Discussion
Whoever zapped this, you have no sense of humor and I'm disappointed in you.
Who decides what is meaningless for me? π
Addictions are harder to break for some than for others.
Crack is meaningful to the addict. It doesnβt mean itβs healthy or that they have a healthy perspective on the reason they find it meaningful.
When you sit by a river you hear the water moving over rocks. I hear stories. The water has meaning to me that you may not understand.
This discussion doesnβt exist in a vacuum, as if itβs merely theoretical. βLikesβ and their affect on people and their behavior online are well studied. This is not some crazy idea I came up with on my own. π
I think the problem is more pronounced when someone is posting/writing notes in the hopes of likes, or as their goal. When they tailor their writing, or only write in a way that they believe will provide them with likes, they become dependent on that βhitβ. If one writes for themselves and they write to provide value to their community (laughter, thought provoking, education) then it doesnβt matter.
Personal motivation is a huge part of it. It is the norm on social media to βdo it for the likesβ and their systems are built to reward that behavior. Thinking it doesnβt carry over into how people behave on Nostr is foolish.
Iβm sure it does and Iβm sure people will continue to care about how many followers they have and will attempt to leverage their followers to make money. Incentive structures matter and help to dictate behaviour. There is no doubt about that.
For many, another mental hurdle to hop over, is that sats are more than a store of wealth. Some may be so committed to holding that they are unwilling to zap content π€·ββοΈ
Some may be completely unwilling to zap, but I think that changes over time as they see them in action. But yea I agree itβs a hurdle for some. The problem is where weβve all come from. Nostr is unlike any social network any of us have used. When it comes to content (Iβm differentiating βcontentβ from casual social interaction like this discussion), there is always a price. We pay for content with our time, our attention, and/or our money, whether or not we realize it. Traditional/legacy social media monetizes our time and attention, and in some cases allows for direct payments to creators (super follows on Twitter, for example). If we are unwilling to pay for content in a way that is meaningful for the content creators, then they will either go elsewhere or we will find that our time and attention on Nostr become more monetized in the way of ads.
π―agree.
About to start ignoring anybody who smiles, waves or nods in public for now on. Drop some change in this can or fuck off, fiat people!
π Not exactly comparable as nobody keeps a running tally of how many people smiled or nodded or waved and then displays it for everyone else to see as they pass by.
Then maybe we should stop displaying those metrics on profiles and notes, only to those recieving it?
Or maybe we should stop being zuckerfucks and stop deciding for others what social experience is right for them and allow people to adjust these things in a way that suits them. Give everybody the ability to enable okr Diable whatever they wish. This should be a client. Total, beautiful and unrepressed anarchy.
Options are good and a feature such as this should be optional if it exists in the client at all. Not arguing to take away options, simply that they are meaningless and have a long proven history of being misused and abused on social media to the detriment of users.
Interestingly, Instagram gives users the option to hide like counts. You can both disable like counts so you donβt see them on othersβ posts, as well as disable them so others canβt see how many likes your posts receive. This was a decision made to help alleviate the pressures users feel to βdo it for the likesβ so to speak. The problem is real, and people here shouldnβt pretend it isnβt.
And without an algorithm to game, who here is misusing and abusing likes?
When I see a real example of harmful behavior and manipulation through likes on Nostr, I'll reconsider my stance. But until then, most of this is a knee-jerk fear response to old tech. It's like the kid who grew up religious and resents it so he goes full atheist and devotes his life to converting everybody to his way of thinking because he doesn't like being told what to think.
Have you tried disabling likes? If not, I encourage you to do so for one month. Thatβs all, just one month, and then reevaluate afterwards. Kind of like how people took March off Twitter. When Damus introduced the feature to disable likes (βonlyzapsβ) I leaned more toward that youβre saying β likes are not completely meaningless and i wanted to still use them for certain interactions. I decided to give myself at least a month with no likes because a habits donβt change overnight. It was weird at first not having likes, and I considered turning likes back on a few times, but decided to see wait and see for myself if I stuck it out. I was surprised after about 3 weeks how my perspective shifted and how much I didnβt care to turn them back on.
β‘οΈ > π€
Indeed, but that doesn't mean those who like my notes are not providing any value at all. A zap is a next level interaction, not an expectation.
Turned mine off and never looked back. Donβt miss them at all.
Donβt miss Twitter.
Donβt miss mainstream media.
Donβt miss shitcoins.
Donβt miss failed banks.
And I get likes every day from people I value, and ignoring that those exist seems arrogant to me.
Barely used Twitter and don't miss it.
Tuned out of mainstream media long ago.
Very glad to be free of all shitcoins.
Banks are shitcoins.
Well not being a Damus user, no I have not.
And I have no interest in either limiting my audience and friends' avenues of interaction with me, nor do I want to blindfold myself to it.
Likes exist whether or not the Only Zappers choose to ignore them. I'm far too open minded to start limiting myself now.
Too open minded to try something new/different? That sounds contradictory. But hey you do you.
When trying something different literally means ignoring people who are interacting with you, I don't really see how it's somehow enlightening. They say ignorance is bliss, but it's also a choice.
Meanwhile nostr:npub1g3827ewz6d23rlgdhkaslc78gyule52ymcqdyt2hsxdwtlw8dt5q7dfpvg has his zaps disabled