💧 Bad Ads: Clickbait

If you’ve spent any time on this here web without an ad blocker, you’ve undoubtedly seen some lousy advertising. While reading a tech site which shall remain unnamed, I was recently stunned by the tremendously low quality of the following ad block:

Let’s take a look at each of the parts of this triptych of terrible.

The first block shows a photograph of actress Rebel Wilson on the left, and a caption proclaiming that she’s lost a tremendous amount of weight. While a quick search indicates Ms. Wilson may indeed have slimmed down some, the photo on the right is simply a disturbingly photoshopped version of Ms. Wilson. Classy!

The second block again shows two photos. On the left is actress Laura Dern in perhaps her most famous role, as khaki shorts-wearing, Triceratops poop-sifting Dr. Ellie Sattler from the movie “Jurassic Park”. On the right is what looks to be a mugshot of some sort. While it’s plausible that this could be Ms. Dern in some sad fall from grace, that’s not the reality. In fact, this is simply some other poor woman entirely. Since her part in the blockbuster hit of 1993, Ms. Dern’s career has continued with parts both big and small, and nary an arrest to be found.

Oddly, this third block is entirely truthful. The former Mr. Heidi Klum, “Kiss from a Rose” singer Seal, is not just a lupus sufferer.1 He’s also a tremendous marksman, and using his techniques can increase the quality of your shooting tremendously.

Footnotes:

While it’s very rare, sometimes it is in fact lupus.↩︎