The Onion Launched Its Buzzfeed/Upworthy Parody Site. You Won’t Believe What Happens Next.
ClickHole has arrived.
When the Onion announced its intention to launch a Buzzfeed parody during a conference at the end of May, it was one of of those ideas so good it was hard to believe it hadn’t already happened. “People will climb into this click hole and find content so interesting they won’t be able to keep it to themselves,” said Onion News Network host Jim Haggerty, played by Brad Holbrook. “Every post is engineered to be as shareable as possible, so it spreads like a deadly wildfire on social media.”
The presentation that followed was full of barbs poking fun at viral content, digital marketers, and advertising — so much so that the tech reporters present took a while to be sure the whole thing wasn’t a joke.)
But overnight, ClickHole launched in its full, resplendent glory — and it is just as good as it sounded.
“We don’t think anything on the internet should ever have to settle for mere tens of thousands of pageviews,” reads the website’s manifesto, published last night. “We believe that each and every article—whether about pop culture, politics, internet trends, or social justice—should be clicked on and shared by hundreds of millions of internet users before they can even comprehend what they just read.
“ClickHole has one and only one core belief: All web content deserves to go viral.”
A few select headlines so far include ‘10 Hilarious Chairs That Think They’re People‘, ‘You Won’t Believe How Cheap This Stock Video Of A Woman Sitting On A Swing Was‘, ‘This Elderly Couple Died Two Days Apart, So Why Aren’t Police Investigating It?‘, and a Buzzfeed-style quiz: ‘If I Ordered Fries Would You Have Any?‘ The articles they link to? Pretty worth it, in an Onion-style way. (This one is particularly excellent.)
And in case you needed a prompt, here’s their handy guide to clicking:
