Fake news on Facebook
Published 7:00 am Saturday, December 17, 2016
There are some really great aspects concerning how technology is changing our lives.
Many of them can be very helpful if you are, at times, a forgetful person.
Did you forget whether you set the thermostat before you left the house?
Well if you installed network connected thermostats in your home, and downloaded the application to your smartphone, you can easily fix that mistake without having to drive back home.
The same goes for a number of other things people forget to do around the home.
If you think you forgot to turn
off the oven, lock the door or feed the pets, and you bought a robot such as iPatrol Riley, you can remotely check on the status of your home.
Simply connect to the robot, and use your smartphone as a controller and display to see if the doors are locked, the cat and dog have food and water and turned the oven off before heading to work, again, without having to drive back home.
But there are things about technology that need some work. Fake news websites are on top of that list.
Not everyone can determine the difference between a real and fake news story, especially if the only thing they read was the headline.
So, Facebook has pledged to work to prevent stories from websites that host them from showing up in newsfeeds by utilizing staff to do fact checking and other tasks.
While the efforts of Mark Zuckerberg are commendable, more needs to be done to fix the problem.
The first step would be to educate its users about the difference between a real and fake news site. Take the Onion for instance.
Most people are aware that the site hosts satire infused stories for entertainment purposes.
These stories are great for a laugh, and as such should be taken with many grains of salt.
By taking that first step, we will make great strides in avoiding the spread of misinformation.
Additionally, if you think a story is fake, do a quick search on Google, or better yet Snopes.com. Most fake stories will be identified as such quickly.