4 ms·

> I am not sure what the solution is. I boycott them. Google News will present three articles about the same thing, and I will click the one whose headline is

> I am not sure what the solution is. I boycott them. Google News will present three articles about the same thing, and I will click the one whose headline is most like what a headline should be: an actual summary of the story. Sometimes all of them are clickbait, so I just click the one for the site that I like most. It was surprising when I first saw that even respectable companies like Time and USA Today had adopted the clickbait style with gusto. I'm not saying that this boycott will catch on and change the world. It's just my own little war. > Within the insular world of tech people, it all seems so absurd It's not because I'm in tech that I am wise to their tricks. It's because of my writing background. I have only bits and pieces of evidence from my own non-tech friends, but I'm pretty sure most people are aware that ads and clickbait are manipulative and that gossip magazines are the linguistic equivalent of junk food and bad for the heart. And while I said I was dismayed to see the old guard like Time and USA Today adopt the tactic of clickbait, most disconcerting of all is to see everyday people start to adopt it. I've seen quite a few blog posts and Medium articles posted on HN with clickbait titles. And on a certain video production forum, I see members starting threads with clickbait subjects (something like "I bought this camera, and you won't believe what happened!"). Forum members get no money for clicks. So why do they do it? Maybe they just want some attention. But I'm a little worried that it's just unconscious imitation, that clickbaiting is catching on like a bad habit.

rms_returns 10y ago
Another problem is how do you decide that something is clickbait without clicking it? Agreed that most of the catchy headlines are actually clickbaits, but there could be always some that are genuine. Think of clickbaits as a marketing tactic. On the way to your workplace, you see hundreds of those salesmen trying to sell you something by telling tall tales. Your impression would be like, "Hey, not these stupid fellas again. Next time one comes near me, I'll start a war on them!". However, if you think about it, a substantial portion of those salesmen (at least 20-30%) are genuine people who are just earning their livelihoods. You know that even after accounting for some of their exaggerations, their products are sometimes actually useful to you!
- viewer5 10y ago
  > Agreed that most of the catchy headlines are actually clickbaits, but there could be always some that are genuine. Can you think of an example? Make one up, I don't mean scour the internet for one. I thought about what you said and I can't think of an instance where the crappy clickbait headlines we're used to seeing would actually be a well-descriptive headline for its content. Like, I can't think of an instance where something like "I bought this camera, and you won't believe what happened!" [or other clickbait formats] is a reasonable descriptor for its content, where you just can't write title without titling it like that. Maybe I'm misunderstanding you?
  - acbabis 10y ago
    > Maybe I'm misunderstanding you? Perhaps he's suggesting that otherwise honest people have to resort to clickbait tactics to compete with the worsening signal-to-noise ratio
    - rms_returns 10y ago
      > otherwise honest people have to resort to clickbait tactics to compete with the worsening signal-to-noise ratio Exactly. Imagine that you are a pristine expert in your subject and want to share your knowledge. Now, you want to write a well-researched article and post it on your blog, think what title will you give it? If its a plain old title like "Acme stock is down by 5%", that won't be doing justice to your well-researched article. Maybe, you have got insights about technical/fundamental analyses about Acme stock that the rest of the professionals don't? Unless you give it a catchy title like "10 reasons to avoid Acme stock" or "Unpredictable mess lie ahead of Acme", no one is going to read your article (although it deserves to be read by millions). tldr; Even a good product needs marketing sometimes.
- combatentropy 10y ago
  > how do you decide that something is clickbait without clicking it? It's easy. The headline should tell the whole story: "Acme Widget stock down 2.5%" "CERN sientists discover Higgs Boson" "Smith and Jones tied in polls" There is no mystery ("Acme Widget stock makes startling change"). While there's not much room for detail, still: 1) I know what the article is about, 2) I know whether I would be interested in the rest, and 3) I can get a summary of the day's happenings just by skimming the headlines. This was the original purpose of headlines and one of the main reasons for the article itself following a structure called the Inverted Pyramid. The headline told the whole story, just in outline. The first sentence of the article told the whole story again, just with a little more detail. The first paragraph covered the whole story again, in yet more detail. Want more details? Keep reading paragraphs. You can stop at any time. Your only loss is some detail. Compare that to the circuitous, long-winded introductions of many blogs, where the writer finally gets to the point about two thirds through. Clickbait deliberately withholds information, instead of giving all it can in the room that it has. Clickbait churns up questions, headlines give answers. Clickbait lures you into a story that, in the end, was not interesting to you. Headlines help you know whether the story will be interesting to you or not.
PaulHoule 10y ago
outbrain and taboolah get redirected to 127.0.01 in my hosts file
ryandrake 10y ago
> I will click the one whose headline is most like what a headline should be: an actual summary of the story. I think you might be stating your opinion as fact. Clearly there are a lot of people in web publishing who disagree. Also, we're talking about link titles not headlines. I'm not in web publishing but still I'd argue that the whole point of a link title is to get you to click on it. Just like the whole point of the design on your cereal box is to get you to buy that one instead of some other box. One link title can be measurably better than another by counting how many clicks each one gets.
- combatentropy 10y ago
  Have you no standard for right and wrong other than "whatever is in one's own interest"?
  - ryandrake 10y ago
    Sorry, I honestly don't see how the wording of a link title is a moral issue.
    - AnimalMuppet 10y ago
      How about if the title is trying to deceive me about the contents? Is lying a moral issue? How about if the title is manipulating me to try to get me to click on it in order to make money from me doing so, even though it's going to waste my time? Is that a moral issue?
    - TeMPOraL 10y ago
      One example - while browsing, people read many more headlines than actual articles. If you follow a popular strategy of overemphasized or misleading headlines, you're essentially lying to people on mass scale. This is a real problem, because people end up remembering (and believing) the bullshit they read in a headline, without ever realizing that the actual article debunked that statement.
      - 10y ago
usrusr 10y ago
> most disconcerting of all is to see everyday people start to adopt it. "User posts interesting observation on website. The last paragraph implies a terrifying view into the future." I think (hope? fear?) that it is mostly imitation. We start learning language by imitation and we never really stop. Will the clickbait we learn today go away again our stay with us? Pre-radio newspaper headlines are notorious for their crazy front page headlines. It would be interesting to analyze everyday writing from that time for traces of the front page style. If present, did those patterns go away again or did they shape language as we use it today?
ssunstruck 10y ago
Boycotting rarely ends up accomplishing anything

rms_returns 10y ago

Another problem is how do you decide that something is clickbait without clicking it? Agreed that most of the catchy headlines are actually clickbaits, but there could be always some that are genuine. Think of clickbaits as a marketing tactic. On the way to your workplace, you see hundreds of those salesmen trying to sell you something by telling tall tales. Your impression would be like, "Hey, not these stupid fellas again. Next time one comes near me, I'll start a war on them!". However, if you think about it, a substantial portion of those salesmen (at least 20-30%) are genuine people who are just earning their livelihoods. You know that even after accounting for some of their exaggerations, their products are sometimes actually useful to you!

viewer5 10y ago
> Agreed that most of the catchy headlines are actually clickbaits, but there could be always some that are genuine. Can you think of an example? Make one up, I don't mean scour the internet for one. I thought about what you said and I can't think of an instance where the crappy clickbait headlines we're used to seeing would actually be a well-descriptive headline for its content. Like, I can't think of an instance where something like "I bought this camera, and you won't believe what happened!" [or other clickbait formats] is a reasonable descriptor for its content, where you just can't write title without titling it like that. Maybe I'm misunderstanding you?
- acbabis 10y ago
  > Maybe I'm misunderstanding you? Perhaps he's suggesting that otherwise honest people have to resort to clickbait tactics to compete with the worsening signal-to-noise ratio
  - rms_returns 10y ago
    > otherwise honest people have to resort to clickbait tactics to compete with the worsening signal-to-noise ratio Exactly. Imagine that you are a pristine expert in your subject and want to share your knowledge. Now, you want to write a well-researched article and post it on your blog, think what title will you give it? If its a plain old title like "Acme stock is down by 5%", that won't be doing justice to your well-researched article. Maybe, you have got insights about technical/fundamental analyses about Acme stock that the rest of the professionals don't? Unless you give it a catchy title like "10 reasons to avoid Acme stock" or "Unpredictable mess lie ahead of Acme", no one is going to read your article (although it deserves to be read by millions). tldr; Even a good product needs marketing sometimes.
combatentropy 10y ago
> how do you decide that something is clickbait without clicking it? It's easy. The headline should tell the whole story: "Acme Widget stock down 2.5%" "CERN sientists discover Higgs Boson" "Smith and Jones tied in polls" There is no mystery ("Acme Widget stock makes startling change"). While there's not much room for detail, still: 1) I know what the article is about, 2) I know whether I would be interested in the rest, and 3) I can get a summary of the day's happenings just by skimming the headlines. This was the original purpose of headlines and one of the main reasons for the article itself following a structure called the Inverted Pyramid. The headline told the whole story, just in outline. The first sentence of the article told the whole story again, just with a little more detail. The first paragraph covered the whole story again, in yet more detail. Want more details? Keep reading paragraphs. You can stop at any time. Your only loss is some detail. Compare that to the circuitous, long-winded introductions of many blogs, where the writer finally gets to the point about two thirds through. Clickbait deliberately withholds information, instead of giving all it can in the room that it has. Clickbait churns up questions, headlines give answers. Clickbait lures you into a story that, in the end, was not interesting to you. Headlines help you know whether the story will be interesting to you or not.

PaulHoule 10y ago

outbrain and taboolah get redirected to 127.0.01 in my hosts file

ryandrake 10y ago

> I will click the one whose headline is most like what a headline should be: an actual summary of the story. I think you might be stating your opinion as fact. Clearly there are a lot of people in web publishing who disagree. Also, we're talking about link titles not headlines. I'm not in web publishing but still I'd argue that the whole point of a link title is to get you to click on it. Just like the whole point of the design on your cereal box is to get you to buy that one instead of some other box. One link title can be measurably better than another by counting how many clicks each one gets.

combatentropy 10y ago
Have you no standard for right and wrong other than "whatever is in one's own interest"?
- ryandrake 10y ago
  Sorry, I honestly don't see how the wording of a link title is a moral issue.
  - AnimalMuppet 10y ago
    How about if the title is trying to deceive me about the contents? Is lying a moral issue? How about if the title is manipulating me to try to get me to click on it in order to make money from me doing so, even though it's going to waste my time? Is that a moral issue?
  - TeMPOraL 10y ago
    One example - while browsing, people read many more headlines than actual articles. If you follow a popular strategy of overemphasized or misleading headlines, you're essentially lying to people on mass scale. This is a real problem, because people end up remembering (and believing) the bullshit they read in a headline, without ever realizing that the actual article debunked that statement.
    - 10y ago

usrusr 10y ago

> most disconcerting of all is to see everyday people start to adopt it. "User posts interesting observation on website. The last paragraph implies a terrifying view into the future." I think (hope? fear?) that it is mostly imitation. We start learning language by imitation and we never really stop. Will the clickbait we learn today go away again our stay with us? Pre-radio newspaper headlines are notorious for their crazy front page headlines. It would be interesting to analyze everyday writing from that time for traces of the front page style. If present, did those patterns go away again or did they shape language as we use it today?

ssunstruck 10y ago

Boycotting rarely ends up accomplishing anything