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| Facebook and Instagram. |
‘No Likes’ option to be introduced on Facebook and Instagram.
This week, Facebook will roll out the option to hide likes on posts, across Facebook and Instagram.
Originally, the idea to hide Like counts on Facebook’s social networks was focused on depressurizing users experience.
Users are often faced with anxiety and embarrassment over the number of likes gotten on their posts, as enough likes are seen as one being popular.
“How many likes [users] got, or other people got — it turned out that it didn’t actually change nearly as much about the experience, in terms of how people felt or how much they use experience, as we thought it would. But it did end up being pretty polarizing,” admitted Instagram head, Adam Mosseri.
“Some people really liked it and some people really didn’t. For those who liked it, it was mostly what we had hoped — which is that it depressurized the experience. And, for those who didn’t, they used Likes to get a sense for what was trending or was relevant on Instagram and on Facebook. And they were just super annoyed that we took it away,” he added.
The company is rolling out the “no Likes” option on both platforms. Both content consumers and producers can choose to turn on or off Like and view counts on posts on Instagram.
How to access this setting on Facebook:
Step 1.
Go to “Settings and Privacy” area under News Feed settings.
Step 2.
To turn this settings off, you’ll find an option to “Hide number of reactions”, tap on it.
Interestingly, Facebook says both private and public profiles will have this feature, including previously published posts.
Another factor worthy of mention here is Instagram’s plan to make its app available to children below 13 years of age. In this case, adding “no likes” by default option or adding parental control option would necessitate such a setting.
This feature will roll out this week, according to Facebook and Instagram. But, it’ll become global over time. This may take days on Instagram.
On the other hand, Facebook says this feature would get to a small percentage of users and they would be notified on News Feed through an alert. It would reach global audience over the next few weeks.