I know the site clarifies it, but the headline messaging on this is meaninglessly confusing.
"Wait until 8th!"
"Oh, you mean their 8th birthday?"
"No, 8th grade!"
"Oh, so wait until they're in 8th grade, got it!"
"No no, until the end of the 8th grade, when they graduate middle school!"
"Oh, so it's really wait until 9th"
Just seems like this would be the beginning of every conversation and lead to a non-unified approach. They should emphasize it being like an intro to high-school gift or something.
till I read it, i thought it meant the 8th of November,† and I was thinking "does this have something to do with the election?" I was a little afraid to click "take the pledge" for fear of what I might be supporting
† obscure trivial point of US law for fer'ners, US elections are held on "the first Tuesday after the first Monday of November" which puts them anywhere from Nov 2 to Nov 8, so that's why "wait till the 8th" is an election trigger. (I don't keep track of the date of the election this year, I just need to know it's going to be on Tuesday)
yes, or to put it another way, it's the first Tuesday of the month unless the first Tuesday is November 1st, then it's the second Tuesday, November 8th
pointing it out because it's always the first Tuesday unless that 1 out of 7 where you have to wait a week -1 for the first Monday.
I think the reasoning is something like "we need to have a full business day in November before we have an election, that will give us a chance to fix problems or something"... not sure if under the old county/shire system months made a difference or something.
Agreed 100%. Additional factors on top of all those is some countries start year 1 at age five, and others at age 6, and of course there's a variety of actual ages within a grade as well.
"Wait Until 9th" would have definitely helped a lot. "Wait until 14" might be even clearer. Or even "wait until high school".
I mean as a non American, I think this is one of the most American sites I've seen all week, and do not get the impression that they will particularly mind if it's ambiguous for other people in other countries
Clickbait is always to sell you something, this is the opposite. But I think the ambiguity helps, it’s not a specific cutoff date that is important but delaying the inevitable. Smartphone use at that age could bad, I’m thinking scammers paradise type of bad but with a different context. Middleschoolers aren’t scams targets but are perfect for being primed with nefarious things, think crypto and nfts, porn, gambling, addictive gaming and bad culture. I turned a blind eye on memes for a long time just because people do and like silly things but I’ve seen some disturbing memes out there. My kid is definitely not getting a smartphone till he understands some things.
People put something on the internet and they want attention and engagement. Then people use click bait to get people to look at something because they are curious or confused instead of knowing what it is from the title.
They sell you attention to something you didn’t expect. Click and bait says it all. In this case it’s something benefic, not selling you a device or service to help you in advertised ways. It’s just campaign to get kids away form smartphone and social media harm. I would not classify this as clickbait or self promotion. When you have kids you’ll think this more deeply and escape the knee jerk reaction that I don’t condemn at all. The web is mostly clickbait for self promotion.
not selling you a device or service to help you in advertised ways
Again, click bait means getting you to click on something in ways other than telling you what the article is about. Anything published on the internet wants readers. I don't know where you got the idea that 'clickbait' only applies to direct advertisements, but you should move past that.
If keeping kids away from harm doesn’t mean anything to you then I can’t help you. But you probably don’t have kids or know anyone with kids nor you care.
This thread was about the title being click bait because it's vague and confusing. You took a hard left into "you don't care about the kids" territory and it has absolute nothing to do with what is being talked about here.
This is not clickbait, it’s like a movement with a catchy name so it sticks. You seem to be stuck with clickbait but at the same time you don’t understand what clickbait is.
it’s like a movement with a catchy name so it sticks
No, it's a title with no information, because we're talking about the title.
You seem to be stuck with clickbait but at the same time you don’t understand what clickbait is.
No, you seem to not understand what clickbait is because you think it has to do with selling something directly, which is bizarre and not backed up by anything other than you claiming it.
An intentionally sensationalized, vague or misleading headline
Explain to me how "Wait Until 8th" isn't intentionally vague. If you knew nothing else, what would the title tell you? Nothing. That's vague. There could be more information in the title but there isn't. That's intentional.
"Wait until 8th!"
"Oh, you mean their 8th birthday?"
"No, 8th grade!"
"Oh, so wait until they're in 8th grade, got it!"
"No no, until the end of the 8th grade, when they graduate middle school!"
"Oh, so it's really wait until 9th"
Just seems like this would be the beginning of every conversation and lead to a non-unified approach. They should emphasize it being like an intro to high-school gift or something.