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10.2 Reasons Why You Should Visit The Onion’s Clickbait Parody Site, ClickHole

Years ago, one of the first things I wrote here at Nerdist was a feature piece entitled, “Has SEO Ruined Comedy?” I didn’t really draw any definitive answers to that question, but it would seem that The Onion and The A.V. Club have answered the question with a resounding “Maybe?” Clickbait sites often overly format everything on their site with search engine optimization, making it difficult for the average person to not click on any number of links, no matter how little intrinsic value the article may have. Listicles, quizzes, buzzwords, and more fill out the visual real estate on computer and mobile device screens alike, and also manipulate our subconscious behavior.

With this in mind, The Onion and A.V. Club created a parody of clickbait sites you may have seen populating your feed recently, appropriately named Clickhole.

Much like The Onion is spot on with parody of news, Clickhole hits the mark dead on in making fun of the viral nature of the Interwebs. Headlines such as “Stanley Tucci’s Racist Tirade: Our Take If It Ever Happened,” “I Lost 150 Pounds and No F*cking Way Am I Telling You My Secret,” and more populate the homepage for a pretty damn good laugh the whole way through. Even the most seemingly unassuming quiz “Which Mad Men Character Are You?” is designed to be simultaneously the best and most frustrating online quiz by not allowing you to “game the system” like most people do with these sorts of quizzes. As a result, it actually ends up being the best online quiz.

Basically, Clickhole is such a good parody of a clickbait type site, that it is, in its own way, a great clickbait site.

Oh yeah, here are the 10.2 reasons to visit Clickhole, if the above two paragraphs weren’t convincing enough.

1. You don’t waste enough time online.
2. You’ve been productive enough today.
3. You haven’t been productive enough today.
4. This season of Game of Thrones is over.
5. Really, this season of Game of Thrones is over.
6. You now have something to forward your parents/grandparents that constantly forward you life affirming e-mail chains.
7. It’s funny.
8. It’s (insert day here), you deserve it.
9. You need something to balance out the presence of cats in your search history.
10. Did I mention it’s hilarious?
10.2. You clicked on this and read down this far? That’s the whole point. Have fun on Clickhole already.

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