🤣 Exactly! Sometimes, when I suggest a more specific and interesting title to somebody, and they push back with the title that's as vague or more vague than the one they proposed before, I ask myself, "Don't they WANT people to read their story?"

So long as a title is specific and accurate, it's not click bait. Click bait refers to titles that promise more than they deliver. I keep an eagle eye out for titles like that, but I rarely see them in submitted stories.

I see more along the lines of (and this is made up, not an actual submission), "The heartfelt conversation that changed my life forever."

That sort of title might speak powerfully to the person who wrote it, but it doesn't speak powerfully in all likelihood to very many other people, because they don't know what the story is about: What conversation? How could it change your life? Forever ... really?

Then I'll come back with a suggestion about how the, say, interesting transgender issue at the heart of the conversation should show up in the title.

And they'll come back with something as vague or more vague, like, say, "Heart to heart conversations with queer friends are so important."

And maybe that's not a horrible title, but it's hardly engaging. What I mean by that is that most people are going to look at it and think to themselves, "Well, of course," nod in agreement, and scroll on down their feed without reading — looking for something more meaty.

In the meantime, the really meaty part of the conversation that the story is actually about doesn't make it into the title, meaning that when we publish, people who probably would have wanted to read about that issue, don't end up reading. Which is a shame.