Hello everyone.
Since the new forums arrived yesterday, this has been over everyone’s head.
First let me say: I don’t miss the old forum. Yes it’s been a nightmare trying to understand everything on my screen, but I feel the work that has been put on this, and I like it a lot. Kudos to you, devs!
Now to the matter in topic.
The community is, yet again, divided into this account. On my persona, I have mixed feelings about them.
For once, downvoting and Upvoting posts allowed people to share they agreement with it. Right now we can only like them. This doesn’t show the true level of apreciation for a post. A post might have a hundred likes, but there might be fifty people that didn’t like them and have no way to show it, like if their voice didn’t reach as high as the ones who liked it.
Sure, they can always go ahead and post a well-composed reply to the post, which is one hundred percent OK.
But what happens when there is a post of great significance? A huge post that has the community divided? Right now, after a while, it will just show the likes.
A post may have a hundred bad replies and a hundred good ones, but when we see the summary, we only see 100 likes, no dislikes. The summary doesn’t show just how much appreciated a post really is.
And this is more important than you might think. When there are 50 replies to a post, not all people reads them fifty. They stick just to the first ones, which are just near the first post.
This, is called FIRST IMPRESSION. Think about how back in the old forums, megathreads had hundreds and thousands of likes in their first page, but as the pages went by, posts had only about 5 likes in the best scenario. Suddenly they get a Blue Answer, which is pinned down like the most important thing in the post. That answer, and the 10 following ones had again hundred and hundred of likes. Even if they were answers like “GET DUNKEEED ON” with no composition whatsoever. First Impression.
If one person liked it but 5 didn’t, the first impression is that one person likes the post. Now, if to the current posts we add a dislike feature, we have ourselves a new summary, 1 person liked it, but 5 more didn’t… doesn’t look so good now huh?
HOWEVER.
Back in the old forums, the summary wasn’t real as well.
If someone got 10 downvotes, the post suddenly lost light. If they have (I believe it’s) 20, then the post was HIDDEN. Like someone was screaming but his voice faded. This was awfull. It felt like your opinion was shutted down by those who opposed you. Your’s, and those of the people that agreed with you, that upvoted you.
And if was the other way arround, the same happened. If there was people that didn’t agree with you, but even more actually agreed, then they are silenced, even if they had a very well composed responce.
The minority is silenced.
What I feel, is that the dislike feature should be added, but at the same time, it must not be made like the old Downvote. Instead, we need to see both the likes and the dislikes, and without our posts fading away if we get too much negative responses.
Now, i’ve seen some people arguing about how the new forums force people in disagreement to have to reply instead of just “fast downvoting”. Having to show disagreement in a composite response actually makes you think about why you disagree, and a lot of people may even change their mindwhen thinking about it.
I agree with this and I really like that people has to think before downvoting. However, first as I stated before there’s a need for a real summary of the community’s love or hate towards a post, and second… the same happens now for upvote. “TOPIC: MOIRA NEEDS NERF - I agree, have a fast like. Didn’t even read your post”. Again, a lot of people may change their minds about something when they have to do a response.
My suggestion is, that at least when disliking, people should still have to answer WHY they dislike a post. I mean: add the dislike feature, but make it so that it just can be choosen when answering a post. If the same could be made for likes, then even better, I believe.
Anyway this is my personal thought.
If you disagree please leave a like! 
Have a nice day everyone!