Re:The Mark Zuckerberg Manifesto Is a Blueprint for Destroyi...
by ABCLAW on Sunday February 19, 2017 @04:09PM
(#13681996)
Clickbait works, but tabloids weren't shaping elections.
Newspapers would use attention-grabbing headlines and cover photographs, but ultimately subscription would require people to make a decision about whether or not they gained recurring value from receiving the publication.
Technological fatalism in this area undervalues history. This exact battle between sensationalism and quality is not a historical novelty. Tabloids were not out-competing the NYT. A more nuanced view shows that current trends aren't predestined, or even distribution medium specific.
You're just moving the eyeball-hunting to the aggregators. Clickbait works. The human brain is just plain vulnerable to certain stimuli, and a business which exploits this has an advantage over one which does not.
In the short term, at least. If people will recognize this and choose to willfully select businesses which make a point to not do it, perhaps we can change things. There's just not enough public intent in this direction yet.