The worst parts of the o͟l͟d͟ ͟i͟n͟t͟e͟r͟n͟e͟t͟⌕ have come back to haunt us

[Diff]

Idk if you guys remember this, but like forever ago sites would just shove a script onto their site that'd hook into random keywords in their articles and link them to some kind of sponsored search that they'd get money for. You still see similar things in news sites today, although not quite so egregious and not automatic.

Now it seems like we're doing the same thing, except without anyone making money off of it. It's apparently just trendy now to capture random words, not even your own words, but words from your users, and turn them into search terms⌕ for your own site. I guess it's effectively just auto hashtags but something feels off about it, looking like a link but not being intended by the human you're actually talking to, and the key phrases picked are⌕ so hit-or-miss, and it's popping up more and more across Reddit, YouTube, TikTok, more and more places.

Anyway, that's all my yelling at clouds out of my system for the night.