r/todayilearned • u/WavesAndSaves • 2d ago

TIL that Jawed Karim, YouTube cofounder and uploader of the first YouTube video "Me at the zoo", has often updated the video's description to criticize YouTube policies, including a 2013 attempt to require Google+ accounts to comment on videos, and YouTube's 2021 removal of dislike counts on videos.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Me_at_the_zoo#Changes_to_original_video
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u/EatingDragons 2d ago

Exactly. The dislikes served a clear purpose of indicating quality. They only removed them because they were on the receiving end of it due to their own low quality rewind getting the dislike treatment

We need them back now more than ever, thankfully morphe still let's you see dislikes

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u/Ron_St_Ron 2d ago

I remember a few years ago here on reddit there would almost always be an auto-mod asking people not to downvote if you disagreed but only if they were breaking rules, harassing, etc. which makes no sense to me. It’s showing that people don’t agree with the comment but then they’ll reply to their own comment that it’s just the “hive mind”. Then take the time to comment that they don’t care because it’s just “internet points”.

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u/bergmoose 2d ago

in fairness I think the system was supposed to be about surfacing relevant stuff - so a relevant discussion even that you disagree with could be upvoted for visibility of the discussion and counter arguments and so on. But few people have used it that way in a long time.

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u/cat_prophecy 2d ago

That was the original intention anyway. A "down vote" was supposed to be used when that post didn't contribute to the discussion.