On August 31st, the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications designated a total of four companies as large-scale specified telecommunications service providers: three operating companies of ``pixiv,'' ``note,'' and ``Girls Channel,'' and an individual who operates ``like-dislike.com.'' Based on the Information Distribution Platform Countermeasures Act (Jōpura Law). Until now, only corporations such as Google, Meta, and LINE Yahoo have been designated, but this is the first time an individual operator has been designated. The Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications did not release the names of the victims, only writing ``individuals'' in the list.
What kind of site is Like-Hate.com, which claims to be ``a place where everyone's true feelings gather''? The reporter opened the page and checked.
When you open the top page, you will see three types of rankings: ``Likeability Ranking,'' ``Unpopularity Ranking,'' and ``Trend Ranking,'' under the catchphrase ``Is that celebrity really popular?'' Each page displays the top five people and includes a photo and tags such as ``comedian,'' ``shogi player,'' and ``virtual YouTuber.'' While comedians, entertainers, and announcers ranked high in favorability, the trend rankings were dominated by game commentators and VTubers. There is also a search window at the top of the screen that allows you to search by ``person name/group name.''
The list of ``hot people'' at the bottom of the page includes politicians and athletes, and the ``hot tags'' include names of idol groups, athletes, VTuber agencies, and more, so the target is not just celebrities. In the ``New Comments'' column at the bottom of the page, each time someone posts something on their page, their name will be displayed one after another, with ``(1 minute ago)'' displayed.
When you click on a person's name from the ranking, you will be redirected to the person's page with the heading ``Do you like or dislike 〇〇?'' There are photos of the person in question, and below them are two large buttons that say "I like it!" and "I don't like it!" In the meantime, there is a message that encourages you to ``Vote for ``like!'' or ``dislike!'' and see everyone's comments, and you won't be able to read or write comments until you vote. There is no need to register or log in; just press a button to complete your vote.
When you vote, the ratio and number of votes between those who like and dislike the item will be displayed, and the ratio will be shown in red and blue bar graphs. The cumulative number of votes for the person with the highest likability rating reached several hundred thousand votes. Below that are buttons to share the results on X, Facebook, and LINE, as well as columns showing the overall ranking and ranking by tag.
In addition, when checking the URL of the image displayed on the people page, it was found that the site did not own the image itself, but instead loaded the image directly from Google's image search results. It appears that the top-ranked images from a search by name are automatically sorted, rather than photos of the person registered for each person.
The comment section will open below. The poster's name is displayed with the name of the person who voted, such as ``Anonymous@Liker'' or ``Anonymous@Hacker'', and it is a bulletin board style where you can reply to other comments by specifying a number such as ``>>29588''. For each comment, you can filter the display to ``only likers'' or ``only haters'', and each comment has links to ``report,'' ``hide,'' and ``reply,'' as well as a voting bar to ``like'' or ``dislike'' the comment itself.
On the popularity ranking page that can be accessed from ``See more,'' the top three people are accompanied by their photos and representative comments in speech bubbles, and from the fourth place onwards, only their photos and names are arranged in three columns.
If you click on the tags below a person's name or on the top page, you will be redirected to a ranking page that only lists people who belong to the same comedy duo, idol group, or VTuber agency. Here you can switch between popular and unpopular to compare the ranking within the group. Users can apply to add people or tags that are not listed on the ``About this site'' page.
