Say goodbye to “dislike mobs” on YouTube.
YouTube has announced that it’s making dislike counts private on all videos across YouTube.
The thumbs down button isn’t going away. Users can still click thumbs down to dislike a video in order to inform the YouTube recommendation algorithm about content they didn’t like.
However, when a user presses thumbs down, there will be no dislike count letting users know how many people also disliked the video.
According to YouTube, this decision comes as a result of an experiment the company conducted earlier this year.
The experiment found that when a user can’t see the results of a dislike mob’s campaign to drive up a targeted video’s dislike count, they’re less likely to pile-on. There was actually a reduction in dislikes on videos as a result of removing the count.
YouTube says the experiment also confirmed what many creators previously told the company: Small channels were often the targets of these bad faith actors seeking to drive up the dislike counts.
Exact dislike count metrics will still be available to users in their YouTube Studio dashboard. Without that public count, the dislike numbers can actually become relevant data to find out if a creator’s viewership genuinely didn’t like a video.
But, most importantly, online trolls will lose a major tool that they utilized to discourage up-and-coming creators. YouTube will become a (slightly) happier place.
According to YouTube, the removal of dislike counts will gradually roll out on the platform starting today.
