Do we need likes? Do they hurt more than they help?

Google Maps tips & tricks
21

Hello @PaulPavlinovich I like this topic you just started, it is emotional and may be dangerous or useful to anyone here depending on how you analyse or use it at your disposal. I think hiding the likes and only show to the owner of the post might be the correct thing to do.

For me I accepted that not everyone can like my posts or even intend to view them, I do not have any problem with that since the post itself must attract you to open it or like it based on the heading, photo, animation, text size, font style for the front page. But as the owner of the post I analyse my posts after I have written them based on how others interact with them. Likes may mean something else to the owner of the post or the person reading. We do need some time to interact with the post(reading) but if someone really like something, will make sure to read it, likes can not replace the real feeling of the post and removing the like’s feature, still you can not force others to interact with the post. For me, I use the like feature to indicate that I have read your post or comment.

I think, what may be the solution here is to have a feature that counts how many people viewed the posts, as for me I do wish to know how many people have seen my post, I always have less than 30 likes on my posts, unless it has changed now, and I really want to know if the 30 people is the total number of people who viewed my posts or not, but I am sure the view number is higher than that.

Likes can be used negatively, as the owner of the post, I will know who does not read my posts at all here, which is not good, and as the owner of the post I can use that in return, not to read posts from a particular person, based on the analysis that you never gave a like to someone’s post.

I hope this makes sense, we are all different, and we all analyse things differently, depending on what you want to achieve. Using likes to get badges is not a good thing to do, but it is encouraging to the owner of the post, especially for the new local guides, they need that sense of belonging, which likes covers.

22

@PaulPavlinovich well i totally agree on everything you say. Also on connect it would be fair not to display the number of likes for the reasons you listed. But I believe that the fundamental point is that we must not make our Connect a social network like Instagram or even worse Facebook … but we must ensure that it remains a community unit of local guides with the same goals: helping others. When a new member joins connect he should have a warm welcome and a tutorial on how to move from the site. But after this it is up to us LGs already present to make it feel at home and not marginalized. The likes are unfortunately a double-edged sword: they can do good but they can also do a lot of harm. Moreover often the gesture of putting a like becomes an automatic action almost as if it were not even thought by our brain. A comment (often) offers better results than a like, because whoever receives it understands that someone has spent his time writing it and just today (in an age where everyone goes fast in life) what do we have most precious of the time? Give some to someone is the best gesture I can do :wink:

23

This is true on the surface @Amiran yes, a more popular post will get picked up as trending. I don’t know for sure, but I think its based on comments rather than likes.

Someone unscrupulous could certainly manipulate the system to make their post trend. If they did it once they’d get away with it, twice would get raised eyebrows, three times, well that might get some unwanted attention.

In other words I agree with you, it could happen, but our team of Googlers and Connect Moderators are great at figuring these things out so I don’t really worry about it.

24

Hi @Raphael-Mahumane you’ve done some deep thinking on this topic that’s for sure! I think I agree with all your points, let me address them one by one if that’s ok…

Dangerous - yes, certainly can be - this is an emotive topic for many people and they could get upset. I’m confident the core values of Connect can allow a peaceful discussion and its working out so far with some great contribution to the discussion so far.

Analysing by interaction is certainly the best approach in my mind. You get much more out of reading and understanding comments, and most importantly empathising with another person’s point of view - I’m not always good at that - its something I try to improve.

I’ve come across some others that use likes in the way that you do as a way of showing that they have read a particular post or response in a stream. I have to admit sometimes I do that too :).

I like the idea of a view count, as long as its a count of times the post was opened. In an ideal world you’d know how long they stayed on your post before clicking off but I don’t think we can expect that level of information. Otherwise its like the photos in Maps, getting a count every time someone scrolls past one doesn’t give you a good idea of which posts people like.

I had not really thought about retribution of not liking person X’s post because they did not like your post, but I guess that could certainly happen. That is sort of a transference of instagram mentality, when someone likes your photo, you feel compelled to go to their profile and like something of theirs.

Belonging is the most important thing for everyone I think, and Local Guides does enable a sense of belonging to a community, even a family sometimes. This is one of the only global communities I’m involved in where for the most part country, race, sex, religion or anything else simply don’t really matter. There is the occasional aberration but they tend to get sorted out pretty quickly. To me this community is a great expression of why globalisation is actually good and why the isolationists who try to stop it are wrong.

Paul

25

This is true @Matt95Bassett we have a common set of goals and values that help forge us into a community and Connect is definitively not a social network - the Googlers actually spend a lot of effort understanding how Connect is working and ensuring it does not degenerate into just a social network. You’ve hit the nail on the head there.

Paul

26

Hi @PaulPavlinovich I thank you for your response. I think you just made me question my self now if it is ok to like someone’s post, indicating that I read it, without leaving a comment, you are really sharpening our capacity of interacting with a post. I hope others will read your post as it is very much important on this platform.

27

Hi @PaulPavlinovich ,

very interesting and actual topic, the argument here is so wide and I believe also controversial for some people.

From my perspective you are fully right, although the likes are a measure for the author of the post for its visibility. they are not necessary needed for someone else, also because I think if I like a post, a photo, anything shared it is certainly not because other xxx like it :stuck_out_tongue: . Well here the “trend” post might only help the visibility of the post if happens to not seeing it, but 10 or 100 likes it doesn’t count too much.

Unfortunately not everybody thinks like that and many people they do fully rely on this, like you say the “influencers”, which tends to be bad … I read many stories (also watched once a terrific documentary on the topic) about people trying to change their lives to obtain more “attention” (on socials) and this did lead to sad stories :confused: , and again because of the attention paid by the number of likes of someone else!

I will vote to hide the number of likes, for me good on every platform … the icon which shows I liked that contents (or any other reaction) is more than enough.

28

I think I saw that documentary too @LuigiZ or one very similar to it - it was quite interesting, a lot of people end up self harming because they cannot succeed in the cut-throat competitive world of the influencer.

Thanks for your thoughts.

29

Don’t rethink that too much @Raphael-Mahumane I sometimes leave a like when I think the post has the beginning of being good but isn’t really and they get a comment when it is good.

Paul

30

Thank you for that @PaulPavlinovich I just wanted to be sure I am on the right track.

31

This is a great post @PaulPavlinovich . And I think this is the voice of many of us. It sure hurts when you see a big zero next to the heart. And it’s not always because the post is below standard or not likeable. Sometimes it’s also because it gets lost among many other new posts. And every day there are so many new posts coming. It’s a good idea if the likes can be made invisible to the readers and visible ONLY to the author. This at least will save us from embarrassment. But it will still hurt. What about the comments? You can’t keep the comments hidden too. So a part of embarrassment remains there when a post doesn’t get any comments. That’s heartbreaking.

32

As so often, @PaulPavlinovich I find myself representing a minority point of view: I like Likes.

But there’s an important side note: I like them if everyone uses them the way I use them - as a means to express you like content and really have nothing else meaningful to add. Comments are in my view a useful tool, provided that they are used to contribute to the post, but not if they are used to basically only express the same as a Like. Some good examples of what I don’t like are posts here on Connect by Googlers that then get literally hundreds of comments like “Great post @Googler”, as this then makes it difficult to find the 3 or 4 meaningful comments between all of those comments (let alone find back that meaningful comment later - was it on page 27? 28? 29? I give up).

33

And yet I can’t help liking everything @ErmesT ! So the hiding of the count, as proposed by yourself and @PaulPavlinovich is a great idea. I do think the addition of removal of the kudos badges has merit also.

34

Interesting post @PaulPavlinovich

Your signature still has Always @Mention me so I see your reply in it - so I do!

I am still learning about Google Maps and Local Guides Connect as I only joined this year in the spring and my days are very full so I get about ten minutes a day average to interact with LGC …

35

@SoniaK it would be lovely if more people took a moment out of their busy lives to comment on a post as you have done here. Displaying or not displaying the comment count is an interesting thought.

@JanVanHaver nothing wrong with presenting the opposing view - debates would be a bit boring if they were one sided, and yes I like to receive them but am not so convinced the count is useful and yes I share your frustration on meaningless comments posted only to suck up that hide the genuine contributions on a post.

@lynneannec seems like the idea should really be logged into Idea Exchange

@Dave26 absolutely yes always happy to be mentioned to see a good comment - I think we all learn every day and its pleasing to know that you’re taking a bit of time from your busy day for Connect - there is much richness to be had on this platform

Paul

36

I have lodged the idea here https://www.localguidesconnect.com/t5/Idea-Exchange/remove-the-visible-like-count-on-a-post-to-improve-well-being/idi-p/1999310#M37278 if you’d care to vote on it.

Paul

37

That’s a really interesting reflection @PaulPavlinovich . It’s already well known how social pages can interfere in people feelings, specially depressed persons. I really like to give first kudos to posts when they catch me firstly whit image and title. However I lost lots of posts… I lost good posts and that’s also a Connect problem because when I open one post and after that I go back, I have to see all the same first posts again and again. I don’t go back to the place of the post that I opened…

38

It can be a little hard to find new stuff on the home page @Patriciapraca I seem to go ok on the topics for working out what I’ve not looked at yet. I understand it can be a challenge though.

There are a few people using likes for working out what they have and have not read. If it was implemented like insta the person who hit the like button would still be able to see that they had so your use case would still work.

Thanks for your thoughts.

Paul