Do you have weather forecast clickbait websites?

13 comments

1. We have two poorly- regarded newspapers, the Daily Mail and the Express, which both do this. In print and on their website, there will always be a “SCORCHING HEATWAVE” coming in the summer (reality is a couple of days above 28⁰c for London and surrounds, everywhere else 24-26⁰c ish). They’ll find a Spanish place which is a little cooler than average for one day and then say “Brits to bake as temperatures to be higher than Barcelona!!”

   In winter it’ll be “TEMPERATURES PLUMMET TO ARCTIC LOWS” or “3-DAY BLIZZARD TO BATTER EAST COAST” which turns out to be a bit of sleet, disappointing thousands of kids. If it does snow it will be at a different time they didn’t mention it.

2. Not that I know of, our weather forecasts usually rely on Met Office data I think and they tend to be quite sober and objective about these sorts of things.

   If you want sensationalist stuff like that, the tabloids are probably the better option. [The Express](https://www.indy100.com/viral/daily-express-same-weather-story-wrong-7332186) in particular is known for consistently predicting “the coldest winter in a century” several months in advance, with several weeks of consistently heavy snowfall. Most of their predictions, it should be said, don’t come to pass.

3. Swedish newspaper Aftonbladet is infamous for their sensationalist weather headlines.

   * [“Extreme weather hit: ✔️Lightning chaos ✔️ Pouring rain ✔️Golf hail ✔️Electrical failures”](https://www.ttela.se/image/policy:1.4095437:1483524696/extremvader.jpg?f=Regular&w=1440&$p$f$w=26fe350)
   * [“Complete chaos – everywhere”](https://www.gp.se/image/policy:1.4095445:1483524696/fulltkaos.jpg?f=Regular&w=1440&$p$f$w=0ee00ee)
   * [“The Putin cold is entering”](https://www.gp.se/image/policy:1.4095448:1483524697/putinkylan.jpg?f=Regular&w=1440&$p$f$w=0c1d33d)

   Someone even published [a book](https://www.amazon.com/Galna-v%C3%A4derrubriker-nyskapande-exempel-kv%C3%A4llstidningarna-ebook/dp/B08N47VCP1) containing 155 bizarre weather headlines.

4. Pretty commonplace to have clickbait weather headlines on the home page of popular news websites.

   Not sure about a Czech site dedicated specifically to weather clickbait though

5. Weather sites don’t do that, at least I can’t remember any off the top of my head, but the tabloids unsurprisingly do.

   Headlines like “Käristyskupoli II: Inferno palaa” (Sauté/fry dome II: The inferno returns (they predicted 25-29 degrees for a few days…)) or “Valkoinen kurittaja iskee illalla: Suomessa sataa lunta lähes kaksi vuorokautta yhtä soittoa” (The White Havocwreaker hits at night: It will snow for almost 48 hours straight) are commonplace.

   They are more stupid wordplay than misleading clickbait, but clickbait/exaggerations anyway.

6. Furthermore, in the later years journalists have started giving names to perturbations or heat waves, usually choosing high-sounding or mythological names, making possible headlines like:

   >**CHARON is about to bring HELLISH HEAT on the peninsula**
   >
   >**Storm POSEIDON is drowning Abruzzo in its FURY**
   >
   >**SCIPIO about to bring AFRICAN HEAT over Italy**
   >
   >**CIRCE will freeze Piedmont in December**

   (I’m inventing these headlines on the spot, but they are definitely plausible)

7. I remember a bunch of years ago how TV news and websites in general were criticised for “sensational reporting”, like calling -5°C “bitterkalt” (bitterly cold) or normal summer weather as heat waves etc.

   I think with the abundance of weather apps and services this is no longer the case. Or I just don’t notice it anymore.

8. We have few weather sites and they tend to be more carefull with their warnings and forecasts. But portals exagerate all the time. Shock titles and clickbait is common in weather news.

9. We have oe24.at which both on its free commuter tabloid, its online platform wetter.at and on its TV channel oe24.tv employs headlines about forecasts for the next 6 months that are fairly clickbait-y and usually accompanied by ridiculous images.

   Usually there is a tightly dressed lady with a ridiculous facial expression photoshopped in front of a close-up of the sun or the south pole or whatever. I know that in many countries sexy women are used in weather boradcats, but in Austria, even on private TV professional meteorologists present the weather so this is quite uncommon.

   But this newspaper /platform is most known for its reporting on comets and asteroids. About once every two weeks, a humongous, deathly asteroid (usually all caps) is about to hit a small city in Austria. In combination with the usual pictures where members of the editor’s private harem look very hot and very, very scared and the general line of this newspaper which is against immigration and so on, there are lots of memes about “deadly afghan death stars” that are approaching Austria

   edit: I sadly haven’t found any too ridiculous headlines by them rn but a satire magazine that impersonates them fairly accurately (but usually is more factual) gives us these examples that absolutely could’ve been real ones:
   “Comet, that looks like Hitler will hit earth tomorrow”
   “on July 8th, a deadly comet will hit Austria and we will all die a deathly dead-death.

10. We have meteo Balkans. Sometimes not sure if reading meteo Balkans feed or /r/collapse

11. We don’t, but it would be hilarious. We only get boring regular clickbait on the internet.

12. Nope, we have goverment funded Slovak Hydro Meteorological Institution who takes care of all weather forecast shmu.sk

13. Buienradar. But it doesn’t matter how reliable their systems are, the weather is unreliable.