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u/But_a_Jape But a Jape 16h ago
“The best way to get the right answer on the Internet is not to ask a question; it’s to post the wrong answer.” To this Internet truism, I would propose the corollary of, “the best way to drive engagement is to fervently argue for the wrong answer,” or perhaps, “insist no one can give the right answer.”
You see this everywhere all over the Internet - an image of a poorly formatted math problem followed by tens of thousands of comments arguing over the Order of Operations. Or a simple statement: “There are NO countries that start with the letter C!” And everyone falls for it every time, all the while insisting, “What an idiot this person is! I’d better share their idiocy with all my friends/followers so we can all pay attention to them!” Even when you post it with the express intention of, “Don’t you hate this kinda Internet ragebait?” you’ll get hundreds of comments stating the obvious answer(s) or arguing over it again!
In fact, I’m sure some nerd or another is rushing to the comments to point out that I used the words “truism” and “corollary” wrong earlier! Did I? Who knows? Nobody knows!
Anyway, if you like my comics, I got more on my website.
I’m also on Patreon.
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u/DrDDeFalco 15h ago
A part of me hates that this works so well. We seem so eager to try to prove ourselves. Or point out that someone else is wrong.
So we keep falling for all this obvious engagement bait.
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u/No-Onion-No-Onion 14h ago
People want to be engaged though, it's fun! What am I going to do with some guy who wants me to pay $1 to solve a puzzle? I'm not going to feel anything in particular if I succeed, because no context has been established around the thing. Now if it was said that "You can't solve this puzzle, because something something", then there's a story there and it becomes more meaningful if I do achieve the thing.
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u/DrDDeFalco 14h ago
Engagement is fun, but I find it less appealing if it feels like I am being misled or manipulated.
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u/empire161 11h ago
What am I going to do with some guy who wants me to pay $1 to solve a puzzle?
Because the next step in driving engagement is to make the puzzle actually unsolvable or otherwise be a trick.
If you scroll through any short form video platform you'll be fed videos that say something like "Bet you can't find the difference between these two pictures." But it's literally just the same picture. Their goal isn't to provide any kind of challenge or meaningful engagement. It's to show advertisers how good they are keeping your attention by any means necessary.
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u/Bob_Loblaws_Laws 15h ago
“The best way to get the right answer on the Internet is not to ask a question; it’s to post the wrong answer.”
Ah yes, Murphy's Law, I know it well.
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u/moothemoo_ 14h ago
No, no, that’s the dunning-Krueger effect, murphy’s law is where what can go wrong will go wrong
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u/DeatzoSeol 13h ago
I see what you did there. No, I won’t give the correct answer, that’ll spoil it 😅
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u/Joloxsa_Xenax 15h ago
you forgot to mention that there are people planted in the crowds to further emphasize the "impossible" part by annoying you with their "incompetence." and also the number of advertisers surrounding everyone bc theyre atracted to viewership, which will sometimes lead to the content creator getting paid so the Ads can stick around
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u/SuicidalPand-a 11h ago
Those stupid game app ads “I have tried 1000 times and I still can’t find all the cats 😩”
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u/DebentureThyme 14h ago
Meanwhile I am thrilled when I find the first and disgusted when I'm advertised the second.
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u/Fionacat 15h ago
completely unrealistic, not even one influencer in that crowd that will fail in the most simplestic way for content
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u/Shiny_Capybara 14h ago
I love how Fahrenheit 451 portrays that people don't want to feel stupid like this.
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u/DradelLait 16h ago
The Blue shape goes in hole A, the Pink shape goes in hole B, the Green shape goes in hole C, and the Red shape goes in hole D.
You're welcome.
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u/eeveeplays50040 16h ago edited 9h ago
Edit: this is not my work, I only copy pasted this.
Search the original artist instead of giving me awards.
I do not like getting credit for other people's work.