Scientists Prove That Truth is No Match For Fiction on Twitter (theguardian.com)

Twitter is not journalism by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-08 08:03 · Score: 1

Not that the real journalism is readily available these days but sites such as Twitter are not in the running. Those wishing to be informed have choices but have to know the intent of the content provider. All need revenue, some have agendas. Choose wisely.

Re:Twitter is not journalism by gnick · 2018-03-08 08:23 · Score: 2, Interesting

All need revenue, some have agendas.
Some? Everyone has an agenda, even if it's just to attract readers by telling them what they want to hear. I primarily use BBC News and CNN. Both have excellent records on the facts, but I'd have to be deluded to think I was reading something written without bias.
I follow two accounts on Twitter - Same guy. And occasionally, his Tweets are news.

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He's getting rather old, but he's a good mouse.
Re:Twitter is not journalism by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-08 08:42 · Score: 1, Insightful

CNN and facts? Ha haa, and the BBC is not better.
Re:Twitter is not journalism by RhettLivingston · 2018-03-08 08:53 · Score: 1

True, though there is occasionally journalism on it. But, neither do I believe that Twitter is completely new.
It used to be that if you really wanted to know what people believe, you could go hang out at the local barbershop for awhile. That was where opinions were hashed out and consensus was reached. Now that is happening on Twitter. Twitter and services like it are the new barbershops.
The problem is that it is easier to find a "barbershop" that doesn't disagree with anything that you'd like to believe. Nothing is ever actually hashed out. You can have your every view rubberstamped by someone of like mind.
Re:Twitter is not journalism by harrkev · 2018-03-08 08:56 · Score: 5, Informative

Wow, praising CNN?
I remember when the report about Russian meddling first came out a month or two ago.
Both Fox and CBS (the only two others that I checked) included the fact that the Russians appeared to also support Bernie. CNN, for whatever reason, chose to omit this fact.
Then there was that time when CNN reported a Trump e-mail as being from September 4th instead of September 14th, which took the story from "Illegal" to "who cares." Yes, they had to correct it, but the damage was done.
http://money.cnn.com/2017/12/0...
Then, there was the time that CNN had to "insert" a word into one of Trump's quotes in order to make him seem racist. Yeah, that is the height of honesty.
http://thehill.com/blogs/ballo...
But if you believe their bias, then you don't see it as a bias.

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"-1 Troll" is the apparently the same as "-1 I disagree with you."
Re:Twitter is not journalism by sycodon · 2018-03-08 08:58 · Score: 0

I would submit that ALL "Fact" checking sites have agendas and are more often than not complicit in distributing Fake News through their imprimatur of having been "fact checked" something.
Simply witness the mental gymnastics they invariable go through to go from, "While technically true"...to "in light of this, we rule it Not True".

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When Fascism comes to America, it will call itself Anti-Fascism, and tell you to give up your guns.
Re:Twitter is not journalism by gnick · 2018-03-08 09:04 · Score: 1, Informative

CNN and facts? Ha haa...
Guess what? The guy who most prominently screams FAKE NEWS at CNN is occasionally inaccurate himself. I can help with a couple of examples if you don't believe me. CNN, and especially cnn.com where I access their stories, has an excellent track record of getting the facts straight.
Back your shit up. Link me to a cnn.com story that gets the facts wrong. Or point me to a story where they made a mistake and doubled-down when corrected instead of retracting. You might start your search here.

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He's getting rather old, but he's a good mouse.
Re:Twitter is not journalism by jellomizer · 2018-03-08 09:12 · Score: 1

False information is far more interesting then the truth, that is why it spreads so easily.
Real life, has layers of boring complexities, where they are trade offs that need to be accounted for, and resources that may be better spent elsewhere.

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If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
Re:Twitter is not journalism by fahrbot-bot · 2018-03-08 09:19 · Score: 1

The guy who most prominently screams FAKE NEWS at CNN is occasionally inaccurate himself. I can help with a couple of examples if you don't believe me. CNN, and especially cnn.com where I access their stories, has an excellent track record of getting the facts straight.
And... almost all actual news sources will issue corrections in the cases where they get things wrong or incomplete. Our Tweeter-in-Chief, not so much -- though, to be fair, he lies so much he'd spend (at least) an equivalent amount of time issuing corrections. Hell (and it really hurts me to say this) even Fox News will issue corrections -- meaning the actual news part of the outlet, not their Opinion / Pundit masking as news part, -- the line between which they seem inclined to blur when it suits them.

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It must have been something you assimilated. . . .
Re:Twitter is not journalism by gnick · 2018-03-08 09:21 · Score: 1

Wow, praising CNN?
Is "technically accurate but biased" praise? They typically are technically accurate and they typically are biased. Adding "racial" to profiling was dirty and unfair, even if they thought that was what he meant. The date on the email was a major, unfortunate, but rare blunder that they handled responsibly once it was pointed out. The Russians did support Bernie. And Trump. And Hillary. And the alt-right. And Antifa. Of course Fox focused on Bernie and of course CNN focused on Trump.

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He's getting rather old, but he's a good mouse.
Re:Twitter is not journalism by Rujiel · 2018-03-08 09:22 · Score: 1

You're right, but cnn hates bernie, so it's not like smearing him with Russia BS is beneath CNN.
Re:Twitter is not journalism by gnick · 2018-03-08 09:25 · Score: 1

...even Fox News will issue corrections -- meaning the actual news part of the outlet, not their Opinion / Pundit masking as news part...
Last time I watched Fox News (it's often playing at my dad's house), Tucker Carlson was saying that the Dems are trying to keep illegals in the country because illegal voting is keeping them in office. Opinion piece or not, unfounded allegations of voter fraud are irresponsible.

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He's getting rather old, but he's a good mouse.
Re:Twitter is not journalism by Rujiel · 2018-03-08 09:27 · Score: 0

"Guess what? The guy who most prominently screams FAKE NEWS at CNN is occasionally inaccurate himself"
Who cares? The only one to bring up trump here is you. It may not be true of your thinking, but other people are capable of actually evaluating something like CNN without bringing up trump. Cool your reptile brain for a moment.
Re:Twitter is not journalism by gnick · 2018-03-08 09:32 · Score: 1

The only one to bring up trump here is you.
I apologize for evoking DJT, but it seems like he's been very influential in public opinion of CNN. They've always been accused of bias, but I haven't always heard them being called liars. DJT himself said that he was the first one to call them FAKE.

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He's getting rather old, but he's a good mouse.
Re:Twitter is not journalism by Luckyo · 2018-03-08 09:34 · Score: 1

That one is actually straight from Pew:
http://www.pewresearch.org/fac...
It was seen in the last election as well, were pollsters said that latino population would go 8:1 to Clinton. Exit polls were only 2:1.
Why?
Pollsters forgot to ask if people they were polling were citizens, and hence had a right to vote.
So you'd have to be utterly stupid not to try to make such people citizens if you are a democratic politician in US.
Re:Twitter is not journalism by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-08 09:37 · Score: 0

Then, there was the time that CNN had to "insert" a word into one of Trump's quotes in order to make him seem racist. Yeah, that is the height of honesty.
Tru-ish, but not true. CNN was not quoting Trump, they were interpreting what he said in an exchange with O'Reilly, and frankly if you saw that exchange there would be no other way to interpret it than as a call for "racial profiling". O'Reilly asked something like "You want to profile Arab and Muslim men?" and Trump responded "There's no other choice" or "There's no other way" ... sorry I don't have the exact quote. So Trump didn't use the term "racial profiling" but "racial profiling" is exactly what he and O'Reilly were talking about.
Re:Twitter is not journalism by gnick · 2018-03-08 09:38 · Score: 1

Saying the Dems want to make illegals into citizens is entirely different than saying that illegal votes are keeping Dems in office. Tucker said the latter.

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He's getting rather old, but he's a good mouse.
Re:Twitter is not journalism by Luckyo · 2018-03-08 09:51 · Score: 1

There is evidence of this kind of voter fraud on part of some Democratic party supporting organisations:
https://www.npr.org/2016/10/19...
It's likely fairly minor, but it appears to be practised by some.
Re:Twitter is not journalism by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-08 09:54 · Score: 0

Not that the real journalism is readily available these days but sites such as Twitter are not in the running.
People do not rely on journalism to find out what's going on. They soak in whatever. That includes you and me. For example, you might have recently read on Slashdot that some people think Twitter users don't know how to be skeptics. How confident are you, that they actually said that? Probably pretty confident, and that's ok!! If TFA were a lie, you'd sniff it out pretty quickly and also join in all the comments here about how TFA is bullshit.
It's ok that Slashdot's editors aren't "serious journalists." You don't need them to be.
Twitter exists, and as baffling as this is to me, some people are able to read it. And if you read stuff, you're going to be exposed to ideas and sometimes a lie might be able to sneak in under your skepti-dar.

Those wishing to be informed have choices but have to know the intent of the content provider.
Hey, that's a swell idea, but doesn't really go very far. People with good intent sometimes fuck up, and people with bad intent will sometimes tell you a truth. Who-said-it is merely one factor among many, evaluated by your bullshit-detector.
...
(Funny coincidence: I was feeling a little nostalgic and was glancing at an online copy of "Metamagical Themas." (Whole book on one web page, so I hope you like scroll bars.) I scrolled to some arbitrary part, about CSICOP and Skeptical Inquirer, the spread of bullshit, "dehoaxing" to help people spot bullshit, etc. It's amazing that this stuff is from so long ago (1980s), since it's basically talking about all the same thing on everyone's minds today. It's like people just don't fucking learn. We've all been here before. We'll probably be here again.)
Re:Twitter is not journalism by penandpaper · 2018-03-08 10:01 · Score: 1

https://www.cnn.com/videos/us/...
Do you consider this factual and trustworthy? If you were a layman and saw this, what would you think after that segment?
Re:Twitter is not journalism by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-08 10:09 · Score: 0

Both Fox and CBS (the only two others that I checked) included the fact that the Russians appeared to also support Bernie. CNN, for whatever reason, chose to omit this fact.
Shouldn't be too hard to figure out the reason.
The purpose Russia supported Bernie was to divide the Democrats in favor of Trump.
Leaving the detail about Bernie out doesn't really change the truth and there are probably a million other things they left out, if not because of their agenda then at least because of space.
Re:Twitter is not journalism by Rujiel · 2018-03-08 10:43 · Score: 0

Pretty sure that CNN itself created the fake news monicker. Trump turned the phrase around on them and it stuck, much to their dismay
Re:Twitter is not journalism by gnick · 2018-03-08 10:44 · Score: 1

When it comes to guns, I am a layman. I've fired a couple dozen, but know relatively little. After that segment, I thought that the AR-15 looked like a dangerous weapon similar to some used in war. Pretty sure it's dangerous by design and 'similar' is subjective. I guess I don't know enough to spot the inaccuracies, but I try to stay open-minded and am not under the delusion that CNN has never gotten anything wrong. What did they say that wasn't factual? I'd like to report it.

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He's getting rather old, but he's a good mouse.
Re:Twitter is not journalism by nwaack · 2018-03-08 10:44 · Score: 1

Twitter is not journalism? Tell that to HuffPo!
Re:Twitter is not journalism by gnick · 2018-03-08 10:51 · Score: 1

Pretty sure that CNN itself created the fake news monicker.
Do you have anything to back that up? I'm legitimately interested. Google lead me here, here, and here, but they tell it differently.

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He's getting rather old, but he's a good mouse.
Re:Twitter is not journalism by penandpaper · 2018-03-08 11:24 · Score: 4, Informative

Mark Hertling is an activist with an agenda yet they do not mention this (#vetsforgunreform). He maybe experienced being in the military but he is pushing a particular agenda and purposefully obfuscates information to push that agenda. As demonstrated by the poor handling and mentor-ship of the CNN presenter (seriously that opening with the guy flaccidly shooting the gun is ridiculous under that kind of mentor).
Blurs the line between civilian and military weapons. That is what they are doing when they talk about the looks and appearance. If I put spoiler on my car, racing stripes, and racing numbers does that make it a race car? Yet, black plastic is supposed to be more dangerous like the M-4?
In the 1950's Colt did market the AR-15 to the military which was a basis for the M4 but that doesn't mean the rifles are the same nor does it mean that their looks mean they functionally the same. The AR-15 is just like any number of civilian semi-automatic rifles.
"a defining characteristic of the AR-15 is the speed and power of the bullet." .. Absolute non-sense. the speed and power of the bullet are defining characteristics of the bullet, not the rifle. Any rifle with that caliber will have the same speed and power regardless what it looks like. You can get most gun models in different calibers.
@1:05 "now those are single shots. If I wanted to fire this on full semi-automatic all I do is keep firing.". There is no such thing as "full semi-automatic". All he means is that he is pulling the trigger faster. 1 trigger pull == 1 bullet. Any semi-automatic can be fired faster if you pull the trigger faster. There is only one firing mode the AR-15 has. His "switching" is him operating the weapon differently. Semi-automatic. "Full semi-automatic" is a blatant misinformation designed to misinform laymen.
"this weapon in the wrong hands can be more dangerous than most weapons because of its capability to do a lot of damage in a short period of time and is irreversible". Why? Because he can pull the trigger faster? Because it looks scary? Because of the bullet it shoots? It isn't more dangerous than any other semi automatic gun in the market. Name a gun whose damage can be reversed. Name a gun that is semi automatic that can't fire faster if you pull the trigger faster. The AR-15 isn't unique or special from any other weapon. Not the caliber of bullet. Not the speed at which you can fire it. Not the damage it can do. That is nature for every gun for every caliber ever made.
I have to wonder if it is stupidity or malice that they got so much wrong in a 2 minute segment. They are pushing an agenda using misinformation and ignorance.
Re:Twitter is not journalism by gnick · 2018-03-08 11:49 · Score: 1

They never said the AR-15 and M4 were the same; they said one was the precursor of the other and they look alike.
"Speed and power of the bullet" is misleading, but I'm not sure I'm excited enough to complain.
"Full semi-automatic" is ridiculous. I missed it the first time I watched it. I don't know whether to call it inaccurate or not 'cuz it's just fucking nonsense. I assume that by "full" he meant "at maximum effect" but that was fucking stupid.

...The AR-15 isn't unique or special from any other weapon...
I'm not sure they were implying that it was. Of course bullets from any gun are irreversible; that's pretty pointless but not wrong. I think part of that piece was just griping about semi-automatic rifles.

They are pushing an agenda using misinformation and ignorance.
They are pushing an agenda. I wouldn't even accuse FoxNews of deliberately presenting misinformation. I've seen some VERY slanted pieces there regarding Uranium One, but even they usually got the facts pretty close. I think they both at least try to get the facts right. Playing on ignorance? Yeah, they're probably guilty of that. They're hardly alone in that, but they're guilty.

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He's getting rather old, but he's a good mouse.
Re:Twitter is not journalism by penandpaper · 2018-03-08 12:04 · Score: 1

I think part of that piece was just griping about semi-automatic rifles
I could probably agree with this. The problem is that the push recently is to "ban AR-15" and some ignorant people could use that segment as justification why the AR-15 should be banned even though it applies to all semi-automatic rifles meaning a near complete ban on most guns in the US.

They are pushing an agenda. I wouldn't even accuse FoxNews of deliberately presenting misinformation.
Misinformation was presented as factual. Whether that was malice or ignorance is another story. Whether it was deliberate is hardly redeeming if it is still up without any kind of correction or clarification.
How many other stories are like this? How many go unnoticed by their viewers who then push for legislation based on misinformation?
Re:Twitter is not journalism by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-08 12:17 · Score: 0

"Guess what? The guy who most prominently screams FAKE NEWS at CNN is occasionally inaccurate himself"
Who cares? The only one to bring up trump here is you. It may not be true of your thinking, but other people are capable of actually evaluating something like CNN without bringing up trump. Cool your reptile brain for a moment.
Actually if you do a Control-F and type Trump you are the first mention of Trump here. Way to spread some fake news! You might want to think before making claims like that without being anonymous Rujiel!
Re:Twitter is not journalism by gnick · 2018-03-08 12:20 · Score: 1

...some ignorant people could use that segment as justification why the AR-15 should be banned...
Did you hear the thunderous applause after Rubio jokingly suggested banning all semi-automatic rifles while he was at the CNN town hall? Not all of these ignorant people are making a special case of the AR-15. And yes, I call them ignorant too. The notion of banning all semi-automatic rifles at this stage is pretty ridiculous.

Misinformation was presented as factual.
What would you have them retract? It's super slanted; part was misleading (intentionally?); the guy that the reporter thought was an expert said something stupid; and it's not a wonderful piece of reporting. But short of just deleting it I can't picture the correction. I'm not excited enough to bring it to their attention.

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He's getting rather old, but he's a good mouse.
Re:Twitter is not journalism by penandpaper · 2018-03-08 12:30 · Score: 1

Did you hear the thunderous applause after Rubio jokingly suggested banning all semi-automatic rifles while he was at the CNN town hall?

And that will be used as evidence that many on the left want a complete gun ban.

What would you have them retract?

They don't' need to retract it or change the video but make something known in the description or something. If you make a mistake you own up it. Something to say "this is false.. this is misleading". I thought part of what made MSM institutions more reputable was that they made corrections when they get something wrong.
Re:Twitter is not journalism by gnick · 2018-03-08 12:47 · Score: 1

And that will be used as evidence that many on the left want a complete gun ban.
Many on the left do want a complete gun ban. A lot of them aren't even quiet about it. Not everybody is pro-2nd. I don't personally have much of a problem with guns, but I'm not everybody.

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He's getting rather old, but he's a good mouse.
Re:Twitter is not journalism by gnick · 2018-03-08 12:55 · Score: 1

It was my fault. I may as well have yelled "Voldemort". CNN attacks make me think of DJT. Don't blame Rujiel for calling me out on it.

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He's getting rather old, but he's a good mouse.
Re:Twitter is not journalism by Bing+Tsher+E · 2018-03-08 12:57 · Score: 1

Huffington Post is that blog that Ariana Huffington and Andrew Breitbart set up together, correct?
Re:Twitter is not journalism by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-08 13:21 · Score: 0

Hey - Thank you for a civil discussion. Usually when somebody confronts me for defending CNN they start with name-calling and then go downhill.
-gnick
Re:Twitter is not journalism by ruddk · 2018-03-08 16:02 · Score: 1

"full semi-automatic"

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L'Idiot
Re: Twitter is not journalism by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-08 16:46 · Score: 0

And in Ohio in 2005 exit polls favored Kerry by 20 points, the first time in AMERICAN HISTORY exit poles were greater than 5 points off. So some Diebold machines may have perpetrated a massive fraud but blarghmexicans.
Kill yourself.
Re: Twitter is not journalism by Luckyo · 2018-03-09 03:08 · Score: 1

When you trigger someone fanatical enough to tell you to kill yourself, you know you hit the nerve.
Re: Twitter is not journalism by Reverend+Green · 2018-03-09 06:20 · Score: 1

Real life is fascinating. Semi-official propaganda is boring.
Re:Twitter is not journalism by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-09 10:30 · Score: 0

And there is massive evidence that Republicans count dead people in their votes. They've even admitted to it on camera. Multiple times.
Re:Twitter is not journalism by Keith+Henson · 2018-03-10 08:46 · Score: 1

I wrote the lead author of the paper. Might as well share it here:
Dear Dr. Lazer
For me the critical passage in your excellent article starts with:
"The United States has undergone a parallel geo- and sociopolitical evolution. Geographic polarization of partisan preferences has dramatically increased over the past 40 years,"
On evolutionary psychology grounds, I suspect that population growth and widespread recognition of limits has tripped human psychological mechanisms that evolved far back in pre-history. If all other causes (such as disease) fails to knock overpopulation back, then war does. The proposal is that a resource crisis trips on evolved psychologic mechanisms that cause the affected population to amplify xenophobic memes. Eventually, this psychs up the warriors for a do or die attack on the neighboring tribe. Win or lose, the local area overpopulation problem was solved.
Our ancestors ran into this problem every generation or two for the last few million years--ever since we became the top predator. It is no wonder that a response evolved.
I also suspect that the modern day trip mechanism is a bleak economic outlook. To keep this psychological mechanism turned off, rising or at least steady, income per capita is required.
I have an unpublished paper on a math model examining the genetic outcomes of starving in place vs going to war. If you want to see it, ask.
Best wishes,
Keith Henson
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

--
End MGM. Get prospective parents of boys to Google: Men do complain
Re:Twitter is not journalism by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-11 22:01 · Score: 0

"The guy" equates to Trump. I'm sure you know this.
So in this instance, there is a difference between the guy who first mentioned Trump (aka "the guy"), and the guy who first wrote the name of Trump in this thread.
Re:Twitter is not journalism by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-11 22:13 · Score: 0

I'm googling this right now (not an expert in the topic) but the history of the AR-15 and M4 seems a little convoluted.
I'd say it is a little misleading to say the AR-15 is a precursor to the M4 without some qualification. I.e. the modern civilian version of the AR-15 is not the precursor to the M4.
It seems the AR-15 moniker is well used by Colt (the owner of the trademark) and they apply it to many variants of their AR-15 weapon system.
Re:Twitter is not journalism by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-11 23:40 · Score: 0

Shut up and take my money. I want one of those!
Re:Twitter is not journalism by harlequinn · 2018-03-11 23:42 · Score: 1

This is ripe for a more in depth analysis.
Re:Twitter is not journalism by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-12 04:51 · Score: 0

Don't forget that CNN leaked the debate questions to Hillary prior to the debate.

Q: What kind of a retard gets news from Twitter? by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-08 08:04 · Score: 0

A: cnn, Fox, msnbc, cbs, abc..

(dont use so many caps)

Fact checkers? by BradMajors · 2018-03-08 08:08 · Score: 0, Flamebait

The results will likely be totally dependent on who you use for a fact checker.

Re:Fact checkers? by Archtech · 2018-03-08 08:14 · Score: 0, Troll

If you use anyone as a "fact checker" you are probably hopelessly naive.

--
I am sure that there are many other solipsists out there.
Re:Fact checkers? by penandpaper · 2018-03-08 08:23 · Score: 1

We sampled all rumor cascades investigated by six independent fact-checking organizations (snopes.com, politifact.com, factcheck.org, truthorfiction.com, hoax-slayer.com, and urbanlegends.about.com) by parsing the title, body, and verdict (true, false, or mixed) of each rumor investigation reported on their websites and automatically collecting the cascades corresponding to those rumors on Twitter.
Re:Fact checkers? by HumanWiki · 2018-03-08 08:26 · Score: 4, Interesting

If you use anyone as a "fact checker" you are probably hopelessly naive.
So, the only things you know as a fact are things that you have personally proven? Even then, how do you know your facts are facts and not something else that happened by coincidence?
Otherwise, everything you know is sourced from a fact-checker that has validated the data as factual.
Re:Fact checkers? by penandpaper · 2018-03-08 08:32 · Score: 2, Insightful

So, the only things you know as a fact are things that you have personally proven?
You don't? If I am interested in a topic I spend more time and energy to discern the truth from varying sources to come to some conclusion about the topic. If I am not interested then I look at who is saying it and consider what they gain from any specific fact.
Every fact checker has their bias and opinions that is bled into their analysis. Only a fool would listen and believe any source that claims to be objective and bias free or most trusted.
Re:Fact checkers? by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-08 08:32 · Score: 1

Snopes is very biased, not sure about the others.
The so called fact checkers are just the regurgitation of the party line, the government propaganda, the mainstream globalist spin.
Put all the news out there, let the people decide. I don't want some government or mega-corp becoming the gate keeper or arbiter of truth.
"Never believe anything until it is officially denied"
The main stream media has been caught lying so many times, supporting the government lies), they have lost credibility. Remember the weapons of mass destruction in Iraq? Why was WTC building 7 the only modern steel frame building to collapse in history?
Re:Fact checkers? by HumanWiki · 2018-03-08 08:48 · Score: 1

That's not what you said though. You said:
"If you use anyone as a "fact checker" you are probably hopelessly naive."
Now you're giving qualifications to that statement that weren't present the first time.
Of course you'll have some topics that are of personal interest to you. But, your statement was a de facto if you listen to any fact checker you're probably naive. Which is why I said what I said. It's relevant to your first statement, which was a reduction statement. One person cannot possibly know all facts, so there are plenty of times you simply have to accept what other people say as facts, are indeed facts.
Re:Fact checkers? by serviscope_minor · 2018-03-08 09:03 · Score: 1

So, the only things you know as a fact are things that you have personally proven?
You don't?
No, I don't. For example, it's a fact that the average standard atomic weight of Oxygen on Earth is 15.999. It's a fact and no I haven't verified it personally.
It's also a fact that stratospheric clouds are made of water. I mean I can tell that with mist, sure, but I've never actually managed to get up into a cloud myself and personally verify it is true.
It's basically facile to claim that things you haven't personally verified are facts is true.
If I am not interested then I look at who is saying it and consider what they gain from any specific fact.
That's also an inane point of view. There's plenty of other (better) smell tests, like does it violate the lwas of physics. It is obviously contrary to very easily obtainable data. Does it sound too good to be true.
The trouble wiht seeing if the person has something to gain is that (a) just because they are doesn't me they're wrong and (b) they could very well simply be deluded even if they have nothing to gain.

--
SJW n. One who posts facts.
Re:Fact checkers? by alvinrod · 2018-03-08 09:12 · Score: 1

That's probably why you shouldn't rely on any one fact checker either. If you've got half a dozen different fact checkers and they all agree on something, you can probably trust it, especially if you are relying on fact checkers with opposing biases. For example, if you read an article on all of Fox, CNN, MSNBC, Brietbart, and the Huffington Post, the subset of details that are reported on by all of those sites are the ones that are almost certain to be true even though each of them might individually be trying to spin the story in a particular direction.

That in itself isn't a fool proof method, but it's likely to yield better results on average than using a single source or having to witness everything for yourself first hand before being willing to accept it. I don't recall ever being to West Virginia, but that shouldn't prohibit me from believing that it's a real place or distrusting a "fact checker" who tells me that it's real.
Re:Fact checkers? by penandpaper · 2018-03-08 09:12 · Score: 1

Hold the phone. You responded to Archtech ( 159117 ) and I responded to you. I did not say "If you use anyone as a "fact checker" you are probably hopelessly naive." Although, I do agree with it because I did say "Every fact checker has their bias and opinions that is bled into their analysis. Only a fool would listen and believe any source that claims to be objective and bias free or most trusted." That includes self described "fact checkers".
Re:Fact checkers? by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-08 09:20 · Score: 0

That sounds a lot like you keep shopping for "sources", i.e people who share your biases, until you find enough of them telling you what you want to hear to convince yourself that what you originally thought was the truth.
Re:Fact checkers? by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-08 09:24 · Score: 0

varying sources
There's the rub. Sometimes we keep looking for "varying" sources until we find one that fits our world-view, then we stop looking. In this case, we haven't really learned or proven anything: we've just found a source that confirms what we already believe.

Every fact checker has their bias and opinions that is bled into their analysis. Only a fool would listen and believe any source that claims to be objective and bias free or most trusted.
The idea that every fact checker has an axe to grind is in itself a bias.
Re:Fact checkers? by HumanWiki · 2018-03-08 09:33 · Score: 1

Ah, yep.. You're right.. That will serve me trying to /. while listening to someone drone on in my ear about some project they want me to be a part of even though the project has 0 need of any of my skillsets and the only reason I'm being asked is so someone else won't have to do the work...
my bad
Re:Fact checkers? by Holi · 2018-03-08 09:37 · Score: 1

Snopes may be biased, but does that mean they are inaccurate?

--
Sorry, teleporters just kill you and then make a copy. A perfect, soul-less copy.
Re:Fact checkers? by penandpaper · 2018-03-08 09:54 · Score: 1

No, I don't. For example, it's a fact that the average standard atomic weight of Oxygen on Earth is 15.999. It's a fact and no I haven't verified it personally.
Isn't the basis of science that you can personally verify any claim? I am sure that many scientists that do care enough about atomic weights have gone through to personally corroborate that fact. I personally, and I assume you as well, don't care enough to spend that time and energy to verify it. The real question is are you willing to spend the time and energy to personally verify it? And to another point, do you care enough or does that fact impact your life to such an extent that the validity of that fact can negatively affect your life? What authority are you willing to delegate to whom and on what conditions for trusting specific sources? When it comes to affecting your life I bet that you delegate that authority and trust very narrowly compared to delegating scientific authority and trust.

That's also an inane point of view. There's plenty of other (better) smell tests, like does it violate the lwas of physics. It is obviously contrary to very easily obtainable data. Does it sound too good to be true.
Politics and specifically narrative is never as simple as physics. Because by their very nature deal with topics that you and I will not be informed to make any kind of decision yet we must have an opinion because democracy. The scientists that study clouds and atomic weights are the experts about those specific things and those facts require experts to verify and understand them.
Everything is easily obtained data if you spend time yet it is still contested. Did Trump call Mexicans rapists in his announcement speech? Who are you going to trust when have conflicting narratives? If you were a Mexican immigrant (legal), and you heard conflicting stories from CNN and Fox, who would you trust? Be afraid and vote to protect yourself just in case or nothing new continue on with life and nonchalant politics? That is very different than what the weather is. Even if it is factually inaccurate acting as if it was is still the rational choice.
Re:Fact checkers? by sycodon · 2018-03-08 09:59 · Score: 1

When a source states that the atomic weight of Oxygen on Earth is reported at 15.999 one day and then 14.999 the next and maybe 15.5 the next because of an "anonymous scientist" said so, you begin to understand the problem people have with news organizations today.

--
When Fascism comes to America, it will call itself Anti-Fascism, and tell you to give up your guns.
Re:Fact checkers? by penandpaper · 2018-03-08 10:13 · Score: 1

What bias and what source would that be?
I know I am biased. What is your point?
Re:Fact checkers? by penandpaper · 2018-03-08 10:15 · Score: 1

The idea that every fact checker has an axe to grind is in itself a bias.
or it's the basis of skepticism.
I am not looking for a source to say "Yep I knew it! I was right all along". I am looking at different sources to see what is different and what overlaps between the different sources.
Re:Fact checkers? by penandpaper · 2018-03-08 10:16 · Score: 1

Part of the issue is that many fact checkers and news orgs are not transparent about their biases and they claim to be objective truth tellers.
Re:Fact checkers? by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-08 10:17 · Score: 0

Isn't the basis of science that you can personally verify any claim? I am sure that many scientists that do care enough about atomic weights have gone through to personally corroborate that fact. I personally, and I assume you as well, don't care enough to spend that time and energy to verify it.
There's a massive difference between "you can personally verify [a] claim" and "I've personally verified a claim".

The real question is are you willing to spend the time and energy to personally verify it? And to another point, do you care enough or does that fact impact your life to such an extent that the validity of that fact can negatively affect your life? What authority are you willing to delegate to whom and on what conditions for trusting specific sources? When it comes to affecting your life I bet that you delegate that authority and trust very narrowly compared to delegating scientific authority and trust.
The issue is that invariably you are delegating responsibility on others and not proving facts. Instead, you're leaning on trust for truth. You parrot things as facts when you verify nothing of the kind. Ie, you prove the researchers points because you really aren't going out of your way to prove things except in limited instances.

The scientists that study clouds and atomic weights are the experts about those specific things and those facts require experts to verify and understand them.
On the contrary, they don't require experts in most cases except to the extent that anyone who verifies them can claim to be an expert because they've went through the effort to verify and understand them.

Everything is easily obtained data if you spend time yet it is still contested. Did Trump call Mexicans rapists in his announcement speech? Who are you going to trust when have conflicting narratives? If you were a Mexican immigrant (legal), and you heard conflicting stories from CNN and Fox, who would you trust? Be afraid and vote to protect yourself just in case or nothing new continue on with life and nonchalant politics? That is very different than what the weather is. Even if it is factually inaccurate acting as if it was is still the rational choice.
Meanwhile what you're talking about is less about facts and more about trying to reduce ambiguous speech through logic reduction into truths. The problem then is both CNN and Fox News are more about espousing truth and selectively presenting or misrepresenting facts, including misquoting. To compare it to the weather [forecast] which is merely a prediction rather misses the point.
Re:Fact checkers? by serviscope_minor · 2018-03-08 10:35 · Score: 1

Isn't the basis of science that you can personally verify any claim?
No, not even slightly. The basis is that the claims are in principle falsifiable, not that you can personally verify them.
I'm never going to be able to verify the claims of hogh energy physics because my maths isn't good enough to understand the claims in the first place and I can't afford and don't have the skills to build a particle accelerator.
Nonetheless, the existence of quarks is a fact.
I am sure that many scientists that do care enough about atomic weights have gone through to personally corroborate that fact. I personally, and I assume you as well, don't care enough to spend that time and energy to verify it.
Many, especially these days? I doubt it. Scientists have science to do; verifying well established facts which can easily be looked up (e.g. atomic weights) is just a waste of time.
And to another point, do you care enough or does that fact impact your life to such an extent that the validity of that fact can negatively affect your life?
The first, second and third laws of thermodynamics affect my life every day in a negative way. Can't win, can't break even and can't get out of the game. I've not actually tried building perpetual motion machines just to see.

--
SJW n. One who posts facts.
Re:Fact checkers? by AmiMoJo · 2018-03-08 11:52 · Score: 1

In the post-truth modern era everyone who contradicts your preferred reality is a liar. Everyone else is biased and can safely be dismissed. Only you are objective, the only human able to build a clear and true picture of the world. This grants you moral authority and intellectual superiority.

--
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
Re:Fact checkers? by Sique · 2018-03-08 12:04 · Score: 1

The issue is that invariably you are delegating responsibility on others and not proving facts. Instead, you're leaning on trust for truth. You parrot things as facts when you verify nothing of the kind. Ie, you prove the researchers points because you really aren't going out of your way to prove things except in limited instances.
The issue here is that you simply don't have the time and the ability to prove much for yourself. Your time on Earth is limited, and so are your abiilities. You can't verify the mass of the Higgs boson to be 126 GeV, because you don't have the money and the time and the craftmanship to build an LHC for yourself. So you have to take CERN's word for it.
All the talk about "verifying for yourself" is nice and tandy, but totally ignorant of the reality. The reality is that there are so many things you take for granted without every doubting them, and you are not even aware of them. Most information you get is the result of a large collective effort of hundreds and thousands of people working together and building on each other's results. You as a single person have no chance to even replicate a minuscle part of that effort.
I remember that in the late 1990ies, there was a project of an artist to build a simple toaster all on his own, without using any other's product: Going out and mine the iron ore and the copper, melt them in selfbuilt ovens, using self burned charcoal, welding them with selfmade tools into sheets and wires etc.pp.. As far as I remember, after ten years, he wasn't even halfway into any results. It's the same with the information you get. You don't have 10 years time to hunt down all the facts that lead to that information. You have to rely on others to provide you with facts you will never have any chance to check for yourself.
So all that talk about "not trusting anyone and trying to verify all on your own" is just grand-standing. You simply don't do that. You take 99.9% of all information you get for granted. And you make a few steps of verification of some of the 0.1% remaining ones, but you virtually never follow through, especially not if your first steps seem to suggest the veracity of the information you were trying to verify.
Did you ever verify the timetable at a bus stop? Were you waiting for 24 h each on a work day and on a public holiday making notes of the bus coming? No. You just install an app that tells you when the next bus will arrive, and if that information seem to be ok within +/- 2 mins, you take the timetable for granted.

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.sig: Sique *sigh*
Re:Fact checkers? by penandpaper · 2018-03-08 12:19 · Score: 1

A difference without a distinction. If you make a claim that is falsifiable I can verify it. Falsifiability necessitates others to verify results. Science is not built on trust.
Re:Fact checkers? by penandpaper · 2018-03-08 12:25 · Score: 1

because you don't have the money and the time and the craftmanship to build an LHC for yourself. So you have to take CERN's word for it. All the talk about "verifying for yourself" is nice and tandy, but totally ignorant of the reality.

A lack of means and motive does not prove CERN right. I would suspect that most people are indifferent to the discoveries made by the LHC. The point of science is that experiments can be repeated and claims can be verified. Yes, functionally you put a lot of trust in the accumulated knowledge we have. That is fine for things like the Higgs Boson but not so great for politics. If some billionaire really wanted to he could build an equivalent accelerator to try and disprove CERN which is a fundamental part of the scientific method.
Re:Fact checkers? by Bing+Tsher+E · 2018-03-08 13:05 · Score: 1

I remember that in the late 1990ies, there was a project of an artist to build a simple toaster all on his own, without using any other's product: Going out and mine the iron ore and the copper, melt them in selfbuilt ovens, using self burned charcoal, welding them with selfmade tools into sheets and wires etc.pp.. As far as I remember, after ten years, he wasn't even halfway into any results. It's the same with the information you get. You don't have 10 years time to hunt down all the facts that lead to that information. You have to rely on others to provide you with facts you will never have any chance to check for yourself.

That sort of reminds me of Gingery's Book Series where he tells how to build a complete machine shop from scrap metal. All the way from the foundry to make the castings to a complete finished set of machine tools (lathe, etc.)
Bootstrap projects like that rock, even if not that many of us actually complete the thing. The journalist toaster thing sounds like a liberal arts dude fumbling around, tho.
Re:Fact checkers? by fatwilbur · 2018-03-08 13:30 · Score: 1

I think by using the internet since it's infancy (and understanding the technical realities of it), most of us have the benefit of already being very wary of anything read on the internet.

What *is* new is that it's true you can't trust "facts" presented by major media corporations anymore, if you ever could. One's only reasonable course for determining what is closest to the truth is to read the same story from multiple sources and opinions, and be as objective as you can in weighing the credibility of each source. Unfortunately this takes work, and reading opinions/sites you typically don't agree with, neither of which people are too keen to do.

I usually surprise people with key information on current events they didn't know, and these are smart people, they simply don't read as much news or opinions on a subject as I do. I guess the truth is whoever has first mover advantage on information and can craft facebook headlines to convey their opinion.

The worst part is reading many sources, opinions, and analysis is that it has turned me into a Trump supporter. But this is based on my careful analysis and (as much as possible) objective view of the decisions he makes...this has turned me into somewhat of a political pariah among the majority of my friends who typically only read Trump-rage headlines, or as noted above, only the first story from CNN.
Re:Fact checkers? by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-08 14:34 · Score: 0

A lack of means and motive does not prove CERN right. I would suspect that most people are indifferent to the discoveries made by the LHC.
Practically, though, people do care about technology that comes about from research in areas that today are considered esoteric but tomorrow become important. All the research into rocketry and consideration of time dilation aren't things people care about, but they do care about GPS. You could argue people don't care about the facts underlying the technology, but if you're relying upon those facts as part of your business, at some level you're going to practically care. Maybe the aspects of the LHC research will never matter in common technology. Maybe they will.

The point of science is that experiments can be repeated and claims can be verified. Yes, functionally you put a lot of trust in the accumulated knowledge we have. That is fine for things like the Higgs Boson but not so great for politics. If some billionaire really wanted to he could build an equivalent accelerator to try and disprove CERN which is a fundamental part of the scientific method.
Which is fundamentally bullshit. Sure, a billionaire can spend $13.25 billion can recreate the LHC and do the research, but doesn't he have a vested interest in the results having spent all that money? Scientists definitely have their own interest, but it's not their money. Either way, unless you're the billionaire and directing the activities, you're still back to trusting that someone else because you're not the one personally proving anything.
Please stop confusing truth with facts. Most of what goes on in politics is people arguing about truths, not facts. It's why you can't readily present people with facts to disprove a position because people merely take facts as part of the input to truth. It's also a large part of why people take what others say as false or opinion because their own bias is not interested in facts but what they perceive as truth. The rest, of course, is people who have no qualms at lying or trolling because they consciously or unconsciously wish to manipulate other people for their own ends. This to has little to do with facts and rarely has anything to do with truth.
If you want to conflate what you believe as proven and your belief system as true and factual, fine. But you're just pulling the same political bullshit as the people you seem to complain about. If you want something good to come out of politics, a start would be to recognize that politics is a process. People conjure up truths, often unspoken, that people then use things they claim are truths to reinforce. Yet rarely is the discussion about the process, the methods, or the goals. Unsurprisingly then that people get rapped up in the day-to-day he-said/she-said bullshit, but it's rarely the relevant part of what politics is.
Feel free to continue to watch CNN/Fox News and feel superior, though. Maybe in the future you can spell out what you actual want, figure out what others want, and then perhaps see what the facts and truths are in those. Then you may be in an actual position to judge the situation on an actually deep level. Of course, that's a lot of work. In many ways, it's harder than measuring the atomic weight of oxygen because it asks a lot of questions that are not easy to answer, do not have a clear consensus, are likely difficult to impossible to have clear facts on, and are unlikely to be static throughout your life let alone everyone elses.
It's almost as if politics isn't some sort of solved problem, people aren't merely being nefarious, and science is such a domain specific thing that trying to conflate it to politics in any meaningful way is absurd.
Re:Fact checkers? by rtb61 · 2018-03-08 15:45 · Score: 1

Here's a snap back to reality in this argument. Are the reading that fake news because it is fun or because they believe it to be true. How many people believe the fake news, what ever the source not because they actually really believe it but simply because they want to believe it. Is it actually convincing all that many about anything what so ever, except of one thing, they are not alone in their beliefs, which is what corporate main stream media used, 'USED' to be able to do, simple can't do it any more, because people can watch other stuff instead and they do.
The time is getting close for the news model, still not there though and corporate main stream media will fight the new model fang and claw, the lying animals that they are. The time will come when the new model is accepted but it is not yet.

--
Chaos - everything, everywhere, everywhen
Re: Fact checkers? by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-08 16:53 · Score: 0

Its OK bro. Youve accepted yp
our role as the ignorant woke Amerikuk. Your "friends" are disgusted because they operate under the delusiom of not being the only thing that matters.
Better be teaching your kids Mandarin.. wait, what am I saying.. your kids will starve to death. Enjoy your thirdworld shithole, you earned it!
Re: Fact checkers? by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-09 06:32 · Score: 0

Go get laid, Ivan. You're bringing down our buzz.
Re:Fact checkers? by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-09 10:22 · Score: 0

It turns out fake news worked like a charm on you. Your friends probably all laugh at you for your gullibility. I certainly enjoy your ad revenue.
Re:Fact checkers? by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-12 00:08 · Score: 0

"No, not even slightly."
Even the wiki on falsifiability mentions verifiable as a key component of science... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

Nonetheless, the existence of quarks is a fact.
If one doesn't have the mathematical ability to understand quarks, how can one verify or refute them? (not being facetious/genuine question/just about everyone is in this boat)

Re:Q: What kind of a retard gets news from Twitter by gnick · 2018-03-08 08:10 · Score: 1

Occasionally there are major policy announcements that hit Twitter first. That's news.

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He's getting rather old, but he's a good mouse.

What is Truth by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-08 08:10 · Score: 0

Not to get philosophical but are they talking about the factual quality of twitter or it's "truthyness"

I mean for one thing I see much more satire and outright trolling, which is non-factual content but may contain "Truth"

I need a research grant to determine "why so many scientists waste time on the obvious"...

But how do the scientists know... by Archtech · 2018-03-08 08:14 · Score: -1, Troll

... which is truth and which is "fake news"?

People have been arguing that issue for thousands of years.

--
I am sure that there are many other solipsists out there.

Re:But how do the scientists know... by geekmux · 2018-03-08 08:16 · Score: 4, Insightful

... which is truth and which is "fake news"?
People have been arguing that issue for thousands of years.
Putting religion aside for a moment, we generally use these things called "facts" to discern truth from bullshit. Not sure why you feel we're still validating how we do this thousands of years later. We still use the word "liar" too, which also has a pretty clear definition.
Re:But how do the scientists know... by penandpaper · 2018-03-08 08:24 · Score: 1

You can lie with facts.
Re:But how do the scientists know... by geekmux · 2018-03-08 08:35 · Score: 1

You can lie with facts.
Yes, and you can also multiply the largest number in the world by zero, and get a similar value.
Facts + bullshit = bullshit. It's that simple, if you want truth to survive and thrive.
Re:But how do the scientists know... by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-08 08:37 · Score: 1

we generally use these things called "facts" to discern truth from bullshit.
I see you are still in elementary school. Your entire perspective is based on a lie of trustworthyness.
In reality, we use observations to assess and document the causality we are aware of. In retrospect, some of those observations will be labelled as "fact" and others will be discarded as misunderstandings. Many facts of the past have been discarded when analyzed with more detail or new contradicting observations.
The above is true for hard sciences, social sciences, and history (many "facts" of archaeology have been found false with the discovery of more old texts and ruins). Theoretical mathematics only cares about consistency, lingual fields care primarily about communication, and artistic fields consider everything malleable for the sake of art.
Now, on to the summary:

"Whereas the truth rarely diffused to more than 1,000 people, the top 1% of false-news cascades routinely diffused to between 1,000 and 100,000 people,"
Without providing a numerical definition of "rarely", this looks like they are reporting the exact same rate of effect. 1% is pretty rare, and "between 1,000 and 100,000" is actually a more restricted range than "more than 1,000."
Re:But how do the scientists know... by AmiMoJo · 2018-03-08 08:38 · Score: 1

Aside from straight to lies, "alternative facts" are a huge problem. Things that are kinda true but which are misleading or deliberately omit important caveats.
Statistics are often abused as alternative facts, because you can work the numbers to say pretty much anything you like.

--
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
Re:But how do the scientists know... by iMadeGhostzilla · 2018-03-08 09:04 · Score: 0

They don't! What more confirmation do you need than this quote by Max Planck: "A new scientific truth does not triumph by convincing its opponents and making them see the light, but rather because its opponents eventually die, and a new generation grows up that is familiar with it."
Ever since early 2016 I've been thinking what we call facts is entirely statistical, and, what's worse, filtered by our perception. We'll take a claim as true -- pick any nontrivial contentious topic, such as humans are the cause of global warming -- if we *believe* that a large number of PhDs (a journalist wrote that their number is large, we didn't sit with those people at a conference) who we *believe* are credible (we've never witnessed their theses defenses, so we rely on N-th hand accounts) are making the claim, and not just making, but if (we believe) they are repeating it because we keep hearing about it over and over.
And for all any such claim won't do squat for us if we are not going to make an actual decision based on it. (A decision may be I won't eat gluten for a month.) All these fake news and their pseudo-real counterparts -- such as whose inauguration size is bigger -- are entirely useless, they are just fuel for arguing online.
Why we need to argue online about things that don't affect us is a different question...
Re:But how do the scientists know... by geekmux · 2018-03-08 09:07 · Score: 1

Aside from straight to lies, "alternative facts" are a huge problem. Things that are kinda true but which are misleading or deliberately omit important caveats.
Agreed. That is a growing problem. That said, I see "fake news" on a different level that lends itself more towards the liar-liar end of the bullshit spectrum.

Statistics are often abused as alternative facts, because you can work the numbers to say pretty much anything you like.
Absolutely agree with you here. Statistics is a form of data manipulation. More often than not, they are used to prove one's agenda and not much else. Personally I see the need for more regulation around the use of statistics because of the manipulative power they hold.
Re: But how do the scientists know... by prefec2 · 2018-03-08 09:22 · Score: 1

Facts are information which can be objectively evaluated, i. e. , everyone can in principle test them. Fake news are fiction, they are subjective and can either be based on lack of information, wishful thinking, or deliberate lies.
For example, steel tariffs have been issued by Trump is a fact. If they have a positive or negative impact on jobs in the US is speculation. While there are some interpretation which are more likely than others they are not fact but the interpretations + probabilities are.
Re:But how do the scientists know... by Dragonslicer · 2018-03-08 09:55 · Score: 1

... which is truth and which is "fake news"?
People have been arguing that issue for thousands of years.
Not really, no. The only people arguing the issue are people who want to be able to easily dismiss any events, statements, or facts that are in any way negative or damaging to them.

The Huffington Post is (generally) not "fake news", it's merely biased reporting combined with opinion. The Onion is "fake news".
Re:But how do the scientists know... by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-08 18:47 · Score: 0

The Huffington Post is (generally) not "fake news", it's merely biased reporting combined with opinion. The Onion is "fake news".
That really depends on your definition of "fake news" for me, yes Huffington Post is "fake news" and The Onion is "satire".
Re:But how do the scientists know... by apoc.famine · 2018-03-09 04:57 · Score: 1

Anyone who utters the phrase "fake news" instantly loses all credibility to me. If you can't explain what's wrong with it, then there's about a 95% chance you're full of shit.
Tell me what they did wrong, and I'll listen. Loosened the bounds of what's significant? Threw out too many outliers? Let participants self-select with no controls? Sure. That's bullshit.
"FAKE NEWS!!!", "I know you are but what am I?", and "LALALALA I CAN'T HEAR YOU" are not productive ways to communicate.

--
Velociraptor = Distiraptor / Timeraptor
Re: But how do the scientists know... by Reverend+Green · 2018-03-09 06:35 · Score: 1

https://archive.org/details/Ho...
Re: But how do the scientists know... by Reverend+Green · 2018-03-09 06:59 · Score: 1

DPRK News Service is the only REAL news!
https://twitter.com/DPRK_News
Re:But how do the scientists know... by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-09 11:31 · Score: 0

I don't know, "fake news!" is more concise than "That article is an utter fabrication with no truth to it whatsoever."
The real problem is credibility; people who cry "fake news" usually mean "Uh, it makes me look bad, and I don't want to admit it".

Scientists Prove That Humans Are Stupid by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-08 08:15 · Score: 0

... film at 11

Obligatory quote by ClickOnThis · 2018-03-08 08:16 · Score: 4, Interesting

A lie gets halfway around the world before the truth has a chance to get its pants on.

Attributed, in various forms, to many (including Churchill, erroneously) but there is no clear indication of who the original author is.

https://quoteinvestigator.com/...

--
If it weren't for deadlines, nothing would be late.

Re:Obligatory quote by PolygamousRanchKid+ · 2018-03-08 08:23 · Score: 1

A lie gets halfway around the world before the truth has a chance to get its pants on.
Sort of a twist on:
"Dog bites man!": Not news . . . Won't spread.
"Man bites dog!": Real news . . . Spreads fast!
The real world and real news are boring and difficult for most folks to deal with.
Fake news is fun and exciting!

--
Schroedinger's Brexit: The UK is both in and out of the EU at the same time!
Re:Obligatory quote by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-08 08:39 · Score: 0

The real world and real news are boring...
I remember those days. I miss them.

... and difficult for most folks to deal with.
I'm with you there.
Re:Obligatory quote by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-08 09:05 · Score: 0

A lie will run around the world before the truth has got its boots on.
Re:Obligatory quote by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-08 09:26 · Score: 0

There's an Arabic proverb which says "A lie can travel from Baghdad to Constantinople while the truth is still looking for it's sandals".
I have no idea how old it is, but I'd wager both that it's considerably older than Churchill, and that if you dig enough you'll find similar proverbs far older still. There are a reason liars are practically universally shunned everywhere except in our modern day society where the psychopath seems to be the new ideal.
Re:Obligatory quote by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-08 09:43 · Score: 1

"One should not believe everything he reads on the Internet" - Abraham Lincoln
Re:Obligatory quote by rnturn · 2018-03-08 09:46 · Score: 1

The idea behind this quote has been around for a while. A variation on this quote is often attributed to Mark Twain.

--
CUR ALLOC 20195.....5804M
Re:Obligatory quote by Solandri · 2018-03-08 11:08 · Score: 1

A more mundane way of putting it is that it's easier to make up an interesting story, than it is to find a real one. If you control for how interesting a story is, I'll bet the fake one will be distributed in social media at the same rate as the true one.

That is, this isn't an A->B correlation, where the (A) story being false causes (B) story to spread faster. It's a C->A and B correlation, where (C) a story being interesting both (B) spreads faster and (A) is more likely to be false. The story being false probably has nothing to do with the rate of its spread, it's just that false stories are more likely to be interesting.
Re: Obligatory quote by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-09 03:28 · Score: 0

No, Solandri, your fake stories are boring. Biased and partisan, usually, but entirely devoid of salacious interest.
Re: Obligatory quote by Reverend+Green · 2018-03-09 07:01 · Score: 1

"That which is quoted on the internet must surely be true." - Julius Caesar

"Fact Checkers" used by bracktra · 2018-03-08 08:17 · Score: 2

snopes.com, politifact.com, factcheck.org, truthorfiction.com, hoax-slayer.com, and urbanlegends.about.com

Re:"Fact Checkers" used by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-08 08:53 · Score: -1

Left wing fascists are running those "fact sites"
They are really not sites, they have no facts, and they are really biased.
Re:"Fact Checkers" used by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-08 09:07 · Score: 0

What brand of foil is your favorite?
Re:"Fact Checkers" used by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-08 10:04 · Score: 1

They are really not sites, they have no facts, and they are really biased.
This just in: Despite appearances to the contrary, snopes.com, politifact.com, factcheck.org, truthorfiction.com, hoax-slayer.com, and urbanlegends.about.com are NOT in fact websites. Don't let the MSM distract you from what's REALLY happening. Also, whatever you do, don't verify this yourself by entering any of these URLs in your browser.
These REALLY REAL facts brought to you by that stalwart defender of truth, Mr. A. Coward.
Re:"Fact Checkers" used by DerekLyons · 2018-03-08 16:57 · Score: 1

Translation: I don't have any actual proof that these sources are trustworthy, so I'll use scare quotes so I don't actually say anything that I can be called on.
Unfortunately, that approach requires the people seeing it to be stupid. We aren't. We're quite familiar with how right wing nutjobs (of the type that increasingly infest Slashdot) work. You've gone right down the list of the sites they hate - because they routinely expose the right's lies and corruption. You can't disprove them on facts, so you resort to other methods.
Re:"Fact Checkers" used by RazorSharp · 2018-03-09 03:36 · Score: 1

Left wing fascists
The irony is great with this one. Is this troll serious or is he being ironic? We'll never know. I always find posts like these to be such curiosities. I want to believe he's being ironic, but the cynic in me is inclined to believe that there are people out there who will accuse others of being "left wing fascists" in earnest.

--
"From the depths of my skeptical and rationalist soul, I ask the Lord to protect me from California touchie-feeliedom."
Re:"Fact Checkers" used by RazorSharp · 2018-03-09 03:49 · Score: 1

Reality does have a well-known liberal bias. That's why the conservative coalition is primarily composed of Evangelicals, MBAs, racists, and libertarians. Those who live in a fantasy world, those who live and die by the lie, those who reject reality because it's a threat to their egos, and those who reject empirical economic data because it doesn't conform with their utopian fantasy.

--
"From the depths of my skeptical and rationalist soul, I ask the Lord to protect me from California touchie-feeliedom."
Re:"Fact Checkers" used by apoc.famine · 2018-03-09 05:24 · Score: 1

This has always mystified me, and probably always will. How do you work with reality if you don't accept it? When your decisions are poor because they are based on fallacies, how do you hold tight to those fallacies and create new ones to explain away your poor decision, rather than accept them and make better decisions in the future?
It's closely tied to voting against one's self interest. "It's more important that I identify with and support this group, even if it hurts me, than to be an independent agent."
I just can't wrap my head around it.

--
Velociraptor = Distiraptor / Timeraptor
Re: "Fact Checkers" used by Reverend+Green · 2018-03-09 07:05 · Score: 1

"Fascist" is just a colloquial term of abuse. He means "authoritarian".
I still think the bogus left/right divide is sixteen tons of steaming bullshit.
Re: "Fact Checkers" used by Reverend+Green · 2018-03-09 07:06 · Score: 1

Everyone who disagrees with my political opinions is stupid!
Re:"Fact Checkers" used by RazorSharp · 2018-03-09 09:44 · Score: 1

It's closely tied to voting against one's self interest.
I think there are two primary causes of this. 1) stupidity and 2) the "temporarily inconvenienced millionaire" delusion. The two are closely related. I don't think most people who vote against their self-interest do so consciously.

--
"From the depths of my skeptical and rationalist soul, I ask the Lord to protect me from California touchie-feeliedom."
Re:"Fact Checkers" used by apoc.famine · 2018-03-09 15:42 · Score: 1

There's a cause related to your 2nd, and it's been used very effectively since the civil war: "There aren't enough scraps for you poor people to all have some. What do you want to do about it?" And in that case, a solid voting block is willing to screw everyone poor (including themselves!) to benefit the rich. But either they figure that they'll be rich sometime soon and not have to worry about it, or it's just easier to fuck over the poor.
Somehow "eat the rich" doesn't end up as an obvious strategy, and I'm a little baffled by it.
This crazy strategy has created a long-term push against social safety nets, despite them being better for society and in general, more cost effective than "personal responsibility". It's better and cheaper, but it's "a hand-out to lazy folks", so we refuse it! Even if it would benefit us personally!

--
Velociraptor = Distiraptor / Timeraptor

Re:Q: What kind of a retard gets news from Twitter by PolygamousRanchKid+ · 2018-03-08 08:17 · Score: 1

Wrong question.

"What kind of a retard posts news from Twitter?"

If you have a nation full of retards . . . maybe Twitter is the best choice to reach them . . .

--
Schroedinger's Brexit: The UK is both in and out of the EU at the same time!

Terry Pratchett already knew this by Dragonslicer · 2018-03-08 08:18 · Score: 1

"A lie can run round the world before the truth has got its boots on."

Not really news... by tlhIngan · 2018-03-08 08:19 · Score: 1

There is real truth to the saying "A lie gets halfway around the world before the truth gets its pants on".

Falsehoods have always spread much faster than the truth, it's just in the hyper connected world we live in, instead of taking a day to spread through the world (slightly longer before the age of electronic communications like telephone and telegraph), it takes just milliseconds.

Re:Not really news... by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-08 10:14 · Score: 0

Yes. Someone makes something up about an event that has just happened, posts it in one or more internet echo chambers, and it will be widely disseminated before anything is known with any certainty.

Wow this article really took off fast by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-08 08:19 · Score: 0

Its spread on Twitter was explosive! I wonder if it ts true...

Fake news is more fun by bigmacx · 2018-03-08 08:24 · Score: 1

Real life is just simply boring. Spice it up a bit with some trendy lies and see what sticks.

Yes, but then... by LordHighExecutioner · 2018-03-08 08:24 · Score: 1

...why did they publish their paper on Tweeter ?

Objective truth or subjective truth? by Train0987 · 2018-03-08 08:26 · Score: 1

What's lost in all this is the difference between objective truth and subjective truth. All of these arguments seem to be debating differing subjective truths and extremists on both sides believe that their own subjective truths are absolute. Unfortunately one of those sides is massively over-represented in the media and control of online censorship.

There is no way this true!! by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-08 08:26 · Score: 0

NO WAY!

Well Doh! by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-08 08:28 · Score: -1

the "RealDonaldTrump" is a perfect example of 'Fake News' winning over reality.

And people still use this shite?

Re:Well Doh! by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-08 08:35 · Score: 0

And here we have a perfect example of fake news generation, albeit it somewhat at the meta level.
Why is it that all the allegations against Trump start with, "If true..."? And why is it that they occur so often?
And why is it that the MSN ignores what is actually proved: collusion between HRC and Russia, private servers, DNC stealing the election from Bernie, etc?
Sorry, pal. But the fake news is not Trump. It is the cool aid that you are guzzling gleefully down.
Re:Well Doh! by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-08 08:43 · Score: 0

LOL at MSM ignoring Hillary's private servers
Re:Well Doh! by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-08 08:53 · Score: 0

Oh sure they talked about it a lot, but mainly saying it isn't a big deal.
Re:Well Doh! by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-08 13:15 · Score: 0

And here we have a perfect example of fake news generation, albeit it somewhat at the meta level.
Why is it that all the allegations against Trump start with, "If true..."? And why is it that they occur so often?
And why is it that the MSN ignores what is actually proved: collusion between HRC and Russia, private servers, DNC stealing the election from Bernie, etc?
Sorry, pal. But the fake news is not Trump. It is the cool aid that you are guzzling gleefully down.
This is despite the FBI and Congress investigating Hillary's email server then dropping it due to lack of evidence then bringing it back up and talking about it again on cameras and then dropping it again due to lack of evidence but then it amazingly becomes "Proved" somehow because it "proves" what Trump has repeatedly accused of is actually Hillary's fault of which she has been accused of by only you? Also you might as well add the weight of circumstantial evidence that republicans tend to repeatedly accuse democrats of things they did and then get called on it, then either drop it and shut up or get nailed on it. Trump is headed for the latter with the Russia fiasco. Scream fake news all you want because you don't like it, It does in no way change the truth just because you don't like it. If the Manfort issue gets prosecuted and it leads to an impeachment, then that will be one hell of a piece of fake news! /SARCASM FROM THE BOWELS OF HELL!!
Re: Well Doh! by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-09 07:11 · Score: 0

No one talks about all the money the Chinese spent trying to get Clinton elected.

Re:Q: What kind of a retard gets news from Twitter by war4peace · 2018-03-08 08:28 · Score: 1

News is something that's fresh, has relevance AND IS TRUE.
Statements released 5 minutes ago and unchecked, are not news. They're just statements until proven true, and only then they become news.

--
...gis sdrawkcab (usually not responding to ACs; don't bother posting as AC)

The more preposterous by midifarm · 2018-03-08 08:29 · Score: 1

The more it's believed.

The human brain did not evolve to seek truth by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-08 08:30 · Score: 0

Human intelligence never evolved to more easily paint an accurate picture of reality and how things actually are and work. It evolved as a social tool, a glue to bond together humans into strong and coecive social groups and to support complex languages and interrelation to better coordinate families and tribes into functioning single units. Our intelligence's ability to understand the world around us is just a convininent side effect.

Information bias is just an example of this. When faced with evicence that condradicts our strongly held beliefs, our gut reaction is not to reevaluate those belief, but to strongly deny said evidence, even to the point of attacking those who bring it to us. The harder you try to convince someone of something, the harder he/she resists, regardless of any insurmontable evidence you may present. His/her brain interprets an attack on his/her beliefs exactly like a physical attack on themselves, and they react accordingly.

Because from an evolutionary standpoint, being part of a strong, coesive social group was more advantagous for survival than having a more accurate understanding of reality.

Re:Q: What kind of a retard gets news from Twitter by gnick · 2018-03-08 08:31 · Score: 1

Statements released 5 minutes ago and unchecked, are not news.

'X' might not be true, but "DJT said 'X" might be news in itself.

--
He's getting rather old, but he's a good mouse.

This is a bad result of believing news on Twitter by Patent+Lover · 2018-03-08 08:40 · Score: 1

http://www.foxnews.com/us/2016...

#pizzagate

Churchill the Jew WAR-CRIMINAL by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-08 08:42 · Score: 0

a lie is a forecast of truth: it will happen, eventually.

Sci-Fi is military journalism where facts and people and events are abstracted to protect the source.

Now about that Churchill bit: he bombed Dresden 2-days after peace and is related to Hitler both jews of ROTHSCHILD origin.

Truth is the emperor; doesn't need pants, past or future tense.

Re:Churchill the Jew WAR-CRIMINAL by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-08 08:48 · Score: 0

You forgot to take your lithium again.

Re:Q: What kind of a retard gets news from Twitter by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-08 08:42 · Score: 0

Not to be picky but it depends what the story is presented as

If the story is "DJT said X" that is news and true, as long as the quote is accurate
If the story is "X" then that may not be news or true.

Censorship on the internet by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-08 08:48 · Score: 0

Sign the petition demanding the White House take action against censorship on the internet. We need an internet Bill of Rights!

https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/internet-bill-rights-2

Re:Q: What kind of a retard gets news from Twitter by sycodon · 2018-03-08 09:00 · Score: 1

Don't confuse, "get their news" with making it the news.

How many times have you read, "Twitter erupts!" followed by a "story" comprised mostly of Twitter idiots?

--
When Fascism comes to America, it will call itself Anti-Fascism, and tell you to give up your guns.

Cosmic irony by sinij · 2018-03-08 09:00 · Score: 1

I find it deeply ironic the the hive of SJW and villainy that are FB and Twitter single-highhandedly created right-wing ideological fever swamps.

Before social media, it was mostly contained to a bunch of old senile people protesting with "Keep government hands off my medicare". Today, these cooks have a POTUS and SJWs gave them tools to do it.

Hahahaha.

Re:Cosmic irony by neo-mkrey · 2018-03-08 09:11 · Score: 1

kooks, not cooks, unless you were trying to imply somebody with culinary skills
Re:Cosmic irony by serviscope_minor · 2018-03-08 10:43 · Score: 1

What you're basically aying is you're a mindless product of liberals? A group so evil, they actually created you!

--
SJW n. One who posts facts.
Re:Cosmic irony by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-08 12:57 · Score: 0

kooks, not cooks, unless you were trying to imply somebody with culinary skills
Caution, Don't eat food cooked by Kooks!! That is how you end up eating cyanide!
Re:Cosmic irony by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-08 18:54 · Score: 0

No, they're saying they are a product of mindless liberals.
Re:Cosmic irony by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-08 21:55 · Score: 0

They have their left-wing ideological fever swamps as well. As a prime example I would refer you to the FB page Occupy Democrats, a page with a Zero accuracy rating at politifact, which will ban anyone who attempts to question the lies they spew, even though so many of their posts are easily challenged (again see politifact for their abysmal accuracy rating). It's a pure echo chamber of left wing fever, and it's following is not small.

A similar page is the "Other 98%" page.

The Lie gets from Bagdad to Constantinople... by DrTJ · 2018-03-08 09:04 · Score: 1

... while the Truth looks for its sandals.

Re:The Lie gets from Bagdad to Constantinople... by Mal-2 · 2018-03-08 18:39 · Score: 1

If you're looking for truth in Constantinople, it'll be waiting in Istanbul.

--
How is the Riemann zeta function like Trump rallies? Both have an endless number of trivial zeros.

Everything on the internet is true! by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-08 09:07 · Score: 0

I'm a french model!

https://www.ispot.tv/ad/7VOE/state-farm-the-internet-and-french-model

Step Up Your Game - by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-08 09:08 · Score: 0

This just tells me that people who want to disseminate facts are very poor at communicating, and don't know the first thing about generating or countering mass appeal. The hucksters of the modern era (and before) don't peddle information, they peddle affirmation, and if you don't know how to combine the two, then knowing the truth will never be affirmative enough for people to care. This probably sounds like a hell of a balancing act, and it is, but refusing to do so or pretending that it's impossible is how people who do know the truth and tell it lose control of the narrative.

Before all other things in your life, be a good salesman - because with a good enough pitch, people will buy anything, for better or worse.

Not truth vs false but how much Interesting by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-08 09:16 · Score: 0

False claims are generally more interesting to read than true ones. It is not whether a story is true or false but whether a story is interesting that makes it popular

Never Right or Never Wrong? by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-08 09:19 · Score: 0

Yes we were wrong in the past, but we fixed our mistakes and now we promise, we are right this time! We found another mistake but we fixed that one too so now we are certain we are right! We found another mistake... We are right because we say we are right! The facts prove we are right. What the facts were adjusted to fit the narrative? Now they are right, we promise!

Truthy by jbmartin6 · 2018-03-08 09:24 · Score: 3, Interesting

It's just a sort of natural selection. The fake news which appeals to people's prejudices and desires is more appealing, and thus more likely to get forwarded. I'll bet there is tons of fake stuff which dies on the vine. Also, a lot of fake news is designed to specifically have that appeal, hence the term "clickbait." Meanwhile the truth is often quite prosaic, and doesn't often have that "zing" quality of proving us right all along.

--
This posting is provided 'AS IS' without warranty of any kind, implied or otherwise.

Re:Truthy by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-08 09:32 · Score: 0

"The difference between truth and fiction is that fiction must make sense" - Mark Twain
Or, to expand: a lie will often "make sense" in-so-far as it fits nicely with a person's ingrained prejudices and represents their expectations. Truth, on the other hand, just is: no guarantee it will be what you expect, no obvious, surface-level cause/effect, just an (apparently) isolated "thing". Hardly surprising that people will gravitate to that which makes "sense".
Re:Truthy by pjklein · 2018-03-08 10:49 · Score: 1

When I saw this post's headline, my first thought was Twain. For two reasons 1) the above quote 2) that, though we knew Twain was right, science has proven it. Twitter IS the telelectroscope (https://history-computer.com/Library/MarkTwain1898.pdf). In spite of Twain's warning, in out time, "poor Clayton was hanged" anyway.

Scientists don't prove by WinstonWolfIT · 2018-03-08 09:29 · Score: 2

Scientists observe. Mathematicians prove.

Truth is like poetry by PPH · 2018-03-08 09:36 · Score: 2

And most people hate poetry.

--The Big Short

--
Have gnu, will travel.

Slashdot comments are Fake by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-08 09:40 · Score: 0

I searched for 'fake' on this slashdot topic and got hits.
I searched for 'bible' and 'linux', both which are 'the truth', and got no hits.
Slashdot comments are thus useless junk.

Twitter can actively mitigate this by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-08 09:53 · Score: 0

Twitter can take responsibility and issue rebuttals.

Twitter can resolve this by actively forcing a correction into the timelines of people who engaged with the falsehood.

Yeah, not every single time. Yeah, some qualifier needed as to which falsehoods get rebutted. Yeah yeah, but yeah Twitter can actively resolve this. If they wanted.

You don't say? by MalachiK · 2018-03-08 10:03 · Score: 1

I'm astounded.

Incorrect by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-08 10:19 · Score: 0

Scientists observe. Mathematicians prove.

Scientists observe. Mathematicians describe. Nobody proves. Everybody believes.

In the end nothing is provable as all things that an individual "knows" are based on the assumption that the incoming data stream called reality is the truth.

Re:Incorrect by WinstonWolfIT · 2018-03-09 09:05 · Score: 1

I'm not going to sleep because someone is wrong on the Internet.

News flash: by GoCrazy · 2018-03-08 10:21 · Score: 1

People more attracted to Man Bites Dog stories.

More at 7

--
No beer and no TV make Homer something something

Re: News flash: by Reverend+Green · 2018-03-09 07:16 · Score: 1

I bit my brother's dog once, after it had bitten me. That dog never bit me again.

I always hear by Arzaboa · 2018-03-08 10:32 · Score: 1

When I talk to folks about the fake news they get why they enjoy it and read it, I'm told by them, that every story is based on a little truth. They think that they still get the base story, while being amused at how they are reading the news. Over years when this is all one ingests, it breads cynical distaste in life. Normal articles are long and boring, talking to different people face to face is out, and you can now see the truth, which really is that there is a conspiracy in everything. For the most part, they believe that they have thought it through.

--
People are people so why should it be -- Depeche Mode

Re:I always hear by RazorSharp · 2018-03-09 03:56 · Score: 1

Basically, it's tabloid news.

--
"From the depths of my skeptical and rationalist soul, I ask the Lord to protect me from California touchie-feeliedom."

I think this is more a study in.... by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-08 10:33 · Score: 0

I think this is more a study in how good of a job the fake political news authors do when writing fake stories.

Note...
- Sensationalism sells
- Opposing views rally
- Critical and divisive viewpoints get attention
- Gossip will be gossip

The average real news story is just not that interesting - most of the time. I'm not saying it shouldn't be interesting or people shouldn't care more about some of the newsworthy headlines, the fact is that most people just can't be bothered to give the time or care to it.

Everyone knows that social venues (such as FB and Twatter) are full of people that want to share, are generally very opinionated and are ready to share the latest scoop with everyone they know.

So, the conclusion the data collected by this study is likely extremely accurate, however the conclusion of the study that the data proves the rate of spread of information depends on whether it is true or false is naive at best!

The rate of the spread of information has always and will always continue to be based on the following factors regardless of the platform(s) involved.
1. How interested is the audience in the topic & information
2. Is the audience readily able to actively participate in discussions of the topic

Doomed to fail by petes_PoV · 2018-03-08 10:36 · Score: 1

fake news reaches users up to 20 times faster than factual content

So how far will this story get?

--
politicians are like babies' nappies: they should both be changed regularly and for the same reasons

People who get their news from Twitter.. by h8sg8s · 2018-03-08 10:46 · Score: 1

.. are mostly idiots in the first place. Twitter is the hall-of-mirrors of echo chambers - lots of twisty little tweets, all the same.

--
Organization? You must be joking..

The mass of the human race is getting dumber. by mohsel · 2018-03-08 10:47 · Score: 1

This tells me more about to readers than it does about the platform where the content is published.

Truth is often boring by duke_cheetah2003 · 2018-03-08 12:00 · Score: 1

While wild conspiracy theories, lies and misinformation, it can be flashy and click-baity. Lies exploit our human nature to find outrageous claims to be fascinating.
The more outlandish the lie is, the more interesting it is. Truth is truth, and often it's just dull and boring. It's a lot harder to make truth flashy and bold.

can this be fixed by using reps of retweeters? by sloth+jr · 2018-03-08 12:11 · Score: 1

Off the top of my head - if each Twitter user had a "reliability" reputation associated with their account that decreased on false retweeting and increased with "true" retweeting, and their ability to tweet frequency-limited by that reputation score, would that put a check to this problem?

Re:can this be fixed by using reps of retweeters? by Mordaximus · 2018-03-08 23:30 · Score: 1

Off the top of my head - if each Twitter user had a "reliability" reputation associated with their account that decreased on false retweeting and increased with "true" retweeting, and their ability to tweet frequency-limited by that reputation score, would that put a check to this problem?
If the assumption is that people who tweet are only reporting "news" then perhaps. Displaying reliability would be a possibility, but who judges that? If for instance, Fox News assigned it once, and CNN another, you would have wildly varying outcomes. On the other hand, displaying the reliability value would likely break Twitter's layout if Trump is in your news feed.
Kidding aside, I like your idea, just not sure how it could be implemented.

No Twitter account here by riverat1 · 2018-03-08 12:14 · Score: 1

Just another good reason I'm glad I haven't signed up for a Twitter account (or Facebook either).

Not a fair comparison by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-08 12:33 · Score: 0

Truth is likely to be reported independently by many sources, fabrications have only one.

Unless you figure out how to aggregate the many sources that are all reporting the same truthful story, you won't have a fair picture of how fast that is spreading.

Twitter is "lazy journalism" by p51d007 · 2018-03-08 14:06 · Score: 1

Journalist, have become lazy...instead of investigating stories before they blast them out, they just copy/paste if it fits their personal, or corporate interest. Twitter is why the USA was founded as a Constitutional republic, and not a democracy. A pure democracy is emotionally driven, whereas a Constitutional republic, allows for conscience thought before making a decision. Just look at the whole hands up don't shoot garbage. Twitter blasts out that a police officer shot a kid several times WHILE he was RUNNING AWAY with his hands up, and it spread like wildfire. After the TRUTH came along, that we found out not only was this young adult not running away, he was running TOWARDS the officer, after he had previously assaulted the officer, and, tried to remove his service weapon, after he previously assaulted a business owner. But, still today, there are many who believe the twitter version, even though it was false. Twitter, is for TWITS.

Truth can be less believable than fiction by twosat · 2018-03-08 14:29 · Score: 1

"Why shouldn't truth be stranger than fiction? Fiction, after all, has to make sense." Mark Twain

Science has no truth by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-08 14:33 · Score: 0

It has evidence to support a theory.

Water is wet! Story at 11! by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-08 14:49 · Score: 0

I could have saved MIT quite a bit of money. Of course truth doesn't do as well as fiction. It's boring.

Buy this story is being reported on Twitter by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-08 17:02 · Score: 0

Doesn't that mean it is false. I mean Scientist have proved Scientifically that everything reported and on Twitter is fake news. So when Scientist get this Scientific study published in social media, doesn't it follow that Science is fake news? But Science is never fake. Seems like some kind of logical conundrum. Maybe Twitter does not exist?

All news is fake by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-08 17:11 · Score: 0

People who believe that CNN is accurate and Fox is fake, or vice versa, are just deluding yourself. You have no way of knowing what is actually going on in the world. The only thing you know is what you actually see and are aware of. It has always been this way. So called news is just a means of population control used by elites to control populations to make said elites lots and lots of money and get lots of power. I'm not complaining about this natural order to the world. Wars and civilations have risen and fallen through the delusion created by media. Just don't believe you have some kind of magical ability to know truth. Maybe North Korea is really the best Korea. Maybe It is western media that his Its population brainwashed. You have know way of knowing. Just believe what you see ahead of you and take every established fact reported everywhere with a huge grain of salt.

Re: All news is fake by Reverend+Green · 2018-03-09 07:19 · Score: 1

Shhhhhhhh! People are sleeping, you might wake them.
Re:All news is fake by AutodidactLabrat · 2018-03-09 08:25 · Score: 1

Actually,yes we can know
Like when Faux KNOWINGLY spreads the lie about Scripted Interview 4 hours after CNN gave Faux the facts
Add in the WMD lies, the Obama conspiracy lies, etc, we DO know that Faux is far more often the purveyor of fake news compared to CNN

at some point you will accept other people fact by aepervius · 2018-03-08 17:16 · Score: 1

Depending on your work that point may be earlier or later than most but you WILL accept stuff. Be it what is in history book , social facts, math, physic, what a reporter is telling happens the other side of the world, or what the doctor tells you, some stuff you WILL accepet as fact either what expert tell you or plain where you are not located. Now truth to be told there is gradation, e.g. if you tell me alien landed i will request far more evidence than if you told me there is a bushfire in australia during the summer. But you cannot simply fact check everything. At some point trust will apply. The point you apply that trust is open. One rule of thumb for me is to not forward anything i did not fact check, but then again i read a LOT of article on sciences, economy so i am an outlier.

--
C. Sagan : A demon haunted world:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0345409469/
visit randi.org

The False News Cascades are lovely this year by mnemotronic · 2018-03-08 17:56 · Score: 1

the top 1% of false news cascades diffused to between 1000 and 100,000 people

Actual people or Internet Research Agency bots? I believe the Russians have got this deception propagation and contention augmentation stuff down cold .

--
The Russians have won. They have made the world a cesspool of distrust, greed, fear and hate.

WBBSE 10TH RESULT 2018 by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-09 00:03 · Score: 0

WBBSE 10TH RESULT 2018,
http://alljob.ml/wbbse-10th-result-2018/

This is nothing new by shayd2 · 2018-03-09 01:20 · Score: 1

As Churchill said: 'A lie gets halfway around the world before truth puts on its boots'

There are earlier instances see Quote Investigator

Yeah Disruption by Anonymous Coward · 2018-03-09 06:01 · Score: 0

And, courage, can't forget the courage.

Courage and disruption.

You Silicon Valley types are such stable geniuses.

fifty cent army by Reverend+Green · 2018-03-09 07:26 · Score: 1

The Fifty Cent Army is out in force tonight. All these lame quotes about lies spreading faster than truth, from rarely seen accounts with shitty usernames.

Ivan, Comrade Wang, Agent Smith, or minions of the NGO - who knows. But shit man, it's so lame it's almost cool.

Slashdot Mirror

Scientists Prove That Truth is No Match For Fiction on Twitter (theguardian.com)

194 comments