#SPSM chats about the common social media practices of link-baiting and how that related to social media about suicide, 3/22/15, 9pm CST.

The Tweets for this chat will be archived on Storify.

Trigger warning: The Buzzfeed link below shows images that may be triggering to people who are experiencing thoughts of suicide, or who have attempted suicide. SPSM trusts you to keep yourself safe with your choices about what to look at. If you are in crisis, you can alway reach someone at www.crisischat.org.

This week Buzzfeed shared a link to photography project that depicted some Veterans with guns to their head, and experiencing intense emotional distress. This link was widely shared across social media platforms, and intensely discussed among people with lived experience, the suicide prevention community, and Veteran community.

Aside from questions about the impact and appropriateness of the graphic depiction in this project (which we will discuss), is a larger discussion about how media, messaging, and the disparity in effectiveness/savvy between an outlet such as BuzzFeed, and media/messaging strategies in the public health sector. Buzzfeed is known for it’s ability to generate and distribute viral videos, often using the concept of “clickbait” or “link-bait” to get people to share it’s content. The chances are excellent that *you* have been reading and sharing Buzzfeed content weekly. What can we learn from this?

And #SPSM will be having that discussion, 3/22/15, 9pm CST. So check out www.buzzfeed.com and bring your thoughts to our chat. 🙂