Fake News and Media Bias

A fascinating story about and an interview with the man who runs a large-scale fake news operation with multiple websites and dozens of writers and social media ops. He is a Democrat who started doing this to point out how easy it is to trick people with fake news. He now generates between $10,000 and $30,000 a month in ad revenue.

"It's all about the money". NYT talks to fake news creators.

A New York Times article covering how a picture of buses and a false claim posted on Twitter led to real media coverage of a false story.

Another story of a false story - this time a story liberals wanted to believe.

A Penn State professor of communications argues it is because we we get so much of our news from friends, and we trust our friends, even when we know we should check sources.

" We clearly prefer news stories that are likely to reinforce our existing views rather than challenge them." A professor at The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania explains echo chambers, filter bubbles, Facebook algorithms, and argues that both individuals and companies like Facebook have a role to play in diversifying our news feeds.

Head of the International Fact-Checking Network argues that facts are no less under treat than in other periods of history and that ""post-fact" is a coping mechanism for commentators reacting to attacks on not just any facts, but on those central to their belief system"

A JStor Daily article argues that no, the Internet didn't ruin anything and "Fake news is part of a larger problem of “click journalism”: media that focuses on getting online click-throughs, or on “clicking” with our pre-conceived bias." The author looks to the era Yellow Journalism of the 1890s and how the public and the courts eventual turned against it.

"Fake news, and the proliferation of raw opinion that passes for news, is creating confusion, punching holes in what is true, causing a kind of fun-house effect that leaves the reader doubting everything, including real news."