You may have already noticed one of the decisions we made when we redesigned the Moz Blog:
We removed thumbs down from the posts. And it was largely in the name of transparency.
Wait, HUH? You took away a method of critique, and you're calling that transparent?
Yes. Here's the scoop: Thumbs down are one of the most cryptic, uninformative, and often passive-aggressive forms of feedback on the Internet today. By removing the mud from the water, we make the entire picture clearer. It's so easy to see a handful of thumbs down on a post (we would almost always get 1-2), and begin hypothesizing what went wrong. We shouldn't have published that one. The topic was too tangentially relevant; it was too long or too hard to follow. There wasn't enough evidence to support the claims. We could dive into analytics, attempting to glean clues about what happened, but in reality, any one of the following are reasons someone might thumb a post down:
- The title is confusing
- The topic is one that I'd like to deny exists (algo update, e.g.)
- The milk I poured on my cereal this morning had gone bad, and I need to take out this frustration somehow
- I once had a falling-out with the author of this post
- I still have a bad taste in my mouth about yesterday's post, which is skewing my thoughts about this one
- I found one of the comments offensive
- My finger slipped on my phone while I was trying to thumb this post up (we've confirmed this happens)
- I didn't like the author's self-promotion in this post
- I saw the new Star Wars trailer, and am terrified that Disney might think including Jar Jar's long-lost brother in the new film is a good idea. I hate everything right now.
Okay, the last one might be a stretch. But you get the idea.
Sometimes a post would receive a disproportionate amount of thumbs down simply because the author was proposing an idea that wasn't popular, no matter its importance. One great example: Carson Ward wrote a fabulous post in 2012 titled "Guest Blogging – Enough is Enough," divining what Matt Cutts would write about nearly 17 months later. The response? 45 thumbs down – one of the most maligned posts in the history of the Moz Blog.
Authors have emailed us in a tizzy, asking if their thumbs down meant they weren't quite right for the Moz audience, and in replying to them we came to this overarching realization: We didn't know why they got thumbs down, and we couldn't find out with any certainty, but more often than not it just didn't really matter. We were confident in their points and their presentation, and real criticism would nearly always show up in the comments.
All that said, we love it when people offer up constructive criticism. We always take it to heart, and hearing directly from you all is the best way we can improve. For that reason among many others, we'll always have the comments below the post. If you feel like a post wasn't up to snuff, please take a moment and tell us why in those threads (please keep it TAGFEE).
One last note: Thumbs down remain available on comments, though that's a temporary stop-gap while we work on a more informative system for flagging comments that are offensive, or facepalm-worthy attempts at links (they're nofollowed anyway!), or otherwise inappropriate for our community.
We'd love your questions or comments on this change, and hope you're enjoying the new look of the Moz and YouMoz blogs!