Categories: Science & Technology

Facebook presents “Sympathize” button as an alternative to “Like”

Facebook has developed a “Sympathize” button as an alternative to the “Like” button for use in certain situations.

If a user selected a negative emotion from Facebook’s list of feelings in a status update then the “Like” button would change to “Sympathize”.

A Facebook engineer said at a company event that the button had been created as part of an internal project.

But he later went on to say there were no plans to launch it at the moment.

Facebook has developed a “Sympathize” button as an alternative to the “Like” button for use in certain situations

Facebook were holding a “compassion research day” where members of the public and researchers are invited along to “improve [Facebook’s] understanding of the driving forces and benefits of compassion”.

In a Q&A session an audience member asked if Facebook had thought about changing the “Like” button when it felt inappropriate in relation to what a user had posted, for example when someone had written that their parents had died.

Dan Muriello, a software engineer at Facebook, said another engineer had worked on a hackathon project “a while back” to change the “Like” button to “Sympathize”.

It would not work for every post he said but if you tag a status with certain emotions from a fixed list then the “Like” button would change.

“A lot of people were very excited. But we made a decision that it was not exactly the right time to launch that product. Yet,” he said.

Facebook hackathons are events where the company’s engineers get together and brainstorm new ideas, like Facebook Chat and the “friend suggester” facility.

Nancy Clayson

Nancy is a young, full of life lady who joined the team shortly after the BelleNews site started to run. She is focused on bringing up to light all the latest news from the technology industry. In her opinion the hi-tech expresses the humanity intellectual level. Nancy is an active person; she enjoys sports and delights herself in doing gardening in her spare time, as well as reading, always searching for new topics for her articles.

Recent Posts

Donald Trump and Elon Musk Celebrate Election Victory at UFC 309

Image source: Wikimedia Commons President-elect Donald Trump celebrated his election victory at the Ultimate Fighting…

5 days ago

White House 2024: Donald Trump Wins, Kamala Harris Calls Him to Concede Election

Millions of voters across the US chose to return Donald Trump to the White House…

2 weeks ago

Who Won? Donald Trump Declares Victory as He Addresses Jubilant Supporters in Florida

Donald Trump declares victory in the US election as he addresses jubilant supporters in Florida.…

2 weeks ago

Stocks Soaring as Donald Trump Closes in on US Victory

Stocks around the world are rising as Donald Trump appears to be on the cusp…

2 weeks ago

Who Won? Kamala Harris Cancels Election Night Party as Path to Victory Narrows

Donald Trump has won Pennsylvania, North Carolina and Georgia and taken a lead over Kamala…

2 weeks ago

Quincy Jones Dead at 91

Quincy Jones, the celebrated musician and producer who worked with Michael Jackson, Frank Sinatra, Ray…

2 weeks ago