Twitter is planning to remove the “like” button from its platform as CEO Jack Dorsey is “not a fan” of it, according to a report from the Telegraph.
The Telegraph reported on the social media platform’s alleged intentions, Sunday, claiming that Dorsey admitted last week “at a Twitter event that he was not a fan of the heart-shaped button and that it would be getting rid of it ‘soon.’”
Dorsey’s platform originally gave users the ability to “favorite” tweets, but this was changed in 2015 to a Facebook-style “like” button, prompting complaints at the time.
In response to the Telegraph‘s report, the company declared, Monday, “As we’ve been saying for a while, we are rethinking everything about the service to ensure we are incentivizing healthy conversation, that includes the like button. We are in the early stages of the work and have no plans to share right now.”
As we’ve been saying for a while, we are rethinking everything about the service to ensure we are incentivizing healthy conversation, that includes the like button. We are in the early stages of the work and have no plans to share right now. https://t.co/k5uPe5j4CW
— Twitter Comms (@TwitterComms) October 29, 2018
According to Mashable, Dorsey criticized his platform’s “like” button earlier this month at the WIRED25 summit, hinting that its removal might be an attempt to promote “healthy conversation.”
“We have a big like button with a heart on it and we’re incentivizing people to want it to go up,” the CEO proclaimed. “Is that the right thing? Versus contributing to the public conversation or a healthy conversation? How do we incentivize healthy conversation?”
The idea prompted heavy criticism from users.
What the actual fuck? This is all they could come up with? https://t.co/x7H0ym02lE
— Owen Williams ⚡ (@ow) October 29, 2018
Users: please stop the hate
Twitter: Okay, we’ll take away the “like” button— Molly Jong☠️Fast (@MollyJongFast) October 29, 2018
Sometimes I like a tweet enough to give it a like (and want to give a hat-tip to its author) but not enough to retweet. I try to be very sparing in my retweets. Thanks for eliminating a valuable way of interacting with people on Twitter, @jack.
— Jeff B. (@EsotericCD) October 29, 2018
Twitter, you ok?
This would be a weird thing to do… https://t.co/Fd70lC9Qk6
— Matt Navarra (@MattNavarra) October 29, 2018
Other users on the platform were skeptical of the story.
I’m skeptical of this actually happening https://t.co/r5fBAr4XSm
— Taylor Lorenz (@TaylorLorenz) October 29, 2018
hi everyone this story is based on one quote and PR appears to be mostly denying it. it is not worth getting fired up over i promise https://t.co/wZrPkr47Yi
— maya kosoff (@mekosoff) October 29, 2018
I am somewhat dubious of this; it’s based on a quote from an unspecified “event” last week, PR mostly denies. Last week Twitter met with reporters (including BuzzFeed) to show off several potential new features, this was not mentioned https://t.co/vQeEF17IjJ
— Katie Notopoulos (@katienotopoulos) October 29, 2018
Despite the social network’s claims that a change would not come soon, Dorsey’s company has previously implemented controversial features shortly after assuring users that a change would not be imminent.
In 2016, just four days after Dorsey claimed his platform would not be imminently changing its timeline from a reverse-chronological feed to a Facebook-style recommended posts feed, his team made the change.
Charlie Nash is a reporter for Breitbart Tech. You can follow him on Twitter @MrNashington, or like his page at Facebook.
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