Just shut up and tell me where I can get some of those apples!
PS: what are these situations you talk of? Sounds fascinating.
this. +1 
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Great articles, but to be honest I am still not sure I fully appreciate the concrete risks in this specific case.
People could remove likes, but only those they gave earlier and in my proposal only relatively recent ones in the grand scheme of things (and thus only a fraction of the likes ever given would be at risk.)
What are people going to do that they canāt already? Pout, take their ball part of their likes and go home? Bring in hordes of sock puppets that pump and dump comments?
Do trust levels currently rely on likes?
Regarding likes on edited comments, yes, I admit that not a very likely problem because people usually do it the other way round, covering up offensive comments. I donāt think the fact that something hasnāt happened in anger yet necessarily mean that software ādesigned for evilā shouldnāt consider the possibility.
The change seems relatively harmless because I donāt see how it could hurt the likers and the recipient can make an informed decision. The idea behind the grace period was that most minor edits seem to happen relatively soon. Although I could even live with those removing likes, too, that feels a bit harsh. There can be very good reasons for editing comments much later, but I donāt really see anything wrong with making people decide if it is worth the possible small price.
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This, people. Herding the masses, on hot-button topics, with technical foes whose main goal is the cause mayhem for the lulz is not a walk in the park.
No idea if thereās an algorithm for this, but what if the edit involved strike-through so that the original was preserved, and/or the edit involved only additional info at the bottom after the phrase āedit:ā or āedited:ā?
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Well, except for this site, on any default Discourse instance you can easily browse the full edit history of all posts. You can read about that here:
(for the record I still feel that was a poor and short sighted decision, cc: @Donald_Petersen @grumblebum @fireshadow)
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I still applaud the decision. Donāt forget @beschizza made the final call, and with the passage of time he and the rest of the editors might feel itās time to change back. But as for myself, I still stand by the points made in that thread.
As for the ālikesā issue, to me thatās a much smaller thing. I donāt get all caught up in arguments wondering who liked what. I sometimes peek to see who liked something I wrote, but I almost never check to see who liked something somebody else wrote, and even if I did (maybe in the context of sizing up the opposition in a good old-fashioned forum rumble), I certainly wouldnāt track it. Undoing likes after the passage of a few minutes of time seems (to me at least) like a power I can live without, even if the post is edited. If someone asks why I liked a post that now suddenly shows an affinity to NAMBLA (whereas when I clicked the heart the post seemed to be recommending the new AC/DC album), then I suppose I could just post a reply explaining the sitch. If I cared enough. Which I probably wouldnāt.
Editing my own self-typed expression is more important to me than any restriction on my emoticon-endorsing any given post.
There is still something about it that rubs me very, very wrong.
To say that your right to not have visible āmistakeā edits show (edits after the built in 5 minute grace period, that is) ā or edits that indicate some kind of evolution in thinking ā is more important than the right of your peers to judge your edits on their own meritsā¦ well, thatās just selfish. And flat out wrong. Edits make us more human, not less. The oops and refinements and clarifications are signs of people who care about getting it right in the broadest sense of the word. And that history should be a standard part of the post, broadcast into the world for everyone who cares to see them. Yeah, we all make mistakes. Itās cool. Together weāll fix it!
It is also irritating since hiding edit revisions causes other problems, which is what this topic is about. With edit revisions hidden by default people canāt actually see (for sure) if a post was in fact later edited to say ālike this post if you, too, are a proud GamerGate supporter!ā.
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No, it isnāt. Itās about not being able to change your mind about whether you liked a post or not, or undo a mistaken like, after 10 minutes. Why not? Itās a minor thing, I donāt know why youād lock it.
Why is who liked a post (rather than just a count) visible anyway?
Edits? I donāt much care, I only use them to fix typos or expand my thoughts. If I change my mind Iāll generally just delete the whole thing and start again. But I donāt see how it benefits the community to be able to trawl through peopleās revisions. I donāt need to see their drafts.
You really have no conception of the user who starts to harbor a grudge against user X, who used to be their friend, and then goes and secretly removes every like they cast on their prior posts?
Because this kind of stuff happened every god damn day on Stack Overflow.
Which could cause a 10 likes badge to be removed, could cause them to lose trust level 3 (not reaching minimum like in the last 100 days), could cause top topic offerings to change and topic summaries which are affected by likesā¦
Also, when your post is ālikedā by a bunch of questionable new accounts versus known regulars, or it is liked by the resident nearly-always-banned kookā¦ Yeah, who likes your post kind of matters. Doctorow liking your post matters.
I also personally enjoy reading revisions on a post that represent evolutions in that personās thoughts. It is like reading the footnotes of a novel. You are right that most of the evolution plays out in conversational responses vs. edits, though.
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Then so be it. If I no longer like a post, for whatever reason, then I should be able to āunlikeā that post, with all the consequences that entails.
Proposal: handle it with notifications, e.g. āA post you liked has been editedā. Then, if the edit is bad, it can be brought to modsā attention and dealt with by them.
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But if the post is edited and I no longer agree with it, or want to show my agreement, I canāt do anything about it.
You can notify the moderators, and we will ban the post author/editor for abusing the edit feature. Or just delete the post, or edit a note into it, if itās obviously changed meaning in a way that thereby misrepresents people who liked it.
Honestly, I was just asking. I donāt know what you use them for.
Honestly, I couldnāt care less. Iām not 12.
Ditto.
Iād forgotten that, but the levels are quite low, no? Besides, losing trust level 3 loses what? The ability to make bad jokes using other peopleās thread titles, a stronger spamhammer, and access to all those lovely active Lounge posts? Level 4 is the only trust level that matters, and thatās manual.
I read everything already (or at least review all ānewā topics)
Donāt know why anyone reads those.
Only because likes arenāt anonymous here, and I still donāt see why it matters.
I wouldnāt know. sniff. But I donāt look at BB proper any more, so even if my post is copied to the article, I donāt know or care.
That sounds regrettable, but hard to take too terribly seriously. I donāt want to diminish the importance of what you do, but Iād hazard a guess that for most of us, the time we spend here is more-or-less optional, elective, āfreeā time. This isnāt our job, itās something we do for fun.
Youāll remember Iāve been around for some years now, but I spent several months this spring and summer disengaged with the internet almost entirely for personal reasons. During that time I believe some additional features or ātrust levelsā were activated here, and so despite my longish history, I find myself at level āMember.ā I assume thatās relatively low. But it bothers me not at all, because since I can still run my ridiculously past-its-sell-by-date RPG, and communicate back and forth with all you fine people, I have no interest in badges or trust levels or any of that. As far as it goes, Iāve risen as far as I need to. I need no further authority or respect than my name already brings me.
So as far as Iām concerned, the whole Like thing is a real tempest in a teapot. I understand how this will be more meaningful for you, Jeff, since itās your livelihood. But it may be another manifestation of the way each community works differently. Maybe the BoingBoing BBS harbors a junior-high-school mindset with lots of like-removals and backstabbing and all that tiresome horseshit; you and @Falcor would certainly know better than I do about that. But my gloriously uninformed opinion is that most of us here care much more about the actual conversation than about the gameified trappings and bells & whistles.
Donāt judge. Everyone needs a hobby.
Well, I appreciate that and think it helps build some sense of community. You know, itās really easy to get the feeling youāre talking to a void online.
But there are a lot of people here whose comments and opinions I particularly respect, and knowing they appreciated something I had to say is encouraging. Maybe itās shallow of me to care about that sort of thing, but then if not for people like them, why am I here? And Iād like to think there are some who might likewise be encouraged by me.
Just for the record, when I saw you your like on the one really unpleasant post, my thoughts were ādaneel agreed with that? As if, he must have been aiming for reply or flag or something.ā
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Point taken, but I do worry if it contributes to a somewhat cliquey atmosphere. Youād probably get that anywhere with regular posters, though.
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I like seeing, when two or three people are locked in a heated debate they continue to like each otherās replies/salvos. It makes me feel like it is a more consensual debate and not just a powerplay.
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