Social networks today have reached a high level in their development. This level allows them to influence the consciousness of users within the global network. For example, the "like" button, which has recently appeared, has already become an integral part of the Internet reality.
The "hearts" of social networks
Like (from English like) is a tool that helps the Internet user express their approval of the content posted on social networks and other Internet resources.
The main advantage of this tool is its ease of use. It is enough just to "like" the entry, i.e. press the special approval button, and your opinion will be taken into account. No emails or additional comments.
This mechanism is so simple that, having appeared on a social network, it quickly "captured" many Internet resources, including the official sites of well-known media outlets, as well as well-known projects: Google+, Youtube, Mail and others. Of course, these systems design their own like buttons.
If the site does not pretend to become global in the network, as listed above, then buttons from well-known social networks are used to evaluate the materials on it (more often it is Vkontakte and Facebook). This happens by installing the official widget on the resource.
What is like for?
The number of likes often indicates the popularity of the material and the user who uploads this material.
Likes have had a big impact on users' choices lately. In order, for example, to promote the Vkontakte group, it is necessary to have a large number of likes and, preferably, reposts under the posts in the community.
The excitement about "hearts under ava" has reached such an extent that many users of social networks, not related to the promotion of groups, install various programs on their computers. These utilities allow you to automatically wind up the number of likes.
But these programs are not officially released by social networks, so if you decide to use them, you can become a victim of scams. In the networks themselves, groups are created where there is a "mutual exchange of hearts", this version of "artificial cheating" is much safer.
Likes are often used as ratings in various polls. The one who picks up more "hearts" becomes the winner.
In general, the number of likes does not affect the promotion of the site in terms of seo-optimization and does not put those users who have a higher “like” popularity on the social network in the top positions of the rating.
Where did the like idea come from?
The idea of a husky originated back in 1998 and was implemented on the Surfbook social network by programmer Van der Meer. He filed a patent for this invention.
Since 2010, this button has appeared on Facebook (thumbs up), and a little later on Vkontakte (in the form of a heart). The latest social network went a little further, using the “Like” button with the “Tell Friends” function, which adds a news item to the user's personal page in one click (this is called a repost).
