Hashtag clickbait

I spend a lot of my time online—no, I mean a lot of my time online. Comes with the territory, and it’s how I discover the sometimes interesting stuff I share in the daily email and on the front page at NCPR and on the station Facebook page–stuff that usually doesn’t come down the airwaves.

As you may have noticed, my tastes are a little wonky, a little nerdy. I like science; I like news “explainers.” I like “retro” and have a sweet tooth for eye candy. I even listen to and watch TED talks, and I like out-of-mainstream music paired with experimental short video. All that makes me a typical public media kind of guy.

But I also have a secret affection for the truly silly end of the clickbait spectrum—stuff that has no purpose in life other than to say “CLICK ME.” You know: A woman is knitting tiny wool jumpers to keep her chickens warm. Awww! (I wonder if there is an “Awww!” emoji. Should be.) And I am a sucker for cooking tips: Ketchup leather is the burger key you didn’t know you were missing.

But some clickbait is just a cheat: Secret nudist beaches in the USA is just that, pictures of beaches, not a nudist is sight. And the demented troll child photo displayed to promote a clickbait slideshow of serial killers, mass shooters and genocidal psychopaths when they were children? She is none of them, just some poor kid on a really bad day.

Another five minutes of life I will never get back again.

Tags: listeningpost