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Due to social networking and the internet, many people have become
citizen journalists, sometimes given first-hand accounts of stories and
offering perspectives that many mainstream journalist’s cannot. This
is revolutionary in today’s day and age of instant news broadcast and
information, but does have its drawbacks. Citizen journalism does not necessarily equal responsible journalism.
From Manti Te’o’s girlfriend and the Arizona Powerball winner, to a fake Facebook status claiming to protect your personal information, social media hoaxes have
run amuck. With the availability of anyone who has access to the
internet, any information or news can be posted and created out of thin
air. The true tragedy is the overwhelming amount of people who believe
this so-called “news” without verifying the credibility of the source.
A lot of the false information that gets spread around is outrageous
or tempting articles that will lure the Facebook user straight to a
virus. Or in other cases, false information reported could be illegal if
it hampers or interferes with a police investigation.
Some of these posts may be created for a joke, but can often be
damaging to the individual or group that may be the focus of the hoax.
The best ways to put a halt to these rumors are to be responsible of
your personal posts, and to notify the website’s administrator about any
misinformation. The internet, unlike traditional media based
journalism, does not have an editor or filter to validate the
credibility of a particular story. Just because something is on the
internet, doesn’t mean that it is true.
If a story sounds suspicious, check its source(s). Is the information
attributed to a creditable, non-biased source? Can the story be found
on another legitimate web site? If in doubt, do not share the article,
this can only perpetuate the story continue the spiral of
misinformation. If you are certain that a particular social media post
is either false or viral, discretely notify your Facebook friends, or
post a general message alerting your entire social network of its
untruth.
[Image via inbythroughhim] Author :
