The “Like” button on Facebook has added a whole new layer of interaction in social media, but sometimes using it can be awkward. For instance, liking status posts about unfortunate scenarios–such as getting fired, breaking up, or grieving over the death of a loved one–does not sound polite.
The engineers on Facebook have figured it out as well, and they have created a “Sympathize” button for situations where pressing the Like button would be inappropriate. It would only appear if a user indicates a negative emotion on their status, such as “sad” or “depressed”. Once clicked, a statement such as “5 people sympathize with this” would appear, in contrast to “5 people like this”.
It was Dan Muriello, an engineer working at Facebook, who revealed about the Sympathize button during a company event last week, in response to whether the social networking giant ever considered adding another button to express emotions other than Like.
He further added that the concept button was created by one of his colleagues during a company-organized hackathon, wherein employees compete each other into creating out-of-the-box features for the company.
However, as much as many people within the company like the idea of having a Sympathize button, Facebook itself said there are no plans of adding that feature any time soon. A spokesperson added that “most of the features invented at Facebook hackathons don’t ever make it into the final product”.
Source: Los Angeles Times
Image source: Hadrian/ Shutterstock.com
