Elon Musk’s X is preparing to make “likes” private on the social network, in a change that could potentially confuse users about the difference between something they’ve favorited and something they’ve tagged. According to new posts from company employees, the decision to hide likes is intended to drive engagement by allowing people to favor content that looks “edgy” and protect their public image.
It’s not clear that this is the best solution to the problems X is trying to fix, such as giving its algorithm more signal so it can better tailor its content to your interests.
The change seems somewhat unnecessary given that X, the company formerly known as Twitter, already had a private way to save posts on the platform: bookmarks. While X-marks are designed to collect posts you might want to come back to or topics you might want to read later, they also serve as a more personal alternative to “liking.”
Adding to the confusion is the fact that users will be able to see who liked their posts, as well as the number of likes for all their posts and replies. In other words, a private “like” is only semi-private – it’s known to the author, who can theoretically expose someone’s likes if they want to. If X is trying to drive “edgy” engagement, such as liking posts that include adult content or extreme political positions, for example, people may still be hesitant to “like” that content, given that it not an entirely private system.
Instead, they can continue to use X-marks or even external link-saving tools to save those likes that they don’t want to risk being exposed.
According to posts by X employees, users will no longer be able to see likes associated with other people’s posts, nor will they be able to view someone’s likes through a tab on their profile. This can help eliminate eavesdropping on what others are doing, but it also removes a useful detection feature.
If you’re just joining X, for example, you can look at the likes of others you follow to get ideas about who else they might find interesting and engaging. Or, if you’re researching another person’s profile to determine if you want to follow them, you can use their likes to get an idea of what kind of content they typically like.
The real problem with likes is that the creation of the feature has displaced the meaning of what used to be a tagging feature. Before it was renamed from a star to a heart icon, as was the fashion at the time, the feature was more of a “favorite” than a signal of support. Users could theoretically favor anything, as this does not imply that they actually enjoy or agree with the content.
Rather, it may be something they simply documented – a statement by a politician that you strongly disagree with but want to remember; publication that requires further research; posts you’ve collected to later create a collection Moments (REST IN PEACE); the most upsetting or ridiculous posts by a billionaire and others. No one can reasonably accuse you of “liking” the content because you didn’t click on a heart icon that gives you plausible deniability.
When Twitter switched from stars to hearts, users were outraged. They realized that hearts carry a completely different meaning, which affected how they would use the social network.
TechCrunch wrote at the time, “a ‘like’ limits what it allows a user to express,” while the favorites feature can mean all sorts of things, such as “a thank you, a handshake, a tip of the hat, or even Robert De Niro looking down. At the time, TechCrunch said that the change from stars to hearts wouldn’t solve Twitter’s bigger problems around growing its user base and creating more engagement, and it largely didn’t. The company had to find a way out quarter after quarter of steady growth.
As a result of the backlash to the change, Twitter later launched Bookmarks to bring back a way to keep things private, including those posts you don’t necessarily agree with and those you intend to quote again.
Now that X is once again shifting the functionality around ‘liking’, many users are registering their disappointment. At X, people have suggested various alternatives to this proposed change, such as making likes private as an option rather than the default, or long-pressing the heart icon to leave an anonymous ‘like’. Others have warned that privatizing likes could lead to manipulation as creators hire armies of bots to enhance their content and help them generate revenue.
There is another solution, and it was mentioned by former Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey. While we don’t agree with much of what Dorsey has to say these days—that Nostr, for example, is the future of social networking, or that Bluesky is some sort of censorship platform—on the likes vs. stars debate, he’s on track to something.
Wrote Dorsey in an X post: “’like’/❤️ was originally ⭐️. we should never have strayed from it.
His post has over 700 likes and many replies agreeing with the opinion.
If what X is looking for isn’t adding more privacy around user engagement features, but rather more signals for its algorithm, it doesn’t need to hide likes. Just switching from the heart icon — maybe to a star! — will be a much less dramatic change while achieving the same goal.
