Clickbait is basically a shortcut to traffic and it is actually incentivised by design.

How can you know the link won't correspond to the title and snippet? Should we just avoid all interesting-looking content because we might have been duped? The only way to avoid clickbait working is if those who have actually seen the entire page can indicate it is not worth viewing - which brings us right back to search engine placement algorithms and curation.

Yes, but the algorithm is optimizing for clicks, not curation. Curation is a much more costly process requiring humans in the loop, which often leads to cries of censorship (e.g. my otherwise popular article is being unfairly down-weighted). Clicks are much easier to track and provide a lot of signal.

I'm not saying that Google can't do better. Clearly they have mismatched incentives with their users due to advertising. Moving organic search placements below the fold to increase ad revenue is a major issue, but isn't akin to prioritizing clickbait.

Instead what I'm saying is that due to Google's dominant market position they are under higher scrutiny if they start labeling certain media outlets as frequently generating clickbait and down-weighting them, where smaller search engines like Kagi can get away with that without being labeled a manipulator.

That said, if Google did allow block lists like Kagi, that could go a long way, but likely would still lead to complaints about bias.

Google had blocklists a decade ago. They got rid of them.

You can use the uBlocklist browser extension to add em back, but its not as seamless

It's a choice, A) you make something yourself or B) you have the user create the product. There is probably more money in the later but if you look at it objectively from perspective A it will look like an ever declining turd.

We've had the same plot with TV. It was definitely possible to fill countless channels with the many lectures given all over the world. Countless people who though much effort managed to learn and discover useful and interesting things. You would need complimentary programming to allow the viewer to access or understand the different fields - which is entirely doable.

It's not different from watching a lengthy series of seasons and episodes with a modestly complex plot.

Instant gratification [by definition] has very little to offer in the long run.

If you get sucked deep enough into some.. well... useful topic (like most here know enough about programming) development in that area is going to be more interesting than Ow my balls!

Wheel of fortune isn't going to create any kind of scientific/economic/social revolution.

With any product you work on you can ask yourself what kind of people it creates. Who is the audience, what will I make them into?