cohost support

When someone likes my post, I only find out about this via notifications, and I can't see it on the post itself. I assume it's hidden from posts in general to avoid popularity contests, and that seems perfectly reasonable to me, but for when I'm viewing my own posts, it'd be nice to have cohost help me in remembering which or how many of my friends liked a post.

i agree. 

while i'm not too interested in popularity contests and metrics, i do like to see who interacted with a post or shared it! i feel like not being able to see interaction make my posts (and sometimes other posts, too) feel a little isolated on the home timeline. i'm also wondering how much more isolated they'll feel once my notifications start to regularly move

agreed re: feels isolated. it'll make the website feel a little less 'empty' (even if, obviously, a lot of people are still signing up) by having those numbers visible.

I am strongly opposed to this. I can see who liked my posts through the notifications feed. I don't need to be poisoned with numbers.

I think being able to see a list of who liked a post on the post itself if it requires a button click to do so is ok, but don't think a count is appropriate.

To clarify on my last comment -- just for the author, of course.

Maybe there's a separate discussion to be had about seeing whether your mutuals have liked an arbitrary post, but I don't think the site has real mutual tracking just yet, so probably not relevant yet.

I agree that a "view likes/shares" button that displayed a list of each, only visible to the author of a post, would be nice, without putting the number anywhere. If you really want to count, you can do so, but you could do that from your notifications anyway.

I'm definitely for this idea. I don't chase after clout or popularity--I couldn't give a shit about either--but the numbers help me to feel like I'm not just indiscriminately shouting into an isolated, uncaring void where I may see occasional notifications of likes mixed in with everything else in the notifications.

I like to see how many people like my various ponderings, especially wrt certain prurient pontifications, it's especially reassuring to see that people like the specific ways in which I mix the ideas that appeal to me.

However

I would argue that this should be an opt-in feedback element for users. Cohost's ethos is to not encourage popularity games, which is fine and noble, but it leaves people like me who benefit from the metrical feedback feeling like this site is sterile and unwelcoming, and I'm honestly not sure that I like it.

Definitely agree it feels extremely isolating.

I understand not making the number of likes or who liked a post public, I think that's perfectly reasonable if not a positive feature. However it really should be visible to the post author, or at least have it be an option the post author / account can turn on and off so those who want the feature can enable it, and those who don't can leave it disabled. 

I'm not sure what the point of likes is ( as it currently is here), seeing some of the responses here.

There already exists a publicly viewable popularity metric labelled in raw numbers: No. of comments.
If the goal is to remove 'the numbers game' of traditional media, then by all logic that should be removed as that is a direct indicator of engagement.

If on the other hand that is intentional, how would adding viewing likes/sharing change anything? From what I understand, the timeline/feed isn't sorted by engagement. That is nice for the reason that those who despise this kind of 'numbers poisoning' can turn off all metrics and even the ability for others to like their own posts without compromising the service of the website. 

(I also think this makes likes much more genuine than most other platforms where this feature is manipulated to in turn manipulate the algorithm heuristics.)

 It is of my opinion that allowing authors to view likes directly would benefit a feeling of community without engaging in the toxic comparison that traditional social medias are infamous for and what feels like the primary driving stigma behind engagement metrics. 

where's the 'if this happens, cool; if this doesn't happen, also cool' button

I agree, based on what I'm hearing from some people I've recommended cohost to in the past, some would really want the option to see a number of likes on a post they made. there is a solid "I want to see number go up" impulse that people have, and it gives a little boost whenever people see it.

this absolutely should not include likes on other people's posts; you want to discourage people from comparing each other's likes easily. the number going up should have a good effect; the actual number should be almost meaningless.

most problems I see from earlier comments seem solvable by making sure it's an option and not something people are just stuck with having on all their posts, and by fostering a community that discourages like-comparisons and that understands how little this number actually matters. the latter is purely a social issue, and not something that tech-side solutions can really do much about!

myself, I like just seeing the mango pop off in the corner of the front page, and seeing that people liked a thing I made. I likely wouldn't turn the number on at all. but I want to encourage friends struggling with their art and sketch posts on a certain other site to come here instead, and this is one barrier I've heard mess with people more than once.

My posts not showing the number of interactions with them, coupled with what I believe to have been a bug with the notifications tab when I first got started, led me to believe that no one had been interacting with my posts or my replies to their posts, when in fact, that was not the case. Discouraging popularity contests is fine, but I agree with the previous users who said that the current experience feels very isolating (coupled with the lack of the ability to @-mention people or DM them, it really does feel like shouting into a void.)

And to be honest with you all: post authors should be able to get, if they want them, easily digestible metrics for number of likes, number of shares, etc. so they can see what content people are engaging with more. This is particularly important for artists and other professionals, but even for someone like me who just wants to post funny jokes or share cool information, knowing what people are most interested in helps me make better posts.

I know there is a balance to be struck between making people get addicted to the validation of post engagement and these concerns I've mentioned, but surely we are not at the correct spot right now. As always, we can curb unhealthy behavior by making things like this be behind an option in one's user settings.

"Number of comments" is far from an equivalent or useful metric. People comment way less often than they push a like button. Often times, a post I'll make gets lots of likes, 0 comments. With only comments as a litmus, that falsely flags loads of posts dead in the water. People need *evidence of engagement* to stick around on this site.