Headlines: 'Brown book breaks record in hours'

The ninth headline down in this BBC News 'Most Popular Stories Now' widget caused me some confusion:


What was this brown book, and why was it breaking records?

After a moment's thought, I came to the conclusion that it must be a book about (or possibly by) prime minister Gordon Brown.

Obviously, I was wrong: the book in question was Dan Brown's latest novel, The Lost Symbol. The cover does look fairly brown, though.

If the BBC cares about SEO, it really should include the title (or at least the name of the author) in the headline of an article about a book.


BBC News: Brown book breaks record in hours

Headlines: Gordon Brown ordered mission...

R Mason spotted this poorly written headline on the Times Online website:


She writes:

When I first read this, I wondered: why would a mission hold a journalist? Why would Gordon Brown give it orders?

(If you can't see the picture, the headline reads: "Gordon Brown ordered mission to free kidnapped reporter Stephen Farrell")

Gordon Brown sorry over assault arrest. Really?

Headline four in this BBC News widget left me wondering who Prime Minister Gordon Brown might have assaulted:



It turns out that the story was about R&B star Chris Brown... but how was I supposed to know that? I imagine that most UK readers would think of 'Gordon' if they saw the name 'Brown' in a web headline.

I may have to add this to my knol on web print versus headlines to illustrate the point the web headlines are often seen out of context.