It is the most unsatisfying feature on kbin.
We need something like this:
https://giphy.com/gifs/tri-indonesia-boost-triindonesia-duniatri-3BpyyvDfffs7t22Ged
I’m not taking this literally, but Tumblr actually does add flashy stuff like this a lot (they added fucking confetti when you make a post. WHY) and it has been hell for my photosensitive friends.
I do think we need any kind of visual feedback though, maybe some sort of accent color. I find myself second-guessing a lot if I actually clicked on a button or not
I don’t think it needs anything super flashy. In the userstyle I made, I made the boost button change color when clicked. Looks much nicer than the underline we currently have.
lol
Yeah, boost is kinda out of place. I know it was counted as reputation instead of upvote probably for how things are different in fedi but it’s too out of place. Now it just looks like the little social media share count on some websites.
I find it useful. I follow my Kbin account from Mastodon, anything I boost I then see there - and can boost it to Mastodon easily.
If people followed my Kbin account and I used it as my main for everything, then boost would be useful without the double boosting.
Maybe have the upvote button also boost the post would be the way to go?
I think that would be annoying!
Yeaaahh, lmao. Five people tweeting out “I think that would be annoying!” with no context sounds like a move so short-sighted only a giant corporation would think of it
I would hate this personally. (tho you can take that with a grain of salt, I’m not “from” fedi and I’m still getting used to that voters on a post are viewable at all.) I don’t always upvote things because I love them enough to share, sometimes it’s just like a pat on the back
Fair, but AFAIK upvotes right now don’t do much right? I’m still getting used to fediverse’s ways ( ˶ˆ꒳ˆ˵ )
Pretty sure they serve the same purpose they do on reddit. In a feed on a Lemmy/kbin instance they control the ranking/order of posts and comments.
However I don’t think they change reputation/karma at all.
It’s the other way around.
At least for the top sorting order, boost seems to be all that matters.
Reputation uses the formula
upvotes - downvotes + 2iirc.Kinda makes the voting rather pointless, then, other than an ego stroking.
I’m not sure why this wasn’t the approach. Why would you not want a boost, whatever it really does, when you upvote something? Or vise versa, boost but not upvote? It seems they both have similar or the same objectives, so just make the upvote button (that everyone uses for some positive reason) do it all.
I’m in favor of removing a visible number for reputation/votes and put in a vague ranking system like lots of forums had/have that only shows how active a person is in delivering discussion that’s appreciated. Remove downvote effects and just have them a visual on the posts themselves.
If kbin’s microblog automatically boosted everything I upvote, whoever followed me or anyone else would have a timeline brimming with random comments from other users who said absolutely anything that anyone else liked reading, and it would be the least interesting thing nobody wants to deal with.
We’re talking my whole blog being just one-sided repeat documentation of every conversation I’ve had, because even when we don’t agree, I like showing appreciation for an enjoyable interaction. We’re talking every fair point or inquiry on mine or anyone else’s post. Weed killer reviews. Someone’s socks that I liked enough to pat them on the back for, but not enough to bother people in my life about.
Following anyone would be unnavigable noise and would result in both complaints and an overall chilling effect as to whose contribution is good enough to warrant any attention at all. The platform really benefits from being able to make the distinction between “nice, interesting, thank you” and “nice enough that I’d brag to my dentist,” imo
Which is why its function needs to be both clarified officially and maximized to benefit all users. If it’s directed to followers specifically, then you’re right, that would be madness, and it’s probably happening already since there’s been a lot of posts telling people to both upvote and boost. If it’s actually just bumping it up in feeds more, then no one is getting that spam and it’s being adjusted properly for being still popular. That’s just it, I don’t know which it really is doing, and the fact there’s two ways to “upvote” is confusing.
You’re not the only one. Boost is incredibly useful for sharing beyond Kbin.
What’s weird is following. I follow a couple of other users, but I don’t have any feed or way to see their activity.
I actually came to this thread hoping for what a boost actually does. So far as I can tell the functionality doesn’t exist on lemmy, or it’s hidden behind something else. I know it does something on Mastodon but never having used Mastodon I couldn’t tell you what that might be. Presumably it’s quite different from the up and down arrows which do exist on lemmy and I’m guessing are how the “hot” ranking algorithm works. Suppose I could go to the code and read it, if I get real curious, but if someone has a mental model already, or the right piece of documentation, and wouldn’t mind sharing it that’d be real appreciated.
A boost puts that post into your outbox, which means it’ll get sent to the inbox of any user who follows you. Lemmy doesn’t support following users which is why boosts aren’t visible there. Users on pleroma, misskey, streams, hubzilla, mastodon, and the rest of the microblogging fediverse can see boosts if they’re following you
I should probably stop boosting everything I find remotely noteworthy. Good thing no one follows me. I’d be a spam generator for them.
I mean from that description, it sounds like it is just like retweeting something. Good to know. Don’t boost porn. Got it.
Fortunately, on Mastodon at least, you can set a per person ignore/hide on boosts. Very helpful if they do good posts but are generally spammy with boosts.
Eh. I think a combination of remembering how indifferently casual my sphere of tumblr and old Twitter used to be along with knowing the thing tied to reputation was initially boost instead of the formerly decorative upvote button (it’s fixed now) made me fairly free with who gets it.
Doesn’t have to be profound, just has to be something I really enjoyed or found important, and which I wouldn’t mind passing along to others. If I would normally hand the phone over to show it off irl, y’all get to look at it. Sometimes that’s breaking news. Sometimes that’s just a picture of a turtle.
I have like four people following me (hi peeps, why tho?) and honestly they made that decision. If they didn’t want to hear the things I wanna talk about, they wouldn’t choose to follow me and they should be amending that.
That makes a lot of sense, appreciate the explanation!
That’s a bit disappointing as it would mean many boosts would have little to no effect at all within the forum atmosphere since following someone isn’t a typical thing outside of microblogging. I had read suggestions that it was a refreshing of the post into the feed, so an old or new post that got boosting would get new life for visibility.
I had read suggestions that it was a refreshing of the post into the feed, so an old or new post that got boosting would get new life for visibility.
This is true for the microblogging services, but boosting is pretty much pointless for kbin/lemmy users (right now). On the microblogging systems, you have two signals you can send about a post, like and boost. A like doesn’t affect the post and just lets the author know you liked it. A boost literally boosts the posts and presents it to your followers, even if they don’t follow the OP.
A like is mapped to an upvote on lemmy/kbin. But the visibility boosting is probably why kbin originally mapped upvotes to boosts, since they’re both about enhancing visibility. The problem is lemmy already used likes and microblogging users dont like being overwhelmed with boosts and users outside a forum are more likely to like a post so like <-> upvote allows non-forum users to affect voting.
My most depraved marketing brain thinks borrowing the visual language of Reddit gold would be a good idea. At least in comments.
Partly because it’s familiar to most users, but it also draws your attention and highlights well liked posts.
And if someone is boosting a comment, I think that’s much more significant than boosting the main post, which is already meant to be shared.
Make it the Kbin mascot flying up, like an icon
