Link Bait Hall of Fame

Recession Watch: McDonald’s Cracks Down on Sauce Scofflaws

You know the economy is bad when… …when McDonald’s gets stingy with their sauces. What makes this work as link bait is not just that it portrays a shocking reality (shock value) or that it’s about McDonald’s (pop culture) but that it’s a sign of the times. Signs of the times are great. Why? Because they reach us. [...]

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Revenge Porn

I found this in the blog for the online home of GQ (Gentleman’s Quarterly) and Details Magazines, and the sister site of the official online home of Vogue, Which tells me that what I’m reading has been sponsored by some of the world’s premier fashionistas. And what’s the article about? Pornography, for one. Revenge for [...]

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[untitled ESPN photo]

If a picture is worth a thousand words, then I’ve already wasted too many words on this one. (Go check it out – I only printed a cropped teaser version here). As an example of the true impact a killer photo can have on your website, it speaks for itself (so much so, I suppose, that [...]

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Worst Tattoos — No Regrets: The Best, Worst and Most Ridiculous Tattoos Ever

This piece shows a great way to create a rich and compelling photo gallery without even having to take your own photos. Do a book review of a picturesque release that would interest your audience (don’t forget to link to its sales page) and the chances are excellent that the author and publisher won’t have [...]

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Room With a Screw

This is fun – it’s a true-life narrative of an online correspondence of absurd proportions, the author having given an online scammer a taste of her own medicine. Now, it does run on a little long, a danger for any web page in this age of short-attention-span theater, but it is saved from obscurity by [...]

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Diesel SFW XXX

Sex sells; we all know it. But it’s hard to find new and novel ways to capitalize on sex without crossing dangerous (and costly) legal boundaries that could force you out of the terrain of the all-ages internet and into the Adults Only domain. Fashion has always been our leader in this area, and it [...]

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Russian skydiver swigs spirits while floating

Why does this kind of story interest us so? Is it because it juxtaposes daredevilling and alcohol, two great taste that typically don’t taste so great together (but do lead to a variety of crudely entertaining moments for all us shameless voyeurs – which is, really, all of us)? It’s not quite humorous (though anything [...]

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Where Do Satellites Go When We Die

The first thing I though when I read this piece and saw these pictures of how absurdly many satellites are now orbitting the earth was Wow, look at all the link bait categories this story falls into. It’s got elements of News, Tech, Controversy/Debate, Shock Value, Images (though as eye candy it leaves a bitter [...]

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Garbage Pail Kids

Do you remember the Garbage Pail Kids and GPK cards? They were a “dirty” spoof on the bubblegum cute Cabbage Patch Kids that were the craze of the ‘80’s. Kids attracted to those quirky collector’s items are now even quirkier adults surfing the net for weird and entertaining eye candy. Like this, a collection of [...]

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West Virginia Man Jose Cruz Charged With “Farting On An Officer

Scat humor never grows old. That’s because, as old and “mature” as we get, we never outgrow those twisted and disgusting little fetishes of our innocent younger selves. Another case of condemn-it-on-the-outside/condone-it-on-the-inside. Just look at this news story – yes, it’s actual news – about a West Virginia man arresting for farting on a cop [...]

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