A big change is coming to YouTube – one that has seemingly broken the internet. The Google owned streaming platform has announced a change that may just change how we interact with videos on the platform. Starting 10 November 2021, the public dislike count will be going away. Yep- it looks like dislike bombing may not be a thing anymore. However, the dislike button is here to stay.

YouTube is looking to make the platform a little less toxic and a little more empowering – particularly for new content creators. They highlight that they have realised over the past year that dislikes were essentially being weaponised by bad actors to bully and put down content creators. Swathes of users and bots would target dislike buttons not because of the content being put out; but rather due to the stances that creators take and, in other cases, simply because they don’t like the creator.

That said, the dislike button isn’t going anywhere. In fact, the number of dislikes isn’t going away either. It simply will not be shown publicly. Creators will still see the metric in their creator studio dashboard and analytics. However, YouTube believes that this will allow them to not feel publicly shamed when a piece of content doesn’t resonate or garners more dislikes than likes. In addition, the dislike button will also help optimise YouTube’s algorithm to surface more of the content that you like.

That said, the company is saying that they are staying true to their mission of giving everyone a voice with the change. They say the change will help empower more small creators and allow a healthy, continued discourse on their platform.