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Comment by constantly | Hacker News Reader

Sorry if off topic but what the absolute heck is up with these ridiculous YouTube splash screens? Here it’s some guy seemingly bewildered by a superimposed IDE. It’s so weird and jarring to the extent that I typically avoid clicking on YouTube videos with splash pages like that.

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They are made that way on purpose because it has been proven that those "reaction face" thumbnails generate the most clicks. Unfortunately humans are like that. For the final form, check out the "Mr. Beast" channel's video thumbnails

He or someone else said they found a similar or better result with smiling instead of shock face open mouth so there are variations being pioneered. Think it was mrbeast talking about a new analytics a/b tool or might be confusing it with something else

Or Asmongold. That face just…

I’m so offended by the attempted manipulation that I outright block accounts that do it.

The hilarious part is when they inevitably end up addressing it as “welp, we ‘hate’ clickbait thumbnails too but it gets clicks from dummy viewers like you all so we just gotta go with it because we got mouths to feed!”, as they post yet another video of them spending an absurd amount of money on some obscure eBay or Craigslist trash for content

From "Clickbait is bad, and I don't do it." to "I am working to efficiently clickbait people." Reminds me of:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S2xHZPH5Sng

I never click on a thumbnail when an idiot’s face is making an expression like that. Easy pass.

That is THE YouTube splash screen - I assume it’s the one that gets the clicks since almost everyone who produces YouTube content uses it

Doesn’t matter. SEO aesthetic we live with

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