It lets me feel like my time here is being useful if I get the upvotes. I try to limit myself to positive/fun/helpful posts or adding additional facts from other articles to someone’s post of I feel more info is needed to get a full story, so if people reply or at least upvote, it feels like it was worth adding my contribution. If my humor/help isn’t needed or wanted in a place, I don’t want to both waste my time and annoy people.

I only care when I’m making a post, to help judge how people liked it. I don’t pay attention to points inside threads really.

Yes. It tells me if there’s any engagement.

Yes, but actually no. Upvotes are are similar to seeing someone’s smile or nodding in agreement. Downvotes are like a dead stare or shaking their head in disagreement.

If someone else is downvoted but seems to have posted in good faith or as a joke it means there is probably something I am missing. Maybe they are serious when I think it is a joke, or there is some context that is news to me.

If I have a commwnt that is downvoted significantly (like ten or more down than up, or only down) then I double check to see if I was unclear or maybe a joke didn’t land. Mostly to make sure my intent came though.

If I clarify something and people just don’t agree with it because they don’t see the same nuance then I do think about it a but and come back later to see if maybe I was wrong or everyone else is a dumbass. Most of the time it is me not being clear enough. If they are dumbasses, oh well.

I also feel happy when a good comment gets upvoted to double digits. That is a nice feeling.

I don’t usually feel one way or the other about other people’s upvotes/downvotes.

But I try to use my upvotes/downvotes as a barometer for how well something I posted or commented on was received by the community. If I’m being massively downvoted, I will try to consider what about my post or comment warranted the negative reaction, and I might reconsider what I said, or at least how I said it. If something is upvoted, it does give me the warm fuzzies knowing that other people agreed with, or enjoyed, my content.

i hate useless circlejerk nonsense getting updooted to the ceiling, and good but disagreeable information being downvoted into the earth.

To me, it’s a way to quantify how other people feel about my own positions. It’s neither good nor bad to be upvoted or downvoted. People have unpopular takes sometimes and you shouldn’t stake your identity on the amount of upvotes or downvotes you have.

Instead, upvotes and downvotes are most useful for other people to guage comments. Generally speaking, if a comment is universally downvoted, that likely means the position is unpopular enough that it adds no value to a discussion, and is therefore not worth engaging with.

I consider it to be a system built upon mutual understanding - that you don’t have to seriously engage with everyone’s viewpoints, and conversely, that nobody has to seriously engage with yours.

It becomes a problem when upvotes and downvotes are gamified like on Reddit, because Goodhart’s Law demands that it stops serving its purpose when people are only attempting to optimize their upvote/downvote ratio.

If something has no downvotes, I might second guess downvoting it. For example sometimes I downvote bad typos, but I usually won’t if the post doesn’t have any downvotes.

You already have a couple of downvotes…

My opinion? No, don’t care. For the other stuff I share I would like to know; how many people are interacting with the community, for instance. How big is the niche music Community I’m on? I can see how many people have subscribed (And I’m unsure if that is across servers, or just on the local server), but it tells me nothing if half of them have left since they signed up.

Sometimes when I’m not doing too great and see loads of shit during my daily doomscrolling, I can get very synical, harsh and bold. When I get several downvotes, it can be a sign I’m in this negative depressing mood and I need to light up and be more open to others. It usually takes a while as first I fee like explaining myself making things worse, but in the end it let’s me think “hey dude, stop, take some distance. You’re not like this and your behavior is pulling you further down. Do something fun instead, stay away from comment sections and put away your phone completely and meet some friends or something”.

It’s a struggle sometimes.

Upvotes always help with the short endorphins boost, even though I don’t want to admit it. I got rid of all social media except YouTube and Lemmy. Yes, I’m I search of approval, again, not what I’m proud of. Because I want to get rid of this addiction and doomscrolling.

Yes. But only if people voted in the right way. You’re not supposed to vote it you agree or disagree with something. That’s not how this is supposed to work.

You’re supposed to vote if the context fits the sub or topic.

No