Surviving Fake News

A couple of weeks ago I went to the library in downtown Seattle and got a copy of the information of the class called The Fake News Survival Guide. I found it to be some interesting reading.

For instance: When you look up things on the same computer or log on to a website with the same email there are computer algorithms that keep track of what you’ve looked up and find the same kind of information you’ve looked at before on the same kind of subjects.

The result: You might only be getting one side of the story. That’s called your own bias.

How do you get another side of the story? Well one way is to follow someone or start reading a newsletter that writes about the opposite viewpoint.

That’s probably not the answer a lot of people wanted to read, and you might not like doing it, but it might be worth the effort to find out what someone else thinks if you want to get a bigger picture.

Hey, something is either important to you or it’s not.

There are other things I read about like people re-posting a news clip or article because they like the picture and the title has a funny catch phrase. Or maybe they read a couple of paragraphs and liked it.

Sometimes the article isn’t even what they thought it was about when they posted it. That doesn’t necessarily make it fake news but you might be putting out click bait over the internet and look like an idiot.

Worst Case Scenario: You don’t read the full article before you re-post it you could be misrepresenting yourself on the internet. With any luck you won’t run into legal problems.

What’s a solution? Dig Deeper.

Check sources, ask yourself if it might be some kind of joke, and think about if you really care about what’s in a news clip or article before you re-post it.

There’s a lot of news on the internet. Some of it comes from people who do fact checking and get more than one side of the story. Some of it is people posting their personal opinions about events that are going on.

What exactly is Fake News? Well that’s a damned good question. There’s really no standard to go by like how the guy on the show Drag Net used to say, “Just the facts ma’am.”

You find what you’re looking for on the internet, and with social media you can post what you want. You can dig deeper what you think is important before you post it on the internet, or not. You can also find what you want to read about whether it’s to write a college paper, or learn how to do something better, or opinions about what’s going on in the media.

Since the lines have become blurred about what is real or fake news you have to use your own judgement before you re-post something on the internet

Written by Mark Blevins

Thank You For Reading

About Me:

I was a Construction Worker and Commercial Fisherman. An injury on a fishing boat in Alaska forced me into early retirement. Now I’m a Writer and Blogger. Having to start over forced me to realize people are more than their job title.

Contact me at https://twitter.com/Bllevins

Sources:

The Fake News Survival Guide

Seattle Public Library

https://www.spl.org/about-us/news-releases/fake-news-survival-guide-workshops-in-may-and-june

Title picture:

https://www.google.com/url?sa=i&source=images&cd=&ved=0ahUKEwjt6d6WzvTlAhWZJjQIHZa5BN0QMwiJASgEMAQ&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.thehindu.com%2Fnews%2Fnational%2F265-fake-news-websites-in-over-65-countries-managed-by-indian-influence-networks-study%2Farticle29967820.ece&psig=AOvVaw3oGJQrxqijri8jroBxbLXS&ust=1574195720329830&ictx=3&uact=3

https://www.google.com/url?sa=i&source=images&cd=&ved=2ahUKEwjJ45LLzPTlAhWqKDQIHbooCQYQjhx6BAgBEAI&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.coastdigital.co.uk%2F2016%2F07%2F19%2Fclickbait-case-study-content-marketing-clickbait-part-1%2F&psig=AOvVaw2O5_jRKmRP6Nnior3luM4n&ust=1574195279430014