combatentropy
Veteran
I am seeing more and more clickbait headlines in this forum.
It surprises me, because you can't make money here. Clickbait was started by websites that make money off of advertising. You don't make revenue here. Well, you can, but ironically the Marketplace section has the most descriptive headlines.
A clickbait headline isn't just a headline that makes you want to click. It is a headline that tells you almost nothing, but words it in a way to arouse your curiosity.
The problem is that it wastes your time. You click on stories that turn out to be unimportant, even unremarkable.
This is the opposite of conventional headline writing. Newspapers traditionally crafted headlines carefully. As my eighth-grade journalism teacher taught us, if you had time only to skim the headlines, you would still know today's news, although only in outline.
Further still, the paragraphs of the news stories themselves are worded so that you could stop reading at any moment and still know the story's beginning, middle, and end. The first sentence restates the headline, only it adds more detail. The first paragraph is, again, a self-contained story, adding yet more detail. The farther you read down the column, the more details you get. But you already knew the ending by the headline. This allows time-crunched readers to stop whenever they want to. It also allows news editors to clip syndicated articles to fit in the room they have in their own newspapers.
DVXUser gives you just 85 characters for your thread's title, but I think you should cram every detail you can to avoid this scenario: "Oh, this thread might be interesting. (Click.) Nope, not interesting at all."
My Name Is ___________ (Find Out Inside). A thread in the New Members forum, of someone introducing himself.
It surprises me, because you can't make money here. Clickbait was started by websites that make money off of advertising. You don't make revenue here. Well, you can, but ironically the Marketplace section has the most descriptive headlines.
A clickbait headline isn't just a headline that makes you want to click. It is a headline that tells you almost nothing, but words it in a way to arouse your curiosity.
Boy opens door and you won't believe what happens next!
The problem is that it wastes your time. You click on stories that turn out to be unimportant, even unremarkable.
This is the opposite of conventional headline writing. Newspapers traditionally crafted headlines carefully. As my eighth-grade journalism teacher taught us, if you had time only to skim the headlines, you would still know today's news, although only in outline.
Mladenovic Plays Through Back Pain to Win at French Open
Trudeau Invites Pope to Canada for Church Apology to Indigenous Peoples
Shark Leaps Into Fisherman's Boat in Australia
Trudeau Invites Pope to Canada for Church Apology to Indigenous Peoples
Shark Leaps Into Fisherman's Boat in Australia
Further still, the paragraphs of the news stories themselves are worded so that you could stop reading at any moment and still know the story's beginning, middle, and end. The first sentence restates the headline, only it adds more detail. The first paragraph is, again, a self-contained story, adding yet more detail. The farther you read down the column, the more details you get. But you already knew the ending by the headline. This allows time-crunched readers to stop whenever they want to. It also allows news editors to clip syndicated articles to fit in the room they have in their own newspapers.
DVXUser gives you just 85 characters for your thread's title, but I think you should cram every detail you can to avoid this scenario: "Oh, this thread might be interesting. (Click.) Nope, not interesting at all."
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