Facebook Reactions aka Zuckerberg’s Dislike button cop-out, is starting to roll out to everyone through its desktop and mobile versions. Come on Mark, all you had to do was invert that thumbs-up symbol for those us who are not afraid to show we’ve had enough of sponsored stories, toddlers spitting up cereal, ‘relationship goals,’ and useless GIFs in our news feed.
Instead, Facebook’s given users six ways to express themselves – the Like icon, a heart symbol, a laughing emoji, an emoticon to show surprise or awe, a ‘sad’ face and one displaying anger. Because we only ever have six reactions to everything. Why no love for the haters, Mark? We’re people too. Even we would love to say it in emojis. And it’s tiresome to type out ‘I dislike your post’ now and again.
Facebook Reactions is available to mobile and PC users. It can be found hiding behind the Like button. If you’re on a desktop or laptop, hovering over the blue thumbs-up symbol will reveal the ‘extended’ options. When using Facebook on a mobile device, press down on the Like button to pull up the new emojis. In case half a dozen emoticons cannot express your ‘reaction,’ feel free to type it out of course.
Related news: Facebook ‘dislike button’ is a set of emoji Reactions
Pages, advertisers and those who generate a large part or all of their business through the social network ought to take note. Facebook Reactions will supposedly have the same impact on ad delivery as the Like button. It’s not just Facebook who’s using emojis to gauge how audiences react to content. Several websites also employ similar tools to figure out how people feel in response to posts, videos, images and so on.
Is Facebook Reactions the perfect new lazy way to comment on updates in the news feed? You tell us.