Add to favorites straight from the Popular Favorites tabs

April 13, 2015 11:36 AM

Would it be possible to add to favorites straight from the Popular Posts and Popular Questions pages? Just a + sign like on the main page?

Sometimes I like to visit the Popular Questions and Popular Posts pages to see what I may have missed. There's currently no way to favorite a post from the page itself, and I have to open each post/question one by one.

This is obviously not a huge deal, but I think it would be a nice UX enhancement that (I am guessing) wouldn't be too hard to implement.

posted by alligatorman to Feature Requests at 11:36 AM (13 comments total)

We haven't had it on that view historically because of a general aversion toward favorites inflation—stick a + on a page that's already got heavily favorited stuff and you just end up with stuff getting more heavily favorited as a result, etc.—though it's not something that I think we have any really strong feelings about in this particular case. Is this something a lot of folks would find specifically useful?
posted by cortex (staff) at 11:38 AM on April 13, 2015 [2 favorites]

I don't often look at the Popular page, but I think the favorites-inflation concern is a convincing reason not to add the + to the posts and comments there.
posted by Rustic Etruscan at 2:04 PM on April 13, 2015 [6 favorites]

Also, you rarely see the whole post/comment on the popular page. It would be strange to be able to favorite a chunk of a comment.
posted by Kattullus at 3:19 PM on April 13, 2015

But...but...favorites are a way of bookmarking comments to read later, right? (^_-)
posted by Bugbread at 5:47 PM on April 13, 2015 [2 favorites]

In addition to the significant issue of 'things that are popular becoming more popular because they're popular', the problem of adding favourites for something you may not have seen in its entirety makes this a no-go in my view.
posted by dg at 8:27 PM on April 13, 2015 [1 favorite]

What if you had the option of adding each post or question to your activity but not your favorites? That way you get some bookmark functionality without getting into the politics of favorite-ing things.
posted by litera scripta manet at 8:34 PM on April 13, 2015 [4 favorites]

I can't tell if Bugbread's joking or not, but I agree with the serious reading of the comment: I don't care if a post looks more popular than it should artificially, but being able to save something I want to re-read a little bit easier is a (very minor) improvement to my experiance.
posted by Ned G at 6:04 AM on April 14, 2015 [2 favorites]

Things mustn't get too popular.

This is a thing that matters.

Huh.
posted by Sys Rq at 7:35 AM on April 14, 2015

Things mustn't get too popular.

I see it as a way to increase the flow of new posts and comments to the popular page, rather than making the ones that are already there stickier.
posted by So You're Saying These Are Pants? at 10:46 AM on April 14, 2015 [2 favorites]

I see it as a way to increase the flow of new posts and comments to the popular page, rather than making the ones that are already there stickier.

+1
posted by Rustic Etruscan at 10:54 AM on April 14, 2015

Things mustn't get too popular.

This is a thing that matters.

Huh.
posted by Sys Rq at 3:35 PM on April 14

[428 favorites +] [!]
posted by billiebee at 12:20 PM on April 14, 2015

Sys Rq: Things mustn't get too popular.

This is a thing that matters.

I don't know if this was directed at me or not, but my main problem is that people wouldn't be favoriting after seeing the whole thing. Yes, a single favorite doesn't matter much in the big scheme of things, but I'd like favorites to be at the end of the whole post and comment, at least symbolically suggesting that the whole thing's been read. If I get a favorite, I want it to be because interest was piqued, emotions stirred or thoughts provoked, not because it was on a list generated by an algorithm.
posted by Kattullus at 10:51 PM on April 14, 2015

I've wanted this pony forever and ever, so thanks for asking. Just sayin'.
posted by ifjuly at 9:09 AM on April 15, 2015