this post was submitted on 06 Aug 2023

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Why is the boost button so underused? (kbin.social)

submitted 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) by [email protected] to c/asklemmy

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I mean that's a cool feature Reddit didn't have. There are so many tech savvy people here yet I feel the boost button is mostly ignored even though it can be so much more powerful in how it changes the exposure of a link/comment.
If I can't see the actual amount of boosts due to some fuckery with being on kbin instead Lemmy or whatever lmk.

Edit because I immediately got plenty of confused comments. I enter the lemmyverse through kbin and this federation offers to not just upvote but boost a comment as well. For me this means I can give a comment more exposure.
But I'm really not good with computers plz to halp. There's a very good chance that I entirely misunderstood what I'm clicking on all the time.

Edit 2: I just wanted to let everyone know that this post was boosted eight times 48 minutes after posting which is a lot. Kbin represent!

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[–] [email protected] 70 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) (13 children)

Boost, to my understanding, is only a thing on Kbin. Ernest coded Kbin to have better connectivity with Mastodon (Boost was originally our analogue for a retweet) then Lemmy does, and that's one of the options he made (the Microblog section being another. The non-Kbin instances (so all of lemmy, and thus most of the people who can read this thread) just don't have a Boost button.

That being said Boost has changed a bit in terms of how it works since it was created, and it's gonna keep being changed (literally they have said they are working on it lol). For me I basically Boost anything I upvote as a force of habit at this point.

Edit: And to those even from Kbin who don't know since I see some of you in the comments - It's currently like a super upvote. Boost something and it'll make the comment rise higher in the thread, like higher upvoted comments on a reddit thread would go up to the top. (Less if it's changed since the time I learned that from some other fediverse schmuck lmao).

[–] [email protected] 8 points 2 years ago (11 children)

Thanks for the insight. So if I boost something it's only relevant for kbin-users? I actually like it a lot. I can upvote something but still make a distinction to what I consider a quality contribution or something that requires more exposure.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) (6 children)

I have not tested it with accounts from other instances or platforms but:

Boost - Do so on a Microblog page on a Kbin magazine - Kbin users can see it higher in the Hot/Active, as well as Mastodon users seeing something retweeted via that hashtag (kbin.social/m/gaming's microblog would be visible to them via #gaming).

Boost - On a Microblog page on a Lemmy Instance - Pretty sure only Kbin can see it lol. Lemmy can't see the microblog stuff I don't think, and Mastodon can't see Microblog content there either irc.

Boost - Do so on a Thread on Kbin - Influence the comment order in the same means as Reddit upvotes. I.E. If I boost a particular (parent) comment, and no other comment has a boost, that comment shoots to the top as if on Reddit I upvoted a comment and every other (parent) comment on the thread had 0 or negative points.

Per the above - I HAVE ZERO IDEA IF ANYONE ON LEMMY IS INFLUENCED BY THIS IN THEIR HOT/ACTIVE VIEW. If you know, tell me lol.

Again I may be wrong.

Edit: If someone from Lemmy can confirm: Is the parent comment below mine on this thread by WalnutWalrus? If so, yes kbin boosts in a thread influence the hot/active comment ordering for lemmy users when they view a thread too (I boosted it to test).

[–] marron12 2 points 2 years ago (1 children)

When I sort by hot on Lemmy and kbin, I get a different order on each site. Sometimes it's similar, but it can vary quite a bit. It doesn't seem like boosts affect the comment order on Lemmy.