Originally Posted by
anabolism
Depends on which feature and which goals.
A mechanism to "like" a post? I don't see it as useful. I see it as a social media tool.
A mechanism to rank a post (e.g., as 'helpful')? I see it as a foundation for a subsequent feature to allow filtered views of long threads so that only high-rated posts are visible. Combined, this can be a real leap forward in FT usability with large threads that contain useful information scattered among thousands of discussion posts.
The problem with ranking posts in megathreads by helpful likes is that after some time, older posts are much more likely to have more of these helpful likes than newer posts. Hence, even after the program rules change, people would nevertheless be presented with posts containing out of date information.