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He Gets Paid So You Can Slack
CollegeHumor.com editor dishes on the unlikely science of wasting your time
By Matt Cantor
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Posted Apr 20, 08 10:55 AM CDT
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(Newser)
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Wasting people’s time is an odd job—but it’s also a big business, writes CollegeHumor.com editor Streeter Seidell in the New York Times. Seidell spends his days wading through an “ocean” of submitted videos and other items, choosing which funny or bizarre selections deserve publication. Yet there’s no method to the madness: every day is a guessing game as to what will draw in time-wasters.
It’s a tough game, too, working for a viewership “as idiosyncratic as it is fickle.” While rough guidelines say pieces “should be short, easily understood, universal, nostalgic,” it’s impossible to be sure what will score. But with 45% of 18- to 24-year-olds spending upwards of three hours online per day, getting paid to suck in slackers is lucrative.