The art of writing news headlines is changing due to SEO (search engine optimisation) techniques. There will be less ‘Gotcha‘-style headlines and more literal lines like ‘British Navy sink Argentine warship’ that search engines can understand. This exposes a deep difference between print and television’s strong visual/design element and the string reliance on text on the web. The visual element of news would be a shame to lose on the web after it’s long history offline. It will be interesting to see the future of search in terms of video and photography, and a better understanding of meta-data so it can rely less on the blunt instrument of headlines and pure content text.
3 February, 2007