I made a ham radio clickbait title generator. First you'll be shocked, then you'll be inspired.
There's recently been a lot of local discussion about the way in which radio clubs use (or don't use) the Internet. You can read Charlie, M0PZT's blog post on the subject. This led me to joke whether clubs could indeed become "too up-to-date" and embrace the new trend plaguing social media: The Clickbait link title.
@M0PZT @EssexHam not too current pls, radio clubs; they'll embrace Buzzfeed style titles: "He calls CQ on 70cm, what happens next will ama…
— Nick (@mcoms) March 27, 2015
Regular users of social media over the last year will have seen links like these crop up nearly everywhere. Designed simply to spread and get you to click by any means necessary, the titles are deliberately provocative regardless of their fit to the actual page content. The sad fact is, they actually work. The ploy being to generate that bit more advertising revenue for the site owner.
Could marketing-savvy Amateur Radio clubs take advantage of this new trend? Could a machine even generate headlines automatically?
You bet it could.
New project: The #hamradio clickbait title generator. http://t.co/KEj4CORgxr pic.twitter.com/THTDTGMOqp
— Nick (@mcoms) March 27, 2015
And what silly nonsense it comes up with.
The source code for the title generator is available on Github and welcomes updates from the programmers amongst you. You can even use it on your own site, if you dare!