When Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg hinted at a way to expand Facebook’s Like button this past September, and he has finally delivered.
No Dislike Button Yet
Despite whispers of the creation of the ‘dislike’ button, the Like button has instead been expanded to include emotion. You can now like sadly, lovingly, laughingly, shockingly and even angrily. The new Like button, with it’s new, more empathetic features, provides with a more engaging Facebook experience with six emoji that will sit next to the thumbs-up, attaching some more emotion to the feature.
Facebook adds that the pop-up feature will take a test drive in two markets only, in Spain in Ireland, for the mere reason that both countries have largely national user bases without extensive international friend networks, making them better test groups, according to Facebook’s director of product Adam Mosseri. The test will decide how the feature will be adjusted or expanded further.
It’s Been in the Works for a While
Facebook had filed a patent for how a emoji response attached to their Like button might look and work, and in a natural progression of events, it’s just starting to test drive it.
Other networks have used emoji to enhance user experience, like Buzzfeed, to add to their platform , and Facebook looks to be adjusting to this. The new set of emoji reactions will appear in both mobile and desktop versions of the application and it will be available on all posts in the News Feed for friends, pages or followed accounts, and advertisers. There’s no word on whether or not it’ll be included in Facebook’s Messenger or other add-ons.
How It Will Work
The reactions are set to work in a very simple way. In mobile apps, the emojis will show up upon tapping the like button on screens, while the desktop version will have the emojis pop up while hovering over the Like button or when clicking on it. There will be no option to disable the responses, just like with the Like button or with comments.
This new move will change the face of Facebook, and it has caused a great excitement among users and other companies.
