4 Ways to Spot a Fake News Story | What the Stuff?!

It has become more difficult to spot a fake news story in today's digital age. But don't worry, Josh has a few tips for you!

Article: 10 Ways to Spot a Fake News Story:

Music: "Secrets Instrumental" by YEYEY

Video Clips:

Citizen Kane - How to Run a Newspaper

The Daily Mail Song

• Reputable News Sites Aren't Carrying It
• One of the easiest ways to figure out if a news story is legitimate or not is to check it against the stories posted on other reputable sites.
• Let's stick with the example of the President suffering a heart attack. You become alarmed, but realize that you don’t recognize the website.
• If sites like The New York Times, CBS or CNN are running the same story, it's likely true.
• I know what you’re thinking – c’mon, man. Why is this even on the list? It’s so simple. Yes, you’re right. Unfortunately, a lot of people don’t search for additional sources.
• And one search might not cut it. Make sure to delve a bit deeper.
• You need to find a reputable source that has done its own reporting on the story to ensure its truth and accuracy.
• Think that's excessive? In January 2014, the Daily Mail ran a photo of smoggy Beijing in the early morning. A giant, rectangular TV screen in the foreground showed a beautiful sunrise. The story underneath was titled, "China starts televising the sunrise on giant TV screens because Beijing is so clouded in smog."
• Time magazine and CBS picked up the story, crediting the Daily Mail as the source.
• But they soon issued a correction when, after finally doing their own reporting, they discovered it was a fabrication. The TV screen existed, but the sunrise shot was part of a tourism ad.

• The Website Has an Odd Domain Name
• One of the easier ways to spot suspect stories is if they're located on a news site with a strange domain name.
• Sometimes if a story originates on a site ending in ".ru" or ".co", that's a red flag. ".Ru" is used by the Russian federation, while ".co" is used by Colombia; these two extensions are considered suspect.
• Another trick? Using nearly the same URL as a popular site, omitting a letter or two, or misspelling the name. Very long, complex domain names are another sign something might be amiss
• Remember: anyone can pay for any domain name they'd like.
• The site illustrates, through frowny faces, the 30,000 people she laid off as head of Hewlett-Packard.
• Get it? Slippery? Because butter… nevermind.

[kiler]

"reputable news source like "CNN or New York Times"" funniest thing ever said

[sokra]

the ads...they're getting smarter

[Rusty]

The credibility of this video went out the window from the point he referred CNN as a reputable news outlet.

[Degan]

Or you could just stick with comparing stories from reputable news sources. If the story is of interest to you, see how various news outlets handle it. Reputable news sites include NBC, CBS, ABC, MSNBC, CNN, and most major city newspapers (New York Times, Pittsburgh Post Gazette.
If some offbeat web site has a headline on a subject of national importance, and no one else has that story, it is probably fake. "You read it hear first, because we just made it up".

[peterfmodel]

In the age of post-modernism the news has moved from reporting of news, or facts, to reporting opinions. An opinion is not news, its entertainment. Modern news has become entertainment and that is the crux of the issue. Coupled with this is the philosophy of post modernism, which believes a fact has no relevance without context. Thus, a fact, such as Germany invaded Poland in 1939, has no meaning unless encapsulated into a context. The context could be German aggression, German response to Versailles, or alien influence in human affairs. What has happened is the context; a subjective “opinion” takes credibility from the fact embedded within it, while the fact becomes irrelevant.
The only way to deal with this is to always fact check anything you think is outrageous. A good example was a story which circulated in Australia about a single mother who was forced to pay back $50K in welfare, because her estranged husband used her address as his, even though he did not live with her. An almost identical version of this story circulated in the UK several years before, except it was £50K. Even further back a similar story was circulated in the US, except in this case it was to do with child support and, yes, it involved $50K. Take the text and search on it in Google; you will quickly discover if the story is fishy. Look for names, people, places, etc. and do your homework.
Another method is only believing financial news, because this news is used by people to make money. If its not accurate the paper will quickly die, but even in these papers avoid any opinion pieces. Financial papers are all doing well, while other media outlets are contracting rapidly. The reason is they report facts and assume the reader is intelligent enough to interpret it. The Truth takes effort to find, this has always been the case.

[SeanLamb-I-Am]

Also, some of the satire sites will say that they are satire sites on their about pages.

[sleepyfacedangel]

The Weekly World News was my jam back in the day! :D

[bpccDCin]

The NY Times is a "credible new source"? Now, THAT's incredulous.

[avashurov]

There is nothing inherently wrong with websites ending in .ru, ru is Russian national domain, most websites in Russia are under ru.

[BrandonSmith-fgno]

Thank you for the WWAN reference! I miss the good old days!

[Sea_graves]

I just use BBC News. People in my class always give me blank looks when I say that I used BBC News as a source, its kind of funny.

[joef]

I usually don't believe much on the news lately. in my opinion it's always slanted, twisted, or just made up. Especially when it comes from talk radio or from any of their host.

[Beowolfenstein]

I remember watching this episode when it was called South Park.

[blaze]

So.... how do I know this isn't fake?

[jennifergallagher]

Isn't .ru the country code for Russia? Is the info always questionable??

[Change]

Thx for this very interesting clip! Very good! And never mind the troll reactions hereunder.

[robertmorri]

Bike tard slays HOUSE CONNECT 911, details at 11 .

[diiasze]

you can have a youtube channel? y the heck have a been listen to your podcasts ?! damn you all!!!

[SlipKnotRicky]

If you say the word "Gullible" really, really slow it sounds like

[aaronevens]

What if this whole video was made to determine whether we could realise this video itself is indeed fake news?
Reputable source such as CNN, thanks for the lols.