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This is a hard job, I respect anyone who has to do this.

I've seen so many wrong or questionable answers on Snopes where I wouldn't trust it as a blind yes/somewhat/no answer anymore, without closely reading the explanation. Which is very worrying considering some people have been pushing these services as a solution to "fake news". Consumers should aways have the option of reading the paragraphs, maybe via inline warnings instead of silencing it by scrubbing it from the news feeds.

That said I've also noticed people in general are getting better at arguing and positioning their points. Twitter and other social media are generating huge amount of well-trained debaters (and expert tier complainers) who know how to present information and facts effectively and calling other people out for it too.

Edit: the sublinked article about the Fact-checking book which inspired the play is also excellent: https://www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/the-art-of-fact-...




It sounds like the New Yorker has it down to a fine art as much as possible.

- Identify every statement that could be construed as a fact

- Formulate a simple yes/no question for each one

- Verify with a quick phone call asking trusted source each question in turn

And just don't skip on the process no matter how insignificant or seemingly obvious as there is no room for error in the current environment.




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