sorry” or “interesting” substitutes. On that Zuckerberg acknowledged it was amazingly complex to electronically shape what seems to be a simple human expression.
Readers are encouraged to watch the Q/A session. The full session of Q/A video is available on Facebook on Mark Zuckerberg’s video post.
About the Author:
Engr. Waqas Imam is a Blogger & freelance author; his opinions, letters and analyses had been published in various national newspapers, blogs & magazines of Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Bangladesh, & India.
He can be contacted at his twitter headset twitter.com/smwaqasimam