Facts v. Speculation

Case Studies in the News

As individuals and news outlets report on the tragic mid-air collision of American Airlines Flight 5342 and a military helicopter, very different responses help to illustrate the accuracy and reliability of information cited.

Facts

Source: Associated Press -- "Skaters Jinna Han and Spencer Lane were among those killed, along with their mothers, and coaches Evgenia Shishkova and Vadim Naumov, said Doug Zeghibe, CEO of the Skating Club of Boston, during a Thursday news conference."

Noteworthy in this report is the presence of names that may easily be fact-checked. Proper nouns and numbers are excellent terms for investigative searching, as they may be corroborated--or not--by other sources.

Speculation

Source: CBS News -- "Asked directly how he came to the conclusion that diversity had something to do with the crash, Mr. Trump replied, 'because I have common sense.'"

Noteworthy in this report is the lack of evidence cited and in its place the role of common sense. Common sense may seem trustworthy to the person who cites it, but there are many examples when common sense fails to foresee or prevent unwanted results. Furthermore, there is no way to fact check a personal belief about common sense other than to trust the person responsible or doubt that common sense is always right.

Misinformation on Twitter

With over 200 million Twitter contributors*, misinformation is bound to happen.

It would be pretty interesting if there was a study to determine the frequency of misinformation created by authors in the world of Web 2.0. Maybe there is such a study. I should look.

Regardless, misinformation is regularly created in the form of rumors, honest mistakes and malinformation (intentionally misleading facts and opinions).  Tweets are a good example.

UK's The Guardian has collected seven rumors that attracted a following on Twitter, spread and then died out. These include: 'Rioters attack London zoo and release animals,' 'Rioters cook their own food in McDonalds' and 'Army deployed in Bank.' Here's the complete list and an interactive app to explore the rumors and their trajectories.

All of the rumors are what you could classify as 'breaking news.' Twitter became famous as a source of breaking news during events such as the US Airways flight that ended in the Hudson River. Twitter often scoops other news sources because of eyewitnesses who tweet what they happen to see. Sometimes the stories turn out to be true. Other times they don't.

How do you tell the difference between a 'truth' and a 'rumor?' This would be a great conversation to have with middle school, high school and college students. What can you do not to fall prey to rumors?



* FYI -- Finding the current number of Twitter users makes a pretty good search challenge.