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Investigating how the New York Times A/B tests their headlines

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Re: Investigating how the New York Times A/B tests their headlines

#11

Post by tooltower »

refurb wrote: post #7
JasonFruit wrote: post #6

Should a news source be optimizing for engagement, or for accuracy in communicating facts? I understand it's a business, but it's analogous to a bakery that labels all its goods as its best-selling items, only to confuse and disappoint the buyer when they open the box and find something different inside. It may sell that product that time, but it goes against the purpose of the organization as a whole, and doesn't se…

This is my takeaway. There is a huge incentive for the media to make things more sensational or dramatic because it drives clicks and views. I might also argue that online news drives this more so than print - with print you tend to buy the paper based on the totality of their reporting and reputation versus a zero-cost click of a headline on your screen.

Would you be more trusting of NYT (or other news sites) if they pledged not to look at engagement stats?

Re: Investigating how the New York Times A/B tests their headlines

#12

Post by JasonFruit »

moscovium wrote: post #10
JasonFruit wrote: post #6

Should a news source be optimizing for engagement, or for accuracy in communicating facts? I understand it's a business, but it's analogous to a bakery that labels all its goods as its best-selling items, only to confuse and disappoint the buyer when they open the box and find something different inside. It may sell that product that time, but it goes against the purpose of the organization as a whole, and doesn't se…

Is it not the goal of a headline to engage?

Yes, but not at the cost of accuracy.

Re: Investigating how the New York Times A/B tests their headlines

#13

Post by site-packages1 »

JasonFruit wrote: post #12
moscovium wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it not the goal of a headline to engage?

Yes, but not at the cost of accuracy.

But multiple headlines can both be accurate with one being more engaging. These aren't mutually exclusive.

Article about a bank robbery:

"First National Bank Robbed"

"Gunmen Rob First National Bank in Daring Robbery"

Re: Investigating how the New York Times A/B tests their headlines

#14

Post by afavour »

JasonFruit wrote: post #6

Should a news source be optimizing for engagement, or for accuracy in communicating facts? I understand it's a business, but it's analogous to a bakery that labels all its goods as its best-selling items, only to confuse and disappoint the buyer when they open the box and find something different inside. It may sell that product that time, but it goes against the purpose of the organization as a whole, and doesn't se…

Is there actually an either/or here? Surely it’s possible to write two (or more) headlines for a story that are all equally accurate?

Re: Investigating how the New York Times A/B tests their headlines

#15

Post by rossdavidh »

afavour wrote: post #14
JasonFruit wrote: post #6

Should a news source be optimizing for engagement, or for accuracy in communicating facts? I understand it's a business, but it's analogous to a bakery that labels all its goods as its best-selling items, only to confuse and disappoint the buyer when they open the box and find something different inside. It may sell that product that time, but it goes against the purpose of the organization as a whole, and doesn't se…

Is there actually an either/or here? Surely it’s possible to write two (or more) headlines for a story that are all equally accurate?

But, from the OP article, that doesn't particularly seem to describe at least some of these cases.

Re: Investigating how the New York Times A/B tests their headlines

#16

Post by JasonFruit »

afavour wrote: post #14
JasonFruit wrote: post #6

Should a news source be optimizing for engagement, or for accuracy in communicating facts? I understand it's a business, but it's analogous to a bakery that labels all its goods as its best-selling items, only to confuse and disappoint the buyer when they open the box and find something different inside. It may sell that product that time, but it goes against the purpose of the organization as a whole, and doesn't se…

Is there actually an either/or here? Surely it’s possible to write two (or more) headlines for a story that are all equally accurate?

Yes, but did you read the examples in the article? Many of the high-engagement headlines ignored most of the content in favor of a tangential but titillating detail. That's National Enquirer stuff, not what the New York Times has prided itself on being.

Re: Investigating how the New York Times A/B tests their headlines

#17

Post by iujjkfjdkkdkf »

trident5000 wrote: post #5

"And yet it rarely attracts the kind of close scrutiny of, say, a Fox News. And that’s totally reasonable! Fox News is an absurd clown show and deserves every criticism it gets" I find it comical that any write-up critical of a left wing organization needs to include something like this to avoid being flagged, down-voted, whatever, on the platform its being posted on.

I don't usually read any US news as a rule, because of how sensational it all is. But I think I see most NYT headlines because someone inevitably posts them to NH. And honestly, when I compare them to what I saw on Fox News (which admittedly I only looked at for about a week around the election), I see no difference in the level of partisanship or spin. If anything there is less on Fox News just because the headline writers are not trying to show their undiscovered writing talent in the same way as NYT.

Re: Investigating how the New York Times A/B tests their headlines

#18

Post by freebuju »

Correct me if am wrong but doesn't this mean they are eventually going to move entirely to a click-bait model of acquiring readers.

If this level of desperation is actually seen as acceptable for a media house, then journalism or whatever is left of it, is in dire need of help.

Re: Investigating how the New York Times A/B tests their headlines

#19

Post by zappo2938 »

afavour wrote: post #14
JasonFruit wrote: post #6

Should a news source be optimizing for engagement, or for accuracy in communicating facts? I understand it's a business, but it's analogous to a bakery that labels all its goods as its best-selling items, only to confuse and disappoint the buyer when they open the box and find something different inside. It may sell that product that time, but it goes against the purpose of the organization as a whole, and doesn't se…

Is there actually an either/or here? Surely it’s possible to write two (or more) headlines for a story that are all equally accurate?

Are you saying there isn't just two sides to every story?

Re: Investigating how the New York Times A/B tests their headlines

#20

Post by nkozyra »

JasonFruit wrote: post #6

Should a news source be optimizing for engagement, or for accuracy in communicating facts? I understand it's a business, but it's analogous to a bakery that labels all its goods as its best-selling items, only to confuse and disappoint the buyer when they open the box and find something different inside. It may sell that product that time, but it goes against the purpose of the organization as a whole, and doesn't se…

Headlines have become advertisements. They're almost never written by the journalists who wrote the story, they're written for space constraints that change on a whim ...

They're very rarely "accurate" the way stories are intended to be for these reasons.

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