Twitter chief hints at deleting its ‘like’ button

The platform’s goal is to ‘promote healthy conversation,’ which means battling the toxic environment of fake news, conspiracy theories and online threats. Will this help it do so?

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Rumors are swirling that Twitter might soon remove the ability to “like” tweets.

The Telegraph first published the news based on comments made by the platform’s co-founder and chief executive at a private event.

The Telegraph reported:

Founder Jack Dorsey last week admitted at a Twitter event that he was not a fan of the heart-shaped button and that it would be getting rid of it “soon”.

Vox reported:

“Right now we have a big Like button with a heart on it and we’re incentivizing people to want [the number of likes] to go up,” Dorsey reportedly said. “Is that the right thing? Versus contributing to the public conversation or a healthy conversation? How do we [incentivize] healthy conversation?”

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