Many people, mainly freshmen, have come and asked me to provide some helpful insight to improve their “Yik Yak” game. I avoided doing this for a while–a magician doesn’t reveal his secrets–but certainly I was pressurized. Thus, I reveal to you my dear “yakers,” the secrets to increase your upvote average (and inherently your self-confidence, too).
Have “Fedora Kid” somewhere in your yak. It is statistically proven that the mention of this term will increase your upvotes by at least 50 percent. In theory, yak-ing “Why is Chipotle not on campus?” would get you about 20 upvotes with the mentioning of Chipotle, but tagging Fedora Kid on the end would boost the upvotes to approximately 30 (with a margin of error of 0.2 percent). Your Yak would look like, “Why is Chipotle not on campus? Fedora Kid.” Of course it doesn’t make sense, and of course it’s horrible and distasteful to minimize one student to the hat he wears in order to boost your self-confidence, but this is a business – we have no room for empathy here.
Attribute an uninformed stereotype to a fraternity. I have absolutely no idea why this works, but people love it when it happens. For example, the yaks that attribute homosexual behaviors to a fraternity are usually the most popular. Apparently homosexuality is still funny to people, so go for it. If you really want to exponentially increase your upvotes, I would consider minimizing other fraternities as well with a dumb stereotype. So go ahead, add in the assumption that a certain fraternity disrespects women and that another is “irrelevant” – remember, it’s okay to talk crap because it’s anonymous!
Consider yak-ing about your GPA. Scrolling through the yak feed, there’s always bound to be one yak that cleverly states the fact that their GPA is terrible. Some actual examples include, “Who needs a girlfriend when your GPA goes down on you every day?” (22 upvotes), or “My bank account and my GPA are having a race to 0” (50 upvotes). We all share the struggle, so go ahead and find another creative way to tell us how dumb you are (and financially inept).
Yak every time you see someone do something “basic,” whether a Starbucks patron ordering a venti pumpkin spice latte (PSL for the uninitiated), or a sorority girl showering herself with a pile of leaves while her sorority sisters take a bunch of pictures of the act and put it on their Instagram with the hashtags #mcm #selfie #whitegirlprobs.
Usmani is a member of
the class of 2017.
