https://www.reddit.com/r/changelog/comments/a74eor/we_disabled_the_view_count_feature/
created by LanterneRougeOG on 17/12/2018 at 21:55 UTC
246 upvotes, 64 top-level comments (showing 25)
Hi r/changelog,
As some noticed[1], we disabled the view count feature because of site performance. The view count feature showed the number of views a post had on the post detail page. Only the OP and mods could see it.
After further investigation we've decided to disable the current version of the feature permanently. The current system supporting it was not scaling well and frequently was backed up which required on-call engineers to jump in and resolve the issues.
We were already thinking about how to improve creator stats in the future. We want to give you more robust stats, such as views and comment counts by the hour. How would you like to see us improve it?
Sketch of the potential improvements
Comment by CaptainPedge at 17/12/2018 at 22:31 UTC
322 upvotes, 8 direct replies
How would you like to see us improve it?
Bring back upvotes vs downvotes
Comment by adeadhead at 17/12/2018 at 21:58 UTC
129 upvotes, 3 direct replies
A graph of engagement (votes, comments?) by hour is all I could ever want.
Comment by theothersophie at 17/12/2018 at 21:58 UTC
199 upvotes, 4 direct replies
Put it back ---E
Comment by greeniethemoose at 17/12/2018 at 22:05 UTC
41 upvotes, 1 direct replies
Hourly updating stats sound great! Totally understand if the way you guys had been doing the view count isn't viable long term. The sketch of potential improvements looks super promising!
ninja edit to add: hope this means your on-call engineers will be able to have a calmer holiday season! Knock on wood and all that.
Comment by Aether_Storm at 18/12/2018 at 01:27 UTC
15 upvotes, 2 direct replies
Will the new statistics be viewable on old.reddit?
Comment by tizorres at 17/12/2018 at 22:02 UTC
13 upvotes, 0 direct replies
That mockup looks super handy. Here's hoping we get something like that.
Comment by anser_penna at 17/12/2018 at 22:50 UTC
8 upvotes, 0 direct replies
Apparently, you're replacing view count with view count plus a lot more, so I see no down side except for the delay before the new features become available. Thanks!
Comment by BlankVerse at 18/12/2018 at 00:40 UTC
7 upvotes, 0 direct replies
Can we get some post and comment statistics for the subreddit stats as well?
Comment by knightelite at 17/12/2018 at 22:30 UTC
7 upvotes, 1 direct replies
I found it interesting that it seemed like there was almost always somewhere between a 1:20 and 1:10 ratio of upvotes to views. Would have been interesting to have similar stats for comments (though measuring views on comments might be difficult).
The info shown in the mockup would be great though.
Comment by therealdanhill at 17/12/2018 at 22:25 UTC
5 upvotes, 1 direct replies
Perfect world, I would like to see where the clicks are coming from from within reddit on an hourly basis, and other information such as average account ages, up/downvote patterns (traction) on an hourly basis.
Comment by jetboyterp at 17/12/2018 at 22:25 UTC
6 upvotes, 1 direct replies
Any rough idea on when to expect the new version?
Comment by adreamofhodor at 17/12/2018 at 22:56 UTC
6 upvotes, 1 direct replies
How was it implemented previously?
Comment by ZeroPaladn at 18/12/2018 at 00:34 UTC
6 upvotes, 0 direct replies
As someone who uses features like this as a metric of engagement and, ultimately, success this really hurts our ability to push on some initiatives going forward.
Are these stats still available for request or are we losing it completely?
Comment by shiruken at 18/12/2018 at 01:42 UTC
5 upvotes, 0 direct replies
When views get re-added to the website, will they be retroactively populated for all content between now and then? I'm trying to decide how to handle the change for some of our analytics scripts over on r/science.
Comment by CrasyMike at 18/12/2018 at 05:10 UTC
3 upvotes, 0 direct replies
I really only need historical data, not up to date, to go back and look at.
Comment by [deleted] at 18/12/2018 at 01:57 UTC
8 upvotes, 0 direct replies
That looks awesome, but please don't limit this to r/redesign. There are still a lot of us using old.reddit.com.
Comment by shiruken at 17/12/2018 at 22:26 UTC
6 upvotes, 0 direct replies
Disappointed to see this go. I created a similar dashboard for tracking activity on r/science posts over time, guess we'll just have to make do without views anymore. In the interim can we still request view counts via modmail?
Comment by [deleted] at 17/12/2018 at 22:44 UTC*
3 upvotes, 1 direct replies
[deleted]
Comment by [deleted] at 18/12/2018 at 12:19 UTC*
3 upvotes, 0 direct replies
rip :(
was one of the major ways of actually seeing impact of a post...
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will the 'new' future version be pushed to classic - or only to redesign?
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as a mod:
for the traffic page i'd love to see number of posts and comments [or number of raw votes!] by day and month on the subreddit as a feature request
Comment by Dynamo1503 at 19/12/2018 at 21:05 UTC
3 upvotes, 0 direct replies
bring it back just the way it was. Let only the op and mods see the view counts
Comment by devrelm at 21/12/2018 at 02:29 UTC
3 upvotes, 0 direct replies
Along with a graph of votes over time (as others suggested), some other graphs/charts could be helpful for finding unusual behavior or brigading. For instance:
Comment by tuckyd at 24/12/2018 at 20:15 UTC
3 upvotes, 0 direct replies
We use post view counts for communicating with artists and companies who want to come on our site for AMAs as to how successful their relevant posts have been. It's a really invaluable tool for us on /r/kpop so I hope it can come back in any form!
Comment by [deleted] at 15/01/2019 at 02:31 UTC
3 upvotes, 0 direct replies
Keep the views features
Comment by ijm8710 at 17/12/2018 at 23:15 UTC
5 upvotes, 1 direct replies
Please make sure the new iteration makes its way to mobile
Comment by reseph at 17/12/2018 at 22:41 UTC
4 upvotes, 0 direct replies
Could we get a replacement of it until this new feature is ready? It sounds like it'll take a while. The view count was pretty important to us.
