still using them as read receipts for connection
reactions are public so the data could be collected, analyzed, and sold someday
our data is open source, so there’s no company that control it and exclusively profit from it
Discussion
why not have an explicit "acknowledge read" reaction ?
on GAB there is a drop down list of reactions - you can "laugh" at a post for example if you want instead of "liking" it.
acknowledge read should be default and if you want to express something else use a drop down list of "reactions" ...