Facebook working on 'dislike' button coming shortly

Mark Zuckerberg: Facebook working on a 'Dislike' button

Coming soon to Facebook: a button that lets you express emotions beyond the iconic thumbs up.

Founder and chief executive Mark Zuckerberg made the announcement Tuesday during a Q&A session streamed live online from Facebook headquarters in Menlo Park, Calif.

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The CEO said the company has been working on the feature—which would allow users to express emotions other than "like"—for some time because "we don't want to turn Facebook into a forum where people are voting up or down on people's posts."

Zuckerberg said Facebook is close to unveiling a button or buttons but it's unlikely to be called "dislike." What will likely happen is that Facebook unveils a "sympathize" button or a series of buttons that convey support or solidarity or express other similarly positive emotions. The giant social network encourages civil interactions among its 1.5 billion users.

But don't expect the "dislike" button to work like the downvote button on sites such as Reddit. On Reddit, the upvote and downvote buttons are opposites: Upvoting gives the post more attention, while downvoting can consign it to oblivion.

By contrast, Facebook won't treat a "dislike" as a vote to stop showing the post to other users. Rather, it provides a better option in cases where friends and family paste bad news, like a death in the family or a natural disaster. "What they really want is the ability to express empathy," wrote Business Insider. "Not every moment is a good moment."