It’s happened, but not how most people would have wanted.
The Facebook ‘Dislike’ button is sort of here (most people rumoured to see it tomorrow on Oct 9, 2015), but not as you would imagine, or want. Instead of an actual button to express dislike the social media giant has decided to introduce six new emoji, each representing their own feeling, The Independent reports.
Mark Zuckerberg hinted last month he wanted to expand on the Like button, with a lot of people saying they wanted a ‘Dislike’ button to express their hatred of the constant selfies and photos of half-arsed cooking that clog up their feed. You. Yeah I’m looking at you. Stop.
However, Zuckerberg has said he wouldn’t introduce an actual ‘Dislike’ button as it might promote bullying and make people feel bad. The new ‘Reactions’ on offer instead are: ‘Love’, ‘Haha’, ‘Yay’, ‘Wow’, ‘Sad’ and ‘Angry’.
According to Techcrunch, the website will start rolling out the feature in Spain and Ireland as a test. The countries have been chosen because they’re relatively close groups. Furthermore, allowing Spain to test it out will give a good feel of how foreign countries use the feature.
FacebookThe more cynical among you might point out that these ‘Reactions’ are already readily available as emoji.
Where they do differ from traditional emoji, though, is that they will be added next to the current Like button. So Facebook users can add their ‘Reaction’ to a post, the same you do with a Like, allowing you to get a more detailed picture of what people think of your holiday snaps.
The site is going to start rolling out the new buttons in Spain and Ireland first, to test them.
