I would like to propose replacing up and down voting on comments with emoji reactions. Since Lemmy doesn’t have a consequential karma system, I don’t believe the gamification of comment upvotes helps engender a discussion with a diversity of opinions. Instead of a binary choice, we will be able to express a far greater range of reactions. I see emojis as being especially helpful as a replacement for downvotes since it will help the author understand why the reader disagrees. While I agree that replying instead of downvoting is a better choice, it’s not realistic for everyone to have the time to do so.
For posts, voting serves a useful purpose in creating a curated list of most popular posts in each community. This is important for people who don’t have time to follow all posts in their subscribed communities.
I’m not sure this is possible since reactions tend to be in the context of the comment. For example, if a comment is expressing anger at an injustice, an angry emoji would probably be interpreted as “I am also angry” at the injustice and not disagreement or anger about the comment. If someone is expressing a personal loss, a sad emoji would me likely mean sympathy.