TikTok, a video-sharing platform owned by Chinese ByteDance, announced on Wednesday that it is testing a dislike button for comments on its app.
The video-sharing social network wrote in a blog post that this new feature will help users feel like they have more control over comments. TikTok said this feature will let individuals identify comments they think are irrelevant or inappropriate without letting other users know that they have flagged a comment.
This is similar to Twitter’s downvote button (currently on a pilot phase) that allows users to flag comments that are irrelevant to the initial tweet. Many users, however, feel like the feature is useless and they are burning more for the long-requested edit button that’s been a hot topic recently.
TikTok on the other side seems to think that this new feature is one of the many ways that will help ensure safety on the app.
“At TikTok, we believe community should be built on a foundation of respect, kindness, and understanding. To help people forge positive digital connections in line with our rules for appropriate behavior on our platform, we strive to empower our community members to stay in control of their interactions with others on TikTok,” Cormac Keenan, Head of Trust & Safety at TikTok wrote in the blog post.
In addition, TikTok is also testing safety reminders that will help creators filter out negative and abusive comments by adopting comment filtering, bulk block and delete options.
“We will continue to remove comments that violate our Community Guidelines, and creators can continue to report comments or accounts individually or in bulk for us to review,” TikTok said.
The video-sharing platform already has a dislike feature for videos or content shared on the platform. According to The Verge, the feature was added to keep content that might bother some users away from their algorithm.
By Zintle Nkohla
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