'Restores Faith in Humanity' restores need for migraine meds
Please note: This article is published as an archive copy from Philadelphia City Paper. My City Paper is not affiliated with Philadelphia City Paper. Philadelphia City Paper was an alternative weekly newspaper in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The last edition was published on October 8, 2015.
This is just like that one time you and your best friend almost escaped from the zombies.
philly.com
God dammit, this is just like that time — you know, when you and your best friend finally managed to escape from the zombies and you're smiling at each other in relief, breathing hard? And then you notice that she's looking a little pale and feverish? And then you both notice the bite mark on her arm?
That's what it feels like to see "Restores faith in humanity" in a Daily News headline.
I used to work at the Daily News as a copy editor, where it was usually me, one other person in her 20s and a whole bunch of dudes who had been working there for 30+ years. Little-known fact: At dailies, the copy desk is often in charge of writing headlines and captions, and guys who've been doing this for decades are pun geniuses.
One time, a bunch of us went to a copy editing conference, because we are really cool people. After a while, I ran into one of my coworkers coming out of a seminar on how to write web headlines so search engines would pick them up. He looked really gloomy, so I asked why the long face.
"I don't know... if I can't make puns anymore, I just don't know if I want to be in this business."
I haven't had a chance to chat with any of my former coworkers about the juggernaut of Buzzfeed/Upworthy-style headlines sweeping across the Internet — you know, "X will restore your faith in humanity," "12 amazing things you didn't realize about Y," "If this video makes you uncomfortable, then you make me uncomfortable."
They're all so pandering it drives me crazy, and while they're apparently good for sharing on facebook, they're not useful for stories that ask a reader to think rather than have an emotional reaction. And it's hard for anything non-fluffy to compete for the limited attention span of the Internet. If it's driving me crazy (and it is), I can't imagine how my old-school copy-desk bros are doing.
That's why it made me extra sad to see "Found Wallet Restores Faith in Humanity" on a Daily News column. I'm sure that's being done by Philly.com people. But, still. Sad.
