I think I’ve settled on the latter. Disagreement is maybe best communicated by the absence of an upvote? And downvotes work best when they signal something that is just off base, and while not reportable, is not appreciated at a broad cultural level.

    • anteaters@feddit.de
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      1 year ago

      Good question. I think reporting is left to cases where a post is so bad that a moderator needs to take action to remove it or the user from the community. So downvote things that are of low quality and report things that are against the community or instance rules?

      • Cold Hotman@nrsk.no
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        1 year ago

        So downvote things that are of low quality and report things that are against the community or instance rules?

        Perhaps, but wouldn’t that depend on what you mean by “low quality”? How could one measure the quality of a post in any other way than how it’s adhering to the community rules?

        Any other measurements would simply be “that’s just your opinion, maan”, no?

        I don’t see the downvotes as anything other than a tool for punishing other users in the way it’s always been used. I see a lot of the arguments in this thread as “Well, nobody has tried REAL communism NOT using the downvote as a disagree button.”

        • anteaters@feddit.de
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          1 year ago

          Yes, up/down votes are inherently subjective and reports are to be used for objectively bad content. It is up to the users to decide whether they feel that opinions they don’t agree with are worthy of downvoting or not. In the end the voting system tries to give the community a voice to mirror what content they like to see - within the rules that are enforced by moderators. I think it would be better if people downvote content they don’t like instead of using it to “punish” people they argue with. That’s why I think it is a slight improvement that lemmy shows up and down votes separately - it gives the downvote a bit more gravitas and in consequence “not voting” receives some, too.

          • Cold Hotman@nrsk.no
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            1 year ago

            It is up to the users to decide

            Then it will always be a race to the bottom and people will decide to misuse it to punish users and manipulate the community. Clear evidence of this happening on Lemmy is rife and the technical level for abusing downvotes on the fediverse is quite low.

            In the end the voting system tries to give the community a voice to mirror what content they like to see

            A single up or downvote function would take care of that function. In the end the separate up- and downvote system gives the community a tool to punish users who they don’t agree with.

            I think it would be better if people downvote content they don’t like instead of using it to “punish” people they argue with.

            I agree, too bad REAL communism NOT using the downvote to punish people haven’t been tried.

            That’s why I think it is a slight improvement that lemmy shows up and down votes separately

            Downvotes on Lemmy? Like on Reddit?

            • anteaters@feddit.de
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              1 year ago

              Interesting. I have buttons for voting up and down in the web UI and on mobile in voyager. Is that a setting of the home instance?

              I’m not sure what you mean with single function and the separate voting system. Voting on threads vs voting on posts?

              • Cold Hotman@nrsk.no
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                1 year ago

                Is that a setting of the home instance?

                Yes. Lemmy instances can disable downvote federation. I will never see a single downvote at the price of not being able to downvote others myself. Which is fine because I either upvote what I consider good content or report content that shouldn’t be in the community.

                single function and the separate voting system

                I don’t need downvotes to see the content the community consider good rise above the not so good stuff. It’s the same to me if people downvote or don’t upvote, both means they’re not endorsing it for what ever reason.

                So there’s a way to separate good content from bad content through upvoting. And there’s a way of removing content wrong for the community by reporting it.

                So what’s left for the downvotes to do? I mean, besides letting angry people do something more than just shout at their screen?

    • Zippy@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      Don’t think the moderators need to action every instance when a person or two thinks something doesn’t belong here. The down vote can take care of that. Moderators can focus on blatant issues.