Page 19 - Foodservice Magazine October 2018

HUCK’S RANT
19
Clickbait and listicles are the fast food of modern media. The first few moments of
pleasurably, guilty sweetness soon turns into regret as we realise we’re clogging our arteries with fried, hot and numbing dross that we could do without ever knowing. And yet we feel compelled to absorb them into our bloodstreams.
The first few moments of pleasurably, guilty sweetness soon turns into regret as we realise we’re clogging our arteries with fried, hot and numbing dross that we could do without ever knowing. And yet we feel compelled to absorb them into our bloodstreams.
clicked online food sites, even has a section called ‘listicles’. Someone should pen 10 reasons why reading listicles are worse than a lobotomy. Anyway. We’ve all done it. And media outlets know you will continue to do it.
One minute you’re reading
an in-depth piece about the dwindling sealife suffocating on plastic pollution, the next you’ve bitten the fat, juicy worm of mildly amusing yet mostly dissatisfying tripe listed one through ten and soon enough you’re hooked re- watching a ‘cats being assholes’ compilation or clicking through
a ‘look at them now’ photo list of actors you’ve never heard of.
It makes you want to throw rotten eggs at humanity, or perhaps write a list of the top ten ways we could be better humans.
Anyway, I can’t talk – I’ve just been commissioned to pen ‘10 Signs You Would Choose Food Over Anything Else In Life’ and god damn it, I intend on giving every inch, inch by inch, of my funniest of bones.
In the quest to gain traction, online’s immediacy and availability has made some media a bit like a wonky-wheeled
shopping trolley full of groceries that’s determined to make it to the checkout. It’s all about being first, most clicked, or most liked over the facts, or indeed the art of writing – two much valued things to yours truly.
It’s like diet journalism with a side of loaded fries but, to
be fair foodservice is a bit like that too. There are far more
sad foodservice outlets than cracking ones, that’s for sure. I’ve waisted far too many nights in restaurants consuming fear, emptiness and despair.
The desire to consume
all things faster and easier is creating a chasm between the establishments that deliver on their promise by providing a high perception of value and the rest – a little like media.
But, that ain’t the whole story.
The truth is online has simply taken advantage of our dwindling short attention span. Your choice to be absorbed by it, it is just that; your choice. The truth is great journalism and wonderful food is out there – you’ve just got to want to consume it and, of course, avoid the baited banality clouding your decision making.
DON’T RISE TO THE BAIT
FED UP WITH THE CONSTANT STREAM OF FOOD-RELATED CLICKBAIT AND RESTAURANT LISTICLES ONLINE, ANTHONY HUCKSTEP QUESTIONS WHY WE REMAIN SO HOOKED.
Anthony Huckstep is the national restaurant critic for delicious. and a food writer for The Australian, GQ Australia and QANTAS.
Ten popular foods even your dog would reject (nah, Ziggy would eat that). Is this the
best Japanese in Sydney? (no, not even close and the article never even mentions it). Turns out you’ve been cutting onions wrong all this time! (Turns out
I haven’t but I clicked the link anyway, damn it). Five chefs caught drinking in the kitchen (what, only five?) or 50 things they never told you about being a chef (let’s not pretend we know what chefs go through ok?).
Eater, one of the world’s most