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What happened to the "No Clickbait" promise?

1 hour ago, it_dont_work said:

Only clickbait I see is most forum posts asking for help. 

 

 

YOU"LL NEVER GUESS WHAT GOT STUCK IN THIS VAGI...

 

Can you help me fix this GPU error? it only happens when i run crysis...

Grammar and spelling is not indicative of intelligence/knowledge.  Not having the same opinion does not always mean lack of understanding.  

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Clickbait is not lying, clickbait is creating a title, that makes people click, so overhyping something that is just bland, the examples in post 1 seems to be really click bait like.. and the fun part is, i might be agewise out of scope being 41. but these titles, might make me click, but i end up not watching the next 3-4 videos, simply because i felt my life was wasted.

 

also when writing things i CAPS and stuff like that.. it also really cheapens the product that you are trying to sell, in this setup the LTT brand.

 

I think that is some of the difference with today and earlier times, you have SO much instant viewer data on youtube, that you try to micro manage your content to fit the viewer, so you forget about the long term effect of doing click bait.. since it is hollowing out your brand.

 

take something completely different, the car industry, take BMW, they build a pedigree on the M badge, being high performance cars, now you can get an M badge on your car, if you have some plastic bits, and better seats. 

 

this sells cars now, but the M owners of the real cars, don´t have the same pride in owning this, because the badge in many situations really does not mean anything.

 

so for me, this is not thinking long term, this is just grapping what you can, in a sprint, and hoping it is enough the day the hype dies.

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What determines clickbait?

 

The ones you mention are not click bait imo. 

 

The laptop one i can somewhat understand. But even then it depends.

 

I can make a thread saying "the best band youve never heard of" and talk about a band called blinded colony. If that thread gets viewed 100000 times and 10 people have heard about that band is it clickbait? I dont think so. 

 

Personally i cant recall a ltt video that was titled in a way that upset me. But to each their own.

 

 

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If their argument was that it's the YT algorithm, fine I can accept that. What I cannot accept is that they use the same titles on floatplane (from what a large number of people are saying) and on the video thread on this forum. There goes the algorithm excuse out the window

🌲🌲🌲

 

 

 

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2 minutes ago, Arika S said:

If their argument was that it's the YT algorithm, fine I can accept that. What I cannot accept is that they use the same titles on floatplane (from what a large number of people are saying) and on the video thread on this forum. There goes the algorithm excuse out the window

I think it's more to the point that the titles work on people,  people just can't help themselves but click on anything written like that.  I think it is a reflection of the attention span people have these days.   If 5 words don't pique their interest, tell them about the video and contain some sort of concluding insinuation they won't click.

 

 

Grammar and spelling is not indicative of intelligence/knowledge.  Not having the same opinion does not always mean lack of understanding.  

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18 minutes ago, mr moose said:

I think it's more to the point that the titles work on people,  people just can't help themselves but click on anything written like that.  I think it is a reflection of the attention span people have these days.   If 5 words don't pique their interest, tell them about the video and contain some sort of concluding insinuation they won't click.

 

 

I’m not sure that people are any different now than they ever were.  The newspaper headline game is an old one.

Not a pro, not even very good.  I’m just old and have time currently.  Assuming I know a lot about computers can be a mistake.

 

Life is like a bowl of chocolates: there are all these little crinkly paper cups everywhere.

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21 hours ago, lewdicrous said:

Maybe LTT should take a look at what MKBHD is doing and learn from them; they constantly get millions of views (excluding their YouTube originals) without the use of awful thumbnails/titles.

And that's how I know the whole, "we're doing this because it's what the algorithms want" line is bullshit. His channel is literally a direct comparison almost, they both have similar number of subscribers, both deal with tech, and yet he has much higher views per video on average WHILE not resorting to clickbait bullshit in the titles...

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1 hour ago, Bombastinator said:

I’m not sure that people are any different now than they ever were.  The newspaper headline game is an old one.

I would argue news paper headlines have always been vastly different from video titles.  News papers are physically limited by available space and the fact that people have paid for the paper, unlike youtube videos where the users have no investment at all and any interaction is purely out of an interest that the title has to generate.

Grammar and spelling is not indicative of intelligence/knowledge.  Not having the same opinion does not always mean lack of understanding.  

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I'd agree, the "clickbaity" titles are annoying as hell.  Just about every channel I'm subbed to has sunk to using them.  It definitely causes me to avoid some videos just out of annoyance depending on my mood.  But hey, this thread won't change anything!

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Don't like it? Just unsub. If there is decent video coming around then youtube will likely put it into your recommendations anyway.  Or into the "tech tab". Just step back for a while and check the channel maybe once a week. And although saying something like this in an official forum is not nice, it is the only other option you have. Deal with it or step away. You can change, but LTT surely won't as long as they don't see the sub- or viewer numbers decreasing.

 

You as the viewer don't have to care about the algorithm, you as the viewer just care for the informational value and entertainment you can get out of it, and how much you are willing to put up with. If it annoys you to such an extent, then just stop. Youtube doesn't give a flying F about you, and its algorithm doesn't care about your opinion,

 

Data driven decision-making or something like that. 

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5 minutes ago, Ein0r said:

- snip -

I would have agreed with you if they never promised to change their titles to be more informative 8 months ago. The fact that people are still complaining shows you that there are bigger problems here.

9 minutes ago, Ein0r said:

You can change, but LTT surely won't as long as they don't see the sub- or viewer numbers decreasing.

They have almost 10 million subs, yet the videos that they posted in the last 6-7 days haven't hit 1 million views or barely got over that. I wonder what that means..

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8 hours ago, Arika S said:

If their argument was that it's the YT algorithm, fine I can accept that. What I cannot accept is that they use the same titles on floatplane (from what a large number of people are saying) and on the video thread on this forum. There goes the algorithm excuse out the window

The thumbnails/titles are the same for the most part. The only difference I noticed was that sponsored videos on Floatplane had/have "SPONSORED" in parentheses or "SPONSORED BY [COMPANY]", but they don't add that to the titles on YouTube. 

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Yes, that's the point. LTT either can't change it due to reasons like the algorithm, or won't change because they dont give a fuck while also having a memory like a sieve. But at some point your options as a viewer are exhausted. You can complain, critique, recommend, ignore, or just leave.

 

Maybe thinking about clickbaity titles is like a drug and James, Riley, Alex and the other writers are just heavily addicted. Trapped in a nonsensical bubble.

 

I probably wrote something similar like the above in the last topic about it too.

Oh well.. they can still try and advertise this as another benefit of Floatplane: "nO cLiCkBaItY TiTLeS oN fL0AtPlAnE". But I dont have Floatplane, not sure if there are clickbait titles as well.

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7 minutes ago, Ein0r said:

Yes, that's the point. LTT either can't change it due to reasons like the algorithm, or won't change because they dont give a fuck while also having a memory like a sieve. But at some point your options as a viewer are exhausted. You can complain, critique, recommend, ignore, or just leave.

One of the reasons I unsubbed months ago.

9 minutes ago, Ein0r said:

Oh well.. they can still try and advertise this as another benefit of Floatplane: "nO cLiCkBaItY TiTLeS oN fL0AtPlAnE". But I dont have Floatplane, not sure if there are clickbait titles as well.

image.png.485be05d3db39ec249f53d8f18ce9b62.pngimage.png.9d4732ea81fd970f8d55acb7179d1a42.png

FP on the left, YT on the right. This video's title is one of the ones that OP complained about, they added the hyphen but wrote "No... Seriously" instead of something informative.

image.png.2d58d961e6fa70a891532b802f6e5c7a.pngimage.png.2f10fde2667dbc8c936ab7778ff1ea2b.png

For the video above, they used the format that they promised (catchy title - informative title), but on YT they only used the catchy title.

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On 1/16/2020 at 2:55 AM, lewdicrous said:

One of the reasons I unsubbed months ago.

image.png.485be05d3db39ec249f53d8f18ce9b62.pngimage.png.9d4732ea81fd970f8d55acb7179d1a42.png

FP on the left, YT on the right. This video's title is one of the ones that OP complained about, they added the hyphen but wrote "No... Seriously" instead of something informative.

image.png.2d58d961e6fa70a891532b802f6e5c7a.pngimage.png.2f10fde2667dbc8c936ab7778ff1ea2b.png

For the video above, they used the format that they promised (catchy title - informative title), but on YT they only used the catchy title.

I generally just watch on floatplane and this is just from memory but I feel as if at least 8 out 10 times they have the informative title so im not really bothered by it. I still enjoy the video's and that's why I watch them, I only get truly annoyed by click-bait if I feel the rug has been pulled out from under me. I can't remember an instance of that with LTT even if it was exaggerated I generally enjoy the content. For example the faster internet video was exaggerating but it was still interesting. What they showed off was faster in a way even if it wasn't something I could take advantage of at this time.

 

At the end of the day I don't begrudge them for using those types of titles because I know they work on me. So I believe them when they say it increases viewership. Would I rather have more informative titles yes (I do mostly get them on floatplane) but at the end of the day LTT is a business and will do what they feel they need to make money. As long as I enjoy the content I will continue to watch.

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On 1/14/2020 at 11:21 PM, BloodViolet said:

 

I don't really see problems with clickbaits.

 

LTT is mostly entertaintment slash tech channel and as company they have to make the dough somehow. If clickbaits helps them, whatever.

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2 minutes ago, Ergroilnin said:

I don't really see problems with clickbaits.

 

LTT is mostly entertaintment slash tech channel and as company they have to make the dough somehow. If clickbaits helps them, whatever.

Historically such things help in the short term only.  There was a time a hundred years ago when misleading headlines were the order of the day.  No one liked it but they put up with it. The companies that didn’t do so eventually won out when frustration with misleading headlines reached a breaking point.  It’s a long term outlook.  

Not a pro, not even very good.  I’m just old and have time currently.  Assuming I know a lot about computers can be a mistake.

 

Life is like a bowl of chocolates: there are all these little crinkly paper cups everywhere.

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1 hour ago, Bombastinator said:

Historically such things help in the short term only.  There was a time a hundred years ago when misleading headlines were the order of the day.  No one liked it but they put up with it. The companies that didn’t do so eventually won out when frustration with misleading headlines reached a breaking point.  It’s a long term outlook.  

Any citations? I'm curious and didn't really find anything googling.

 

I'm sure if that did actually happen they would shift the video titles to meet the demand. They can see such changes in a way they would not have been able to 100 years ago. Honestly though it is us as a populace and not them that is the cause. As I see it as I know I've certainly have added to data points clicking on videos that i never would have otherwise without such a title. As long as the populace in general reacts to the tittles with increased likelihood to click through to the video. Click-bait tittles are going nowhere and we just have to live with them.

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Just now, startrekdude said:

Any citations? I'm curious and didn't really find anything googling.

 

I'm sure if that did actually happen they would shift the video titles to meet the demand. They can see such changes in a way they would not have been able to 100 years ago. Honestly though it is us as a populace and not them that is the cause. As I see it as I know I've certainly have added to data points clicking on videos that i never would have otherwise without such a title. As long as the populace in general reacts to the tittles with increased likelihood to click through to the video. Click-bait tittles are going nowhere and we just have to live with them.

It’s a memory I’m afraid.  It’s within the history of newspapers of the period, and the concept of journalistic ethics, which is something that ebbs and flows.  There was one particular newspaper owner who made a stand and was eventually rewarded for it.  I’m afraid I don’t remember his name.  He wasn’t the first who tried.  Just the one who made it stick.

 

 High water journalistic ethics create consumer complacency which allows unethical behavior to become more effective.  Low ebb journalistic ethics creates consumer anger and reduces the complacency level to where consumers just assume a headline is complete crap and are pleasantly surprised and commensurately loyal to the groups that produce them.  The big change of ebb happened with Rupert Murdoch almost 40 years ago.  The 70’s were a high water mark and things have gone down from there.  We’re reaching a low ebb point I suspect.  I don’t know if it’s bottomed out or not.  I kind of doubt it.

Not a pro, not even very good.  I’m just old and have time currently.  Assuming I know a lot about computers can be a mistake.

 

Life is like a bowl of chocolates: there are all these little crinkly paper cups everywhere.

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2 hours ago, Bombastinator said:

 I don’t know if it’s bottomed out or not.  I kind of doubt it.

I doubt it will bottom out in the same way, hopefully it will change someday. But things have changed in the way we consume media.

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5 minutes ago, startrekdude said:

I doubt it will bottom out in the same way, hopefully it will change someday. But things have changed in the way we consume media.

True.  There is already starting to be turbulence though.  Example this thread.

Not a pro, not even very good.  I’m just old and have time currently.  Assuming I know a lot about computers can be a mistake.

 

Life is like a bowl of chocolates: there are all these little crinkly paper cups everywhere.

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5 minutes ago, Bombastinator said:

True.  There is already starting to be turbulence though.  Example this thread.

Fair, but the question is how the silent majority feel they will have show a change is needed. Until the people stop clicking as loud as we are nothing will change. 

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11 minutes ago, startrekdude said:

Fair, but the question is how the silent majority feel they will have show a change is needed. Until the people stop clicking as loud as we are nothing will change. 

Iirc with the newspapers there was a spark that just pissed off everyone.  Don’t remember what it was. 
 

What we’re seeing here is tinder being laid.  I don’t know if there is enough tinder or not.  The whole “fake news” thing implies there is.  Still a spark has not yet happened.  At least one that hasn’t been squelched anyway.

Not a pro, not even very good.  I’m just old and have time currently.  Assuming I know a lot about computers can be a mistake.

 

Life is like a bowl of chocolates: there are all these little crinkly paper cups everywhere.

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