The power of the 'like' button

Real-time human connections

The humble ‘like’ button has a complicated history. It’s been around in various forms for decades! There’s even a Wikipedia page all about it. In the last decade and a half it’s been a critical part of most social platforms, used to feed and inform the algorithms that determine which content gets shown to people.

It's contribution to algorithmically-driven culture¹ is often problematic and complex. That’s not what I’m talking about today. I’m focusing on a much simpler use of the like button. Forget algorithms. Forget how companies use the like button strategically, and often cynically. I’m talking about its use as a response to written work.

Reader-writer connections

The real, honest power of the like button, for me, has always been its ability to directly connect an audience and a creator. I’m not referring to someone liking a tweet or Facebook post (or Substack Note). Those are relatively throwaway pieces of content, quickly consumed, and a ‘like’ in those contexts can mean all sorts of things. That’s a more specifically social interaction. What I’m interested in is someone ‘liking’ something more long-form, such as an essay or story. Liking a thing rather than a person. It’s a way for the reader to reach out across the planet from wherever they are to wherever you are, pat you on the back, and whisper “you did good.”

I’ve been writing serial fiction online since about 2015, publishing a new chapter each week. A flurry of likes on a newly posted chapter tells me several things: people are happy to receive a new instalment, there aren’t any major errors in what I just sent out, and the project overall remains viable. This happens every single week and it’s a fantastic, subtle motivator.

But! It gets better.