Facebook to try and reduce clickbait on their site (again!)

Facebook have announced that they are making another subtle algorithm change geared towards removing the amount of clickbait headlines that spread across their website.

We’re all probably familiar with the headlines.

“You wouldn’t believe this guy’s hilarious reaction to this goat”

“What this girl found under her pillow will SCAR you forever.”

“What this man did to his cheating girlfriend is the BEST THING EVER!!”

They’re the hallmark of “viral content” websites like Distractify and Upworthy, and ever since bootstrapped website ViralNova gained millions of followers in only a handful of months using the same business model, duplicate websites have been springing up everywhere, including Roasted, Diply and Bored Panda. Some more popular than others.

But of course they’re annoying. And misleading. Especially when you find out that that man’s “priceless reaction to a spider” was nothing more than relatively mild shock. In fact if we renamed the title of this article to “Facebook announce SHOCKING news that will rock you to your core”, you’ll probably be more than a little disappointed to find an article on an algorithm change against clickbait awaiting you.

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So Facebook announced via their online newsroom that another algorithm is on its way that will try and identify common words and phrases that clickbait publishers commonly use in those headlines, and attempt to reduce their visibility across the site. Facebook are claiming that headlines that withhold vital information or exaggerate claims will be censored across the site. From their blog post –

We are focusing more effort on this, and are updating News Feed by using a system that identifies phrases that are commonly used in clickbait headlines. First, we categorized tens of thousands of headlines as clickbait by considering two key points: (1) if the headlinewithholds information required to understand what the content of the article is; and (2) if the headline exaggerates the article to create misleading expectations for the reader.

This algorithm tweak will work alongside Facebook’s previous attempt at trying to reduce clickbait articles that analysed how long someone spent on a website before returning to their Facebook newsfeed, in an attempt to identify whether a particular article was actually being read or whether visitors were navigating away from the site straight away.

Will this latest tweak work? We can only wait and see. What do you think, and have you noticed a reduction of clickbait headlines spreading across Facebook over the last few weeks or months? Let us know.