I’d say a reason could be TBT’s users are a small, mostly demographically homogenous community (extrapolating from observations during my time here, my impression is the typical TBT user is retirement age, not a heavy user of social media, relies more on telephone calls than texting and real-time messaging apps for communicating, and isn’t an early adopter of hardware or software) while Apple’s user base is much, much larger and more diverse.
I’m not judging anybody here; I simply think opinions that become popular on TBT seem more commonplace than they would be elsewhere because of who we are.
I agree with the beginning of this but not the end. I definitely fit into the retirement age, not heavily on social media, prefers phone calls etc, but I’m also an early adopter of hardware and software. This isn’t speaking for all TBT readers of course, but I suspect there are others in a similar position.
On the topic of icons, I’m disinclined to give a negative comment or dislike icon, but if I disagree enough I will post why.
I see the heart, thumbs up, I agree, thank you etc to be similar enough as to use them interchangeably. As someone who doesn’t use a lot of social media I’m not wedded to emojis as a form of communication.
I’ve been pondering this and just ran into an example of why I think that Good Post and +1 Agree both have places. In this post:
I am pleased that @Ed68 is providing useful information that both continues to add to the thread’s ongoing story and potentially helps others reading. It’s definitely worth a Good Post. However, agreement is simply not in the cards—I haven’t confirmed what he’s saying, so I wouldn’t want to say that I agreed with him.
A lot of @Shamino’s longer posts fall into this category as well. They’re utterly great, and I strongly suspect that they’re correct, but when I have used the Good Post equivalent on them in the past, I’m saying “I think this post makes TidBITS Talk a more valuable place,” as opposed to saying “I agree that the point made here is correct or that I agree with the opinion stated here.”
To put it another way, +1 Agree requires that you either have explicit knowledge that allows you to back up what the poster is saying or, in the case of an opinion, you’re aligning yourself with their point of view. (“Backups are good” +1 Agree)
Both are positive signals, but I like the differentiation.
I have several reasons for participating. One of them is to help solve problems I have experience with. When someone gives good advice in areas I know, I want both the helper and the helped to know I agree. The same applies when I give advice. In that case, I’m always pleased when someone confirms my advice. or Good Post does not have the same feeling of stamp of approval for me.
And by the way, I wouldn’t have written this if Agree were available here now.
I finally found some time to work on this, and here’s what I’ve come up with. ChatGPT suggested some specific colors that theoretically work for colorblind folks, so I hope that’s true.
I would remove the exclamation point from GOOD POST because I find it hard to differentiate ‘!’ from l, I, or 1 at this type size.
Have you considered Mixed case or Leading Caps (as opposed to ALL CAPS)? Usually ALL CAPS are the hardest to read. Even small caps might be more legible (for me).
Finally, the image seems to degrade after being selected:
I kind of like the exclamation points because they convey more emotion and fit in the space, but I’m happy to try it without them and some casing some alternatives and see how they feel.
The usual thinking about ALL CAPS being less legible applies to running text, not to short labels or headlines. Here are four variants:
I also think keeping +1 is a good idea. As discussed earlier, I like the distinction between “this post adds to the discussion” and “I agree with the content of this post”. The +1 also aligns with the reaction responses used on many sites so it will be helpful for new or infrequent TBT users.
There are very many different types of color blind. For myself, I can tell you that I can hardly distinguish your 2nd (+1) and 3rd (funny).
The +1 is not problematic because of two lines or not, it’s IMHO redundant. In my opinion, the present three options are more than enough. Frankly, the more I see how they are used, the less I see value in having them at all. Perhaps the only one I’d retain is thank you because it encourages good manners and politeness while at the same time also saving threads from being cluttered up with thank-you posts. The +1 and thumbs-down and all those mannerisms imported from social media, in my experience mostly encourage tribalism which I do not see as offering any benefit to a board like this.
I’d say unless TBT reaches the level of hundreds of thousands of active users or becomes a forum that allows debates about politics, social issues, or religion, “tribalism” is very unlikely to take hold here. The current combination of member characteristics, traffic levels, and proactive moderation make TBT a very calm and civil place.
I didn’t have any issues with the emojis, including the larger set, but since enough people felt the emojis were too ambiguous or caused a negative atmosphere to drive TBT to make changes, I think the text replacements are fine. I also welcome the return of a way to say “I agree”.
In any case, I hope reaction text/emojis aren’t ever removed entirely from TBT or reduced to a single choice as it seems some want.
on them in the past, I’m saying “I think this post makes TidBITS Talk a more valuable place,” as opposed to saying “I agree that the point made here is correct or that I agree with the opinion stated here.”
