We've been asking for a "Dislike" button ever since Facebook's now ubiquitous "Like" button started showing up everywhere. Its a general urge to dislike things when you simply don't like them or disagree with them. But Facebook has been on-the-fence about a Dislike button for years. Not just because it doesn't want to turn into a voting system for posts, but also so that you can't dislike those paid sponsored posts.
Nevertheless, Facebook is working on a dislike button and should be heading to testing soon.
"People have asked about the 'dislike' button for many years, and today is a special day, because today is the day that I actually get to say we are working on it and are very close to shipping a test of it," Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg was quoted at saying at a Q&A with CNBC.
There aren't many details as to how this would work, but Zuckerberg maintains that he will not let posts become voting machines with the like & dislike buttons. Instead the dislike button would be used to express empathy, like feeling sad when your friend's dog died or for a calamity. Facebook doesn't want to become a community like Reddit where everything is about voting, instead Facebook wants to leverage the "Dislike" button in a very social sense, not just as an individual point of view.
Source: CNBC
