For many years one of the most common requests from Facebook users (aside from the ability to have pre-approval of embarrassing, unflattering photographs that their friends tag them in) is a “Dislike” button.
The reason is simple. People don’t just share happy news on Facebook.
Sometimes they share information about illness, death, the breakup of a relationship, or some tragic event that is happening in the news. For someone to say they “like” such posts feels kinda… well, weird.
And yet people may want to show support for the poster, or acknowledge that they feel empathy, in some way. “Like” just doesn’t cut it.
Now, of course they could just leave a comment – but folks don’t always want to do that, maybe because they feel they’re not adding anything to the debate, or can’t find the right words to express how they feel.
It’s against this backdrop that headlines have broken today about Facebook introducing a so-called “Dislike” button.
But the headlines may not be telling the whole story. Because, as you’ll see in the video I’ve made, that’s not quite what Zuckerberg announced.
Such is the desire for a “Dislike” button that scammers have tricked unsuspecting Facebook users into taking dangerous actions on many occasions over the years, and news stories announcing the imminent arrival of the feature may only see more attempts to trick the public.
So my advice is to wait until Facebook officially rolls out the functionality – whatever it might be – to your account.
Oh, and as for Facebook ever giving you the ability to pre-approve photos your friends tag you in *before* they are shared with others… don’t hold your breath.
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I imagine many users will strongly dislike this story, for whatever it might become in the end. Whether they dislike my use of puns more than that, is another matter entirely (I suspect that many will dislike the blatant abuse of puns more but if it makes them feel better I hate Facebook, so if they intensify their dislike of my puns to be hate, then there is mutual levels of dislike and the like).
Maybe check something out before moaning about it. You can already review photos and posts you are tagged in, it's in the privacy settings
Hi Gary
Thanks for your message, but I think we may have our wires crossed.
I am well aware that it is possible to review a photo that you have been tagged in by a friend, and that you can hide it from your timeline. This doesn’t, of course, remove the tagged photo from being shared elsewhere on Facebook – the best you can do, Facebook suggests, is ask your friend to take down photos of you that you don’t like.
However, what I am talking about is what most Facebook users seem to actually request.. in other words, that they should be able to PRE-approve a photo that their friend has tagged them in *BEFORE* it is shared on Facebook.
Even better, why not let Facebook users configure their account to say they NEVER want to be tagged in a photograph?