Because currently, it seems like the only thing it’s recording are downvotes. Meanwhile upvotes are completely ignored, leading to pretty much every profile I see having a negative reputation.
Also, I have a very fragile ego and my -6 reputation hurts a bit.
I’m playing with different fediverse at the moment as well as this one. That one doesn’t do down votes. Didn’t know it at the time when I signed up. The idea is appealing. The idea is that if you disagree with a comment, then you should interact and leave your own viewpoint. An anonymous, unthoughtful down vote does nothing that leads to a discussion. In reddit I’d see something down voted to oblivion because of a name brand mentioned but no discussion as to why people disagreed.
Thus far all of the fediverse has been positive comments 90% of the time.
That actually makes sense. Legit the reddit style voting system was often just mindless dopamine button pressing where just interacting in the group vote was enough to give you yours but not really encouraging anything beyond that. Iv been sitting here kinda missing it on squabble and now im more ok without.
I used to get so annoyed seeing mindless comments being endlessly reposted (‘r/unexpectedoffice’ was one that comes to mind, there are many more) and getting hundreds of upvotes. I’m hoping the system here discourages that sort of useless nonsense.
I hear what you’re saying, but as a counterpoint: when I read something really fucking stupid (like someone just trolling and posting racial slurs) the appropriate response is actually to downvote & move on without engaging. Do not feed the trolls.
Without downvotes, you end up with Twitter-tier garbage discourse and arguments because there’s no way for the community to vote to remove an idiot’s platform, just clap-backs and ratios.
The up/downvote system is far from perfect, but I’d really rather not lose it as the fediverse draws more people in. I would much rather have my opinion hidden on occasion because I pissed off a wasp hive than have the content I consume be filled with toxic bait that can only be hidden if a moderator gets involved.