YouTube starts hiding public dislike counts on videos to keep smaller creators from being targeted by dislike attacks, following a test in March

The Verge 2021-11-12 Mitchell Clark

Context & Ripple Effects

YouTube had already been redesigning how audience feedback is exposed: it tested making comments an opt-in view and changed API treatment of live subscriber counts, prompting concerns from analytics providers. The dislike-count change extends that effort from discussion and growth metrics to visible negative feedback.

The policy became contentious enough that YouTube later issued a creator-update defense of hidden dislikes, underscoring that the change trades a public evaluation signal for greater protection against coordinated targeting.

First-order effects

Smaller YouTube creators lose a prominently visible tally that can amplify dislike attacks, while viewers can no longer use the public total as an at-a-glance reception signal.
Creators, viewers, and third-party tools must interpret video reception without a public dislike-count benchmark.

Second-order effects

Analytics providers already affected by changes to live subscriber-count data face another engagement metric whose public visibility no longer supports simple comparative displays.
YouTube's moderation and product teams gain a clearer precedent for limiting visible feedback metrics when they can be used to organize harassment, alongside its earlier test of less-prominent comments.

Third-order effects

If YouTube continues to selectively obscure abuse-prone signals, public engagement data will increasingly be governed as a safety and product-design decision rather than treated as a default platform utility.
That model creates a structural tension between creator protection and the transparency sought by viewers, researchers, and creator-analytics services.

The trend: Large platforms are moving from universally visible engagement counters toward selective disclosure of metrics that can be weaponized against users.

Discussion

@idevicehelpus @idevicehelpus on x
I don't agree with Youtube removing the dislike counter from the public view, I think Youtube should only allow people to rate a video if users watch at least 30% of it, I think this will help avoid dislike campaigns https://www.youtube.com/... @SusanWojcicki @YouTubeCreators htt…
@cilvanis @cilvanis on x
If you want to help creators, get rid of ranking videos 1-10. It strongly discourages experimenting and wrecks your mental health. Hard to try new things when it plasters your failure in your face until your next upload https://twitter.com/...
@forthememes11 Forthememes on x
“We're doing this to protect you” -has not fixed comment bot scams - does nothing to take down scam youtubers - literally lets pornogr@phic ads run on the platform - has not solved AI that randomly terminates youtubers that do nothing wrong. #YouTubedislike Youtube sucks https://…
@mightykeef @mightykeef on x
I don't understand the point of this. If it's to help a creators mental health, it doesn't. They can still see the dislikes. It's only the public that can't see it lol. We need dislikes cause it helps filter out the trash stuff on the website. https://twitter.com/...
@mkbhd Marques Brownlee on x
Hey @YouTube removing info from the rating system is NOT helpful. Public like/dislike ratio = Useful tool to see how helpful a video will be at a glance. Hiding dislikes helps nothing... but increases the # of ppl dissatisfied by spending too much time watching an unhelpful video…
@deebeegeek26 DeeBeeGeek on x
I guess every video on YouTube is good content now. Sure how are we supposed to know when you're hiding half of the voting system. Scammers, click baiters and advertisers are gonna love this. https://twitter.com/...
@youtubecreators @youtubecreators on x
Earlier this year we launched an experiment making the dislike count private. Based on what we learned, the dislike button is staying, but the *count* is now private to creators (in Studio) to help prevent targeted dislike attacks. → https://blog.youtube/...
@accursedfarms Accursed Farms on x
This is kind of lame. I think dislike ratios can be helpful and reflect a populist sentiment. Medium ones usually mean something is controversial. High ones usually mean something is either wrong, really bad, or represents some related scandal going on. https://techcrunch.com/...
@matthewloop Matthew Loop on x
Sneaky move. Another Orwellian attempt to slant public perception on certain topics and people. Can't have the masses thinking for themselves. https://techcrunch.com/...
@autismcapital @autismcapital on x
YouTube removing the like/dislike ratio bar is criminal and maliciously evil. The erasure of the human opinion continues. https://techcrunch.com/...
@youtubeliaison Matt Koval on x
I wasn't supportive of this change until I saw the stories — from lots of new and small creators trying to make it. Let's give them a better chance. I explain in this video👇 https://www.youtube.com/...
@scarletsprites Scarlet Sprites on x
I feel like I'm the only one of my peers who supports this. Large companies can't hide the backlash from the community. The smaller guy who is constantly getting shit on because he goes against the grain however? He's dismissed the moment someone sees the sub and dislike count. h…
@tomwarren Tom Warren on x
YouTube is ditching the dislike count. You can still 👎 a video, but it'll be private feedback rather than public shaming. Good move from YouTube 👍 https://www.theverge.com/... https://twitter.com/...
@thean1meman Joey on x
This literally solves nothing. “Not public” means that creators will still see the amount of dislikes on their end which will just call for trolls to mass-dislike videos to see creators suffering mentally from a problem nobody else can see. Because screw mental health, amiright? …
@epro Emil Protalinski on x
Those most happy about YouTube hiding public dislike counts tend to be creators, while those most frustrated seem to be users. This is an observation, not a rule, but it shows who gains/loses most from the change. It's also in line with Big Tech suddenly caring about creators. ht…
@keleftheriou Kosta Eleftheriou on x
This is terrible. Hiding the dislikes but still showing the likes? Talk about bias. If one can be gamed, so can the other. Either make them trustworthy, or remove them both. Imagine if Apple only removed negative App Store ratings. https://twitter.com/...
@tomwarren Tom Warren on x
if Twitter had a dislike button I'm pretty sure my tweet would be like 80% disliked 🙃 https://twitter.com/...
@carnage4life Dare Obasanjo on x
Publicly showing that lots of people dislike certain content sets a tone for your app. I think it's a good move for YouTube to remove such an obvious talisman of negativity from videos. Even Twitter with its “ratios” doesn't go as far as dislike counts. https://www.theverge.com/.…
@chadtronic @chadtronic on x
What was great about the dislike button was that no one could delete or moderate it. It helped display the true reception of something. Now brands and companies will just delete any negative comments and there will be absolutely no public metric to rely on. Complete censorship. h…
@earsxbl Ears on x
This is a mistake. Having thick skin is apart of the creating process. Not everyone is supposed to like or support you. https://twitter.com/...
@hhariri Hadi Hariri on x
This is a good move YouTube. Well done. And it should serve as a lesson to Twitter to get rid of their stupid idea of downvotes on replies. https://blog.youtube/...
@littlevmills Little V on x
Don't really have a problem with this change honestly. Most of the other socials don't have a dislike button and they're getting along fine Besides if someone dislikes your shit, they'll let you know in the comments anyways! Lol https://twitter.com/...
@charlesarthur Charles Arthur on x
Removing the actual numbers that make us respond hamster-like to things is one of the ways to make social networks less problematic, as I wrote about in Social Warming - via @bengrosser. https://twitter.com/...
@sadlyitsbradley Brad Lynch on x
Mental health on the platform has improved slightly more with this one simple change https://twitter.com/...
@zoneoftech Daniel on x
I 100% agree with this. A lot of the times when we do a device vs device comparison, no matter how fair the comparison is, fans of the losing side would mass dislike the video. Removing some toxicity from YouTube will positively help the mental health of content creators. https:/…
@youtubecreators @youtubecreators on x
We know not everyone will agree with this decision, but we believe it's the right thing to do to make YouTube safer for creators to express themselves. To learn more about how we reached this decision, check out the blog or watch @YouTubeLiaison's video → https://www.youtube.com/…
@ericdjuly Eric July on x
Such a dumbass policy and it has nothing to do with small creators https://twitter.com/...
@ultimashadowx @ultimashadowx on x
YouTube still malding their video was the most disliked of all time. https://twitter.com/...
@danstapleton Dan Stapleton on x
But *now* how will we know when people disagree with the review score of a game they haven't played yet? https://twitter.com/...
@brandonbutch Brandon Butch on x
First reaction is to HATE this decision, but I'm going to let it marinate over the next couple of weeks before deciding how I feel about it. What do you think of the dislike counter being removed from YouTube? https://twitter.com/...
@stryxo @stryxo on x
Now is the perfect time to launch my scam tutorial youtube channel and just delete comments that reveal the truth https://twitter.com/...
@reversalx7 Reversal on x
I HATE IT WHEN COMPANIES MAKE A CHANGE TO SOMETHING THAT'S WORKING PERFECTLY FINE AS IT IS. https://twitter.com/...
@sarahdanielstv @sarahdanielstv on x
You could start by not letting YouTubers defame and slander other creators mercilessly without consequence and then maybe these targeted attacks would happen less? https://twitter.com/...
@ericrayweather Weric Way on x
Trailers everywhere are rejoicing. https://twitter.com/...
@velvetune Emery on x
so, this means that disabling, or selectively deleting comments, allows one to completely silence negative feedback. here's a thread about the catastrophes that could entail from that. 🧵 https://twitter.com/...
@heyguhrl GuhRl on x
The dislike button will be private, I kind of like it. https://twitter.com/...
@retroity @retroity on x
This seems like a horrifically bad idea, especially since dislikes can be used to mark obvious scams https://twitter.com/...
@shoe0nhead Shoe on x
we already have the option to turn off likes/dislikes what the fuck is this???? https://twitter.com/...
@tomwarren Tom Warren on x
it's true that dislike counts are good for avoiding wasting time watching bad tutorial videos, but that's a bigger problem with the YouTube algorithm. Genuinely bad videos shouldn't be getting pushed into search results
@cleoabram Cleo Abram on x
youtube is hiding ‘dislikes’ from now on and I love this https://www.theverge.com/... https://twitter.com/...

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