When Google originally said that Google+ would become a social layer on top of everything else the company does, they weren’t kidding around. From the +1 button to Search, Plus Your World, Google is adding Google+ integration to as many of their products as possible. But at what expense?
Once again, Google has angered an actor from Start Trek. Yesterday, Wil Wheaton posted on Tumblr (warning: profanity) about a change he noticed while watching videos on YouTube. Instead of the ‘thumbs up’ and ‘thumbs down’ icons to vote on a video, he saw a Google+ ‘Like’ button.
Google has told Danny Sullivan, “We are currently running experiments showing different Google+ buttons in YouTube in order to provide the best user experience.” I took a look at screenshots of the buttons being tested, and none of them seem to have a button equivalent to the ‘thumbs down.’
A lot of people are angry because with these new buttons, only Google+ users will be able to vote on YouTube videos. I’m not disagreeing with them, but am more drawn to the fact that there will be no “1-click” way to say that you don’t like the video.
If you wanted to express negative feedback, you would have to comment. After years of Facebook users begging for a ‘dislike’ button, why would they remove their equivalent to it?
I’m starting to worry that it’s going to become harder to give negative feedback on social networks. While it may not be a lot of work to type out your comment and post it, why is it so much easier to agree with content than it is to disagree?
Video comments seem to be a place for users with strong opinions, whether they are positive or negative. This is because those without strong opinions don’t want to take the time to type out their thoughts, which then may be attacked by other users. If you just like a video a little bit, it’s much easier to click the ‘thumbs up’ or ‘thumbs down’ button and move on to another video.
Why do social networks make it so easy and quick to give content positive feedback, but not negative? Do you agree that both opinions should have 1-click options? Let us know in the comments!
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Tags: Google, Google Plus, social media, YouTube
I think keeping a Thumbs Down option would be good.. on YouTube.
Could be as they are ‘just testing’ the G+ buttons that they’ll keep the Thumb’s down as well, but we have seen a progression over the years… this is still part of it.
Remember when we could rate a video with 1, 2… or 5 stars? People complained a lot when it changed to ‘just’ up or down with the thumbs… maybe we’ll now just have an ‘Up’.
Wow, YouTube has gone through so many changes that I forgot about that! Let’s hope they test something like “-1″ to balance out +1′s!
There has been quite a bit of discussion on the -1 idea (at least in the G+erverse) and the consensus is that it will never happen… too many haters out there! So I doubt that a Google-owned property (YouTube) will be allowed to put a -1 on their site.
But in a way, isn’t a thumbs down vote basically a -1?