Linked – Pocket’s Next Frontier: Solving The Internet’s Clickbait Problem

“Gathering good reading material from around the internet is hard. You can’t trust your friends on Facebook. Twitter is too noisy. And even if you’re a master of RSS, you probably spend too much time sorting through filler.

This is where Pocket hopes it can make a difference. For the last nine years, the company—originally called Read It Later—has essentially run a glorified bookmark service, letting people save articles into a slick reading view on mobile devices and the web. To date, Pocket’s 25 million registered users have stashed more than 3 billion links for later perusal.

Now, Pocket is turning all those saved stories into recommendations, helping people find reading material regardless of whether they do any bookmarking themselves. The idea is that any article worth saving is inherently more substantial than your average Facebook or Twitter link. Pocket wants to make itself a destination for those stories that dig deeper than the day’s headlines.”

It’s an interesting idea, but I’m a little skeptical of the results. Sure, since Pocket put out recommendations, I’ve dipped in and taken a look. I usually find some interesting things, and I don’t find a lot of junky click-bait articles. Unfortunately, I also haven’t unearthed anything that wasn’t already making the rounds of social media too.

I’m hoping eventually it can provide some stuff that isn’t as obvious, but it’s not a bad start.

Have you taken a look at Pocket’s recommendations?

https://www.fastcompany.com/3064955/pockets-next-frontier-solving-the-internets-clickbait-problem

Follow these topics: Links, SocialNetworking