I've noticed some conventions of Yahoo news items such as this one. On the page with the headline, and the rider (I think it's called; I really should know this) giving the story in brief, there's usually a funny little question, which is supposed to be put into the mind of the reader, obviously, in a listen-with-Mother sort of way, saying something like, "What happened next?" or "Whose fluid was it?" or that sort of thing. And, of course, finding this question irresistably enticing, you click on the link to read the whole story.
Another convention is that, under the rider (or whatever it's called) there will be links to commercial services or products that someone considers the news item might make people wish to consider.
So, okay, in the case of our current story, about a voyeuristic, cross-dressing burglar, who wore a balaclava made from underwear, what do you think the product-placementy links were? Go on, guess.
The first was for home security specialists and the second was linked to with the words "Pay less for women's lingerie online".
I must say, that's very thoughtful. I suppose they were thinking, if only Gary Marie had known about this, he might never have had to embark upon a life of crime.
See, this is probably another example of me not getting the joke. It’s probably meant to be funny, either publicly or slyly. Isn’t it? At the very least, there must have been some bored gimp like me whose job it was to come up with these products and services links who read the story and sighed, and thought, “Oh well, lingerie will do”, too world-weary even to laugh internally at the knowing humour of their choice.
I was surprised the headline wasn’t something like “Knicker-nicker nicked!” I could have been a sensationalist tabloid journo.
That’s a great headline. I think my favourite ever headline concerned a wildlife sanctuary which had to make special arrangements for some of its birds of prey, who would only mate under certain conditions, for instance, with the lights off. The headline was, “Four kestrels manoeuvre in the dark”.
oooo… I was asked a question in my examinations about this, how to make the links relate more with the article [which I hope I answered correctly 😮 ]. The links provided are chosen using keywords in the article or page content (so they saw ‘underwear’ and found a sponsor with that word). Computers are silly that way…
The links provided are chosen using keywords in the article or page content (so they saw ‘underwear’ and found a sponsor with that word). Computers are silly that way…So that’s how it works. Okay, so it maybe wasn’t a deliberate joke, after all, though presumably there’s some human decision-making in the process.