Fact Checking Websites For News

 Hi All,

Just a quickie email to get you all caught up on various sites to help you fact check your news, current events and websites. 

Media Bias/Fact Check bills itself as the most comprehensive media bias resource.  This article has a list of the 10 best fact checking sites. 

Sites that they cover include Politifact, Fact Check, Open Secrets, Snopes, Sunlight Foundation, Poynter Institute, Flack Check, Truth or Fiction, Hoax Slayer and Fact Checker by the Washington Post.

Click here for a very timely, interesting and useful article from Wikipedia discussing the phrase 'fact checking'.

Enjoy the links and the sites!

Regards,
Stu

Fake News

Hi All,

Fake news had been in the - well - news a lot lately.  For example, if you conduct a Google search for 'fake news' you get over 150 million results.  Interestingly readers get results from the 'Top Stories' section - at least as of 6/17/17 at about 10:34am - The Guardian, Fox 5 Atlanta and Newsweek.  All of which are verifiable news outlets and sources.

This blog entry is not a discussion on politics, political parties or people involved in the government. Its simply an entry in the blog that deals with fake news.  Onward!

Wikipedia has a very unbiased, lengthy and comprehensive entry on fake news.  Click here for the entry and click here for the link to a discussion of twentieth century and twenty-first century fake news.  It makes for interesting reading.

Snopes is a website that is fairly well known. It basically debunks urban legends.  However, this link discusses specific examples of fake news on the site.  This next link fact checks various articles and news events as well.

FactCheck.org is a  website that has, as its mission, "to reduce the level of deception and confusion in U.S. politics. We monitor the factual accuracy of what is said by major U.S. political players in the form of TV ads, debates, speeches, interviews and news releases. Our goal is to apply the best practices of both journalism and scholarship, and to increase public knowledge and understanding.
FactCheck.org is a project of the Annenberg Public Policy Center of the University of Pennsylvania.

So...FactCheck.org is unbiased, accurate, fair and a great place to learn more about fake news.  This next article is called 'How to Spot Fake News?' and was written in November 2016 - very current and timely and interesting.

In addition, the Viral Spiral page has a list of some of the claims they get asked about the most.  Finally, all of FactCheck.org's articles called 'Ask FactCheck', can be found at this link.

Finally, click on this link from the venerable New York Times - its basically a search of the site for the term 'fake news'. 

Other interesting and/or useful fake news sites include, HuffPost.com, Fake News-NPR and this link from the Guardian (a UK newspaper) titled, 'What is fake news? How to spot it and wha tyo ucan do to stop it?'

Enjoy the link and the articles and how to become an even better news consumer!

Regards,
Stu

Urban Legends - Did It Really Happen?

Hi All,

You probably have heard about 'urban legends'...these are things like stuffing onions in your socks to cure disease or Was Tom Hanks' Dad the Lead Singer of the Diamonds? or Do Birds Exploded If they Eat Wedding Rice?

Urban legends have been around for a long, long time.  And now, with the advent of the internet, urban legends have become more and more prevalent.

And, as the internet giveth, so it shall explaineth - and create a website as an answer...forthwith two sites that discuss urban legends: Snopes and UrbanLegends.About.com.

Of the two, Snopes.com is the more popular - and just might be considered to be the seminal 'urban legends' website on the web.  Its tagline is 'Rumor Has It' - and is a well organized website.

Categories at the top of the page include 'What's New', Randomizer, Hot 25, FAQ, Odd News, Glossary, Newsletter and Message Board.

The Newsletter Subscription link has a form to enable readers to subscribe to the free weekly, Snopes.com newseletter.

Taken in turn...'What's New' lists recent updates and additions to Snopes.com - there are also links to the RSS newsfeed on this part of the page.

The Randomizer link takes you to a random urban legend - and changes each time you click on the word, Randomizer. Fun way to learn new things.

Clicking on the Hot 25 link goes to a page that compiles the 25 urban legends currently circulating most widely.  Fun stuff!

FAQ is a link that goes to the Frequently Asked Questions page on Snopes.  Useful Q&A format makes this a good starting point if you are not familiar with Snopes. 

The Odd News link features a daily collection of links to news articles and websites of interest to Snopes.com readers. 

The Glossary link  provides definitions for  number of terms that visitors to Snopes.com might not
be familiar with. Some terms come from the field of folklore and others are specific to Snopes.com.

And, finally, the Message Board link enables users to sign-up, partake and to follow various conversations that like-minded Snopes readers are engaging in.  It is a great way to share urban legend ideas and thoughts with other people on the web!!!

And now for the shameless plug part of the blog entry.  Readers can check out - get it - some books at their very own Farmingdale Public Library on the topic of urban legends.  Click on this link and you'll go to the library card catalog under the topic of 'urban legends'. 

Enjoy the legends and the links.

Regards,
Stu