Website Subscribe Button Breaks, Tech Team Suggests Following on Twitter Instead

The tech team behind a popular satirical news website has officially abandoned attempts to fix their broken subscribe button, instead implementing what they call a “pivot to social engagement methodology” that involves telling frustrated users to “just follow us on Twitter, mate.”

The subscribe button, which has been displaying a spinning loading icon since March, was initially expected to be a quick fix. However, after six months of troubleshooting sessions that consistently ended with someone saying “have you tried turning it off and on again?” the development team has embraced what they describe as “strategic technical surrender.”

“We realized that email newsletters are quite retro,” explained a spokesperson while frantically googling “how to center a div” for the 847th time. “Social media is where the real engagement happens. Plus, Twitter has a functional follow button, which puts them ahead of us technologically speaking.”

The decision came after the team discovered that fixing the subscribe functionality would require understanding their own code, which was written by a previous developer who left no documentation and appears to have named all variables after types of cheese.

“We found a function called ‘cheddarSubscribe’ that calls another function called ‘brie-validation,’ which somehow connects to something called ‘gouda-mail-sender,’” noted a junior developer. “At that point, we just accepted that our website has achieved consciousness and we shouldn’t interfere.”

Users attempting to subscribe have been met with an updated error message that reads: “Sorry, our subscribe button is having an existential crisis. Why not follow us on Twitter/X/whatever it’s called this week? At least Elon’s servers work most of the time.”

The website has also introduced a new section called “Subscribe (Just Kidding)” which features a prominently displayed Twitter follow button surrounded by dancing GIFs and the text “This actually works! Promise!”

Early metrics suggest the strategy is surprisingly effective, with Twitter followers increasing by 340% since the button broke. However, email subscribers remain at zero, as the sign-up form now leads to a page displaying only a confused-looking emoji and a link to the website’s Twitter account.

The team plans to apply this “broken-feature-as-marketing-strategy” approach more broadly, with upcoming plans to break the search function (“just Google us, it’s easier”) and the comment system (“argue with us on Twitter like everyone else”).

When asked if they had considered hiring someone who actually knows how to fix websites, the spokesperson replied: “That would be admitting defeat. Besides, our Twitter engagement is through the roof. Sometimes the best solution is just giving up and going where the people already are.”

The website’s subscribe button continues to spin hopefully, unaware that it has been abandoned in favor of the digital equivalent of shouting into the void and hoping someone retweets it.