What is Linkbait?

Originally coined by SEO superstar Aaron of SEObook.com, but popularized by SEOMoz CEO Rand Fishkin, the concept of linkbait has worked its way into the Internet Marketer's vocabulary of commonly used industry terms. Although not quite a mainstream marketing term yet, in the past six months to a year, professional and psudo-professional bloggers as well as SEO/SEM professionals have used, and overused this term. Below are a few opinions from credible sources answering the question "what is linkbait?"

"Link bait is any content or feature within a website that somehow baits viewers to place links to it from other websites. Attempts to create link bait are frequently employed in the overall task of search engine optimization." - Wikipedia

"Something interesting enough to catch people's attention [online]." - Matt Cutts

"Compelling content that’s remarkable." - Copyblogger

Simply put, linkbait can be used as a blanket term to describe a riveting blog post, a compelling photo, a captivating article, or any other type of originally created content or online tool that is link worthy. Although linkbait's connotations are neutral and/or not intrinsically bad, in the SEO World, one can be accused of linkbaiting his or blog. This is when an intentional and calculated formula using human psychology paired with what has historically yielded great linkbait is used. Linkbait Categories Problogger provides a list of 20 categories of linkbait, of which some of my personal favorites are Lists, Humor, Controversy, Research and Statistics, and the Cool Factor. He also explains why links are good for your blog (which could be applied to not only blogs, but sites in general). What are your favorite linkbaiting methods?