It seems like once a week Buzzfeed posts content that “breaks the internet.” Kim Kardashian’s butt. The great blue black/white gold dress debate. The kid who said “apparently” a bunch.
They use the word “break” to mean that a particular post can become so popular, so viral, so unavoidable that it forms an internet black hole, sucking in the attention of anyone who enters its gravitational field. In their parlance, the internet is then “broken” because it’s dominated by a single idea, rendering it incapable of performing its essential function—making an inconceivably large amount of information, data, and perspectives instantly accessible by the masses.
I’m not interested in the semantic debate about whether or not the internet actually “breaks” at this point (it’d be more appropriate to say they stole or hijacked the internet for a period of time).
But in some sense Buzzfeed is right. They broke the internet.
I’m not using the word “broke” in the “look at all the attention this one thing is getting” way that they use it. I’m using “break” in its traditional meaning. To destroy. To reduce to pieces. To put an end to.
The internet got dumb, and Buzzfeed is to blame.
- 9 Ways to Tell if Your Cat is Planning to Kill You.
- This Giant Baby is Not What You’re Thinking, But it Will Blow Your Mind.
- You Won’t BELIEVE What Happened When This Traveling Circus Got Pulled Over!
Clickbait like this is everywhere. Even weather.com is in on the game—WATCH: This Raccoon Thinks He's a Person. I just want to know if I should bring my umbrella to work.
The articles rarely pay out on their promises. They steal limited attention from things that are actually important. They create an expectation that the internet is just a place to click on listicles, to be shocked and awed, to get a quick laugh. But not a place for deep thought or considered debate. Jon Stewart explained it this way: “I scroll around, but when I look at the Internet, [and] I feel the same as when I’m walking through Coney Island. It’s like carnival barkers, and they all sit out there and go, 'Come on in here and see a three-legged man!' So you walk in and it’s a guy with a crutch.”
To be fair, Buzzfeed’s editor in chief Ben Smith claims that Buzzfeed stopped publishing clickbait in 2009 (and the Atlantic called bullshit). But I think we can all agree that they created and popularized the form.
I’m not trying to be a buzzkill (see what I did there?). I love me some cat pictures and puppies cuddling with babies.
But let’s not forget that we have an amazing tool at our disposal. We could spare a few minutes each day to think about how we can use that tool to make the world a better place.