The Dark-side of Optimization
The litany of post on LinkedIn is a remarkable testament to the growth of this social platform, and also prime example of how optimization has turned what could have been a wonderful opportunity for people to showcase their ability to think creatively by writing features about their business, informative articles on a mosaic niche market, but instead most post recycled generic clones created from optimized headlines. A google search returns hundreds of articles and post proclaiming they’re list of optimized headlines the most comprehensive on the internet and guaranteed to increase the conversion rate and consumer clicks soaring! It seems even in the age of optimization snake oil still exist. Snake oil, a term used to describe bogus cure all products traveling salesmen sold from town to town in the days before mass communication. Optimization is their modern currency, and business is booming to the chagrin of journalist, designers, and others interested in new ideas. The insidious impact of optimization has transformed news into infotainment, journalist into search engine optimization experts, blogging into cloning, and creativity into copy and pasting.
The Negative Impact
Optimization’s negative impact on news and journalism has nearly destroyed the concept of “breaking a story”. The rise of data and analytics has sparked many debates concerning their positive or negative impact. Popular opinion changes like a light switch, maybe even faster due to social media. Optimization is a dangerous word, especially when used outside the context of machinery, electronics, and software. The biggest misconception of optimization is the idea it automatically means quality. A misconception as evidenced by the automotive industry. Henry Ford revolutionized the manufacturing of automobiles by instituting mass lines of people passing parts from station to station until finally a car was fully assembled. The Rolls Royce Company uses both people and machines in a system the company has refined over the years to create a product of unmatched quality. Both companies consider their method the optimal way of assembling an automobile. If profit is used to determine which method is better, both companies do very well, so which is the optimal method? Data and Analytics could present numbers until the ozone is completely gone, but the simple answer is opinion. There has been nothing created to optimize human opinion, in reality all the data and analytics provide is a best guess. That is why the obsession with optimization must not dictate how things are done; instead we must understand that optimization is not one size fits all.
Optimization has infiltrated every aspect of our lives. The needs of the country and the people have always lost to optimization when it comes to increasing profit. That is how businesses operate, but this is not about the effect of optimization of business, it is about the effect on the dissemination of news and information. The vacuum created by the absence of a powerful tool which promotes progress and innovation, information. Science, engineering, and programming was the original realm of optimization. Then the term exploded, it became a buzz word used to add flair, to describe everything from gas to zit cream. The rise of the internet, more specific, the commerce aspect of the internet was proven to be feasible. Suddenly everything had to be optimized, word count, design space, ad placement, screen density, presentations, miles per gallon, pixels, and the list goes on and on. That gave birth to a new way of providing information, headlines before the story. Are any of these familiar, “How To Optimize Your Morning”, “Top 10 Ways To Optimize Your Thinking”, “Are You Optimized?” and of course “Make Money Optimizing”. Optimized articles created from optimized headlines creating homogeneous articles and post littering the blogosphere and online periodicals.
Optimizations Assault on Journalism
Are the days of content written to inform an audience of a compelling story a victim of optimization? No more stories about a new scientific theory causing debate among scientist or a woman from small Alaskan town claiming the door to hell is beneath her shed. It may be exaggeration but an integral tool of a thriving society is the dispersal of information. Information was at one time, facts or details shared by journalist dedicated to informing the populace of what was happening in their world and how it pertained to their situations. Optimization became the pimp, news and journalism the whores. Instead of informing it has become cheap gossip and profitable infotainment. Optimization was never about creating a perfect system to deliver content to enrich the populace. There was plenty of profit to be made and still is, but times have changed.
An essay published by the Columbia School of Journalism recognized the effect of technology on modern journalism and presented a sound platform for the industry. The essay, Post Industrial Journalism: Adapting to the Present ( https://goo.gl/c3eLPP), explains what optimization fails to quantify, “Journalism exposes corruption, draws attention to injustice, holds politicians and businesses accountable for their promises and duties. It informs citizens and consumers, helps organize public opinion, explains complex issues and clarifies essential disagreements. Journalism plays an irreplaceable role in both politics and market economies”
Modern journalist are expected to understand s.e.o.[ search engine optimization] and audience metrics, ideas management learned during an optimization presentation given when they moved from printed to digital. Optimization does not mean a journalist should have to cater because a collection of data shows readers like to read stories about cats. Cats may be fascinating to some readers but how can people know what they like or do not like if they are never given a chance to read or watch it. A journalist could uncover a story about new evidence proving dogs talk when people are not around. A story like that would kill a server. Then consumers would know to come back to that site because it publishes things no outlet is covering because they only use content optimized by search engine optimization and homogenous headlines. Profit would increase through every channel because the consumers returning to the sight with original content are more likely to trust a source actually providing them with original content. Original ideas, real news, content that actually delivers, whether it be entertainment or a corruption scandal, that is not possible if optimization is the only thing that matters. Consumers click thru at rapid paces because it’s the same content on every site, it does take a huge data study to determine that, it is what was once called, common sense.
Business Can Still Profit
Businesses are created to profit, and optimization does have its place in running a profitable business. There is no need for four people doing the same task if it does nothing to add value, optimization makes sense in this case, assign them to task which will increase value for the company. Optimization can also have a calamitous effect on business, for instance Blackberry held to the stringent belief that optimization will always prevail. Look around, count how many IPhone compared to the number of Blackberries. Steve Jobs understood that optimization did not mean the absence of creativity or originality, and his product changed the entire mobile industry.
Headlines filling the internet and across the blogosphere is similar to walking through a suburban housing development. The ubiquitous uniformity, all of the houses look nearly identical, built to optimize profit. There was plenty of profit before optimization became the principle upon which all decisions are based. The human condition has yet to be optimized, and the monotony of mediocrity of optimization has become a full blown epidemic. America is a country born from innovation. It embraced the spirit of not just pushing boundaries, but destroying old ideas previously considered the optimal processes of reaching a goal. The process of striving to create new ideas does not happen when optimization declares there are only 100 optimal headlines that achieve success. Optimization has stymied creativity, which does not optimize profits.
Humanity Isn't Optimized
LinkedIn post are all variations of the same content due to the adherence to the idea that the optimal formula has been discovered, and according to the data provided the cross referenced with analytics compiled by a small group before a computer program used all the data, analytics, and surveys to create a logical set of headlines. The digital age is so impressed with new technology it fails to account for the most obvious fact, humans are not logical. Our entire existence is a series of illogical choices strung together, we call that series life. Why do you think machines always want to destroy us? They do not have capabilities to make choices that may not lead to the best outcome. For instance, a person standing at the top of a water fall is suddenly overwhelmed by the urge to jump, filled with a sense of excitement, leaps off the ledge for the water below to capture that feeling, to log that sensation into their memory so they can carry it with them forever. A program would determine that is not the optimal course of action.
Optimization is another way to insert conformity into a system. Conformity is the antithesis of expression. The right to express ideas in a new way that defies what is considered optimal because optimization is always based on what is known to work, optimization is determined by gathering figures, facts, and statistics collected to substantiate what is known. Change is never optimal, and the human condition is in constant flux, hot fudge was the optimal sundae topping until someone dared to experiment with caramel. Soon Fudge was no longer the optimal topping. What is optimal today may not be optimal tomorrow. The reliance on processes designed to create machines and improve software hinders the growth of humanity. The most optimal outcome for any business is to remember optimization when it comes to people is best summed up by the famous line, “Beauty is in the eye of the beholder”. The same goes for content.
Article By Jonas