The Facebook-owned social network is going to start a test of hiding “like” counts in order to make people think less about Instagram as a race for others’ sympathies.
“We want people to worry a little bit less about how many likes they’re getting on Instagram and spend a bit more time connecting with the people that they care about,” Mosseri said during the keynote of F8, Facebook’s annual software developer conference in San Jose, California.
During the test, the number of people who liked a post will no longer be shown. Users will be able to look at who liked their own post, but they won’t be able to see how many likes someone else’s post received unless they manually count them.
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The creator would still be able to see their own like counts if they choose to do so, Mosseri said.
“We don’t want Instagram to feel like a competition,” he added.
The decision to run a test of hiding like counts comes as Instagram expands its efforts to combat online bullying. Mosseri also spoke about other efforts the service is considering to help with this issue, such as a feature that would nudge users if they are about to post an aggressive comment.
“What we aspire to do is lead the fight against online bullying,” Mosseri said.
