John Green Crash Course on Media Literacy
cynical
doubtful or distrustful of the goodness or sincerity of human motives
Today wikipedia has many more wikipedians and even bots to
enforce rigorous content policies and prevent and correct your bad edits.
We have to find a way to accredit and trust experts,
even though they will be wrong some of the time.
If a piece is mark Opinion, Analysis, Perspective or Viewpoint
it is meant to be persuasive not just informative.
encyclopedia
a book or set of books giving information on many subjects or on many aspects of one subject and typically arranged alphabetically.
motive
a driving force that causes a person to take action to satisfy specific needs
Info Wars
a far-right American conspiracy theory and fake news website owned by Alex Jones, who dropped out of Austin Community College, that receives receives approximately 10 million monthly visits. The content has been banned from various social media websites, including Facebook, Twitter, YouTube citing their policies against hate speech and harassment. 10 million . . . really?! You know these people are not doing their lateral reading.
Daily Kos
a group blog and internet forum focused on the Democratic Party and liberal American politics. It is financially sustained by advertising, with Google AdSense and Blogads. The ads focus mostly on activist causes, media, and political candidates. The site also offers an ad-free subscription to members.
A good question to ask is "How can I make the internet
a more positive force in my life and the lives of others?"
bloviate
talk at length, especially in an inflated or empty way
NPR fact check
trusted fact checking site hosted by National Public Radio
Wikipedia
User-created and edited online encyclopedia
The 3 questions fact checkers ask:
Who is behind this information? What is the evidence for their claim? What do other sources say about the organization and its claims?
fake news
content, news articles, or videos that present totally false information
fortitude
courage in facing difficulties
Knowing where a source came from helps
determine if it is reliable.
cogent
forceful, convincing; relevant, to the point
Snopes
formerly known as the Urban Legends Reference Pages, claims to be one of the first online fact-checking websites. It has been termed a "well-regarded source for sorting out myths and rumors" on the Internet.
infallible
free from error; absolutely dependable
Wikipedia is dependent on published sources, which have their own
gender and racial biases and contribute to what is and is not verifiable.
Wikipedia has become the internet's largest
general reference work with over 40 million articles in 301 languages.
think tank
institutional collection of policy-oriented researchers and academics who are sources of policy ideas
If the site is untrustworthy, then what the site says about itself
is most likely untrustworthy
empathy
the ability to understand and share the feelings of another
resilience
the personal strength that helps most people cope with stress and recover from adversity and even trauma
breadth
the width of something, comprehensive quality
Experts are more likely to be right
then a blogger with no formal education or experience.
net positive
there is more good than bad
cite sources
to cite where your information comes from.
set the record straight
to correct a false story; to provide accurate information
Wikipedians can add flagged notes to the
top of a page so the reader is fairly warned of any concerns about content before starting to read.
misinformation
unintentionally incorrect information
editorial standards
written statements of policy and conduct established by media organizations as a form of self-regulation
Wikipedia view history tab
you can see how and when an article has been edited and by whom.
American Enterprise Institute
Conservative Think Tank
Which way does the Nile flow?
North, thank you youTube commenters.
good evidence vs bad evidence
Not all evidence is created equal. The evidence a source provides should come from another reliable source
wikipedia
Online encyclopedia that can be edited by nearly anyone in the world, allowing people with different backgrounds and knowledge to collaborate and research together
statistics
numerical data
perspective
(n.) a point of view or general standpoint from which different things are viewed, physically or mentally; the appearance to the eye of various objects at a given time, place, or distance
twitter bots
A software program that sends out automated posts on twitter.
PolitiFact
Definition: started in 2007 website that helps citizens find out truth of candidates statements. Ranks statements on amount of truthfulness/falseness.
evaluate
Examine and judge carefully.
neutral point of view (NPOV)
Information must be presented fairly, proportionately and without bias
Center for American Progress
Liberal think tank
Wikipedia core content policies
Neutral point of view, verifiability, and no original research
Neoconservatism
Perspective advocating military strength and the promotion of American values abroad.
Why should we check multiple sources?
Relying on multiple sources of information when studying will help you to develop a comprehensive understanding of the topic, as well as clarify terms and ideas. Also it allows you to test the veracity of the "facts" presented in each source
vertical reading
Starting at the top of the page, look at the title and scroll down from there
Superscript
Text that is reduced in size and raised to the top of the current line.
Journalistic Ethics
The set of ethical responsibilities expected of the journalist when reporting on and writing about a story. Sometimes posted on their website for everyone to read.
anecdote
a usually short narrative of an interesting, amusing, or biographical incident
Wikipedia is an excellent place to harvest
its citations.
To tell if a wikipedia page is locked
look to its upper right hand corner for a little padlock icon.
authority
one's recognized knowledge and expertise on a topic
ProPublica
A nonprofit newsroom that aims to produce investigative journalism in the public interest. It has partnered with more than 90 different news organizations, and it has won four Pulitzer Prizes. The organization also appointed a 12-member journalism advisory board consisting of professional journalists. Brainchild of Marion and Herbert Sandler with a MBA and Law degree between them. The Sandlers also helped found and are among the largest benefactors of the Center for Responsible Lending, a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization fighting predatory mortgage lending, payday loans, and other products that prey on consumers; the Center for American Progress and the American Asthma Foundation. In addition, the Sandlers or their foundation support organizations involved in medical research, the environment, human rights, and civil liberties.
Drudge Report
A website hosted by Matt Drudge, a man who graduated 341st out of a class of 355 in high school and has no higher education. Time magazine is quoted describing the Drudge Report as "a ludicrous combination of gossip, political intrigue and extreme weather reports ... still put together mostly by the guy who started out as a convenience-store clerk." Even Fox News cancelled his show "Drudge" after he insisted that a misleading anti abortion picture should be used. Still during the 2016 election SimilarWeb estimates that Drudge had 1,472,220,000 page views a month. I should stop . . . my POV is leaking through.
fine but that doesn't actually prove your point evidence
Argument that is not relevant to the actual topic at hand. Evidence missing the point.
What should you consider when investigating a sources authority?
The author or authors professional background. The process they use to produce that information. The systems that are in place to catch mistakes and correct them.
Who is the magic arbiter of truth?
There isn't one.
lateral reading
When on a new website instead of stay put and taking their word for it opening a new tab and start looking for more information. Instead of reading top to bottom, read from tab to tab.
FactCheck.org
a nonpartisan, nonprofit, "consumer advocate" for voters that aims to reduce the level of deception and confusion in U.S. politics
fact checker
a person who verifies the factual accuracy of an article before publication
ACP (American College of Pediatricians)
a socially conservative advocacy group of pediatricians and other healthcare professionals in the United States. The group was founded in 2002 by a group of pediatricians, including Joseph Zanga, a past president of the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP), as a protest against the AAP's support for adoption by gay couples
"the media" is
a very large and diverse industry made up of individuals with vastly different viewpoints.
infographic
a visual image such as a chart or diagram used to represent information or data
As of the day they filmed this video there are 1206
administrators for the english wikipedia site.
Daily Wire
an American conservative news and opinion website founded in 2015 by political commentator Ben Shapiro. It secured several million dollars in seed funding from the Wilks Brothers, American petroleum industry pioneers who became billionaires using hydraulic fracking.
Stanford History Education Group
an award-winning research and development group that comprises Stanford faculty, staff, graduate students, post-docs, and visiting scholars. SHEG seeks to improve education by conducting research, working with school districts, and reaching directly into classrooms with free materials for teachers and students.
ombudsman
an official appointed to investigate individuals' complaints against maladministration, especially that of public authorities
AAP (American Academy of Pediatrics)
an organization of 67,000 pediatricians committed to the optimal physical, mental, and social health and well-being for all infants, children, adolescents, and young adults.
Claims should all be backed up by evidence
and not all evidence is created equal, but the absence of it is suspicious.
Concluding that because no source is inherently objective, all information is equally unreliable
and that is dead wrong.
While journalists should seek to inform, journalists are human,
and they make choices both about what to cover and how to cover it, choices we may not agree with.
evidence
anything that supports a claim and gives you a good reason to believe it is true
You shouldn't use a single site
as a definitive source.
None of us has the time to
become an expert in everything.
Better information leads to
better decision, which leads to a better world.
A website written specifically about comics for and by women might
cover the new Captain Marvel movie differently than a site will all male readers would.
It is important to note that many online news organizations have their own point of view sometimes these are
explicit liberal or conservative political leanings. But sometimes they are much harder to pinpoint, like a mashup of their contributors' own interests and perspectives.
Depending on what "seems true" while reading vertically
gives misinformation and disinformation more power. It allows people to hijack your consciousness, and it also makes you part of the problem.
controversial
giving rise or likely to give rise to public disagreement
star nosed mole
is easily identifiable by the twenty-two pink, fleshy appendages ringing its snout which is used as a touch organ with more than 25,000 minute sensory receptors, known as Eimer's organs, with which this hamster-sized mole feels its way around. (sourced from wikipedia)
Sometimes what looks like a grassroots community effort
is really a large corporation trying to manipulate your opinions.
Wikipedia talk tab
is where you can see the conversations wikipedians have had about editing that article.
Wikipedia should not be your
one stop shop for conducting in-depth research, nor is it permission to cite it on your works cited page.
sponsored content / native advertising
online editorial content paid for by a company that is designed to feel more like regular editorial content so it is less intrusive
Even if the site is generally trustworthy, it is inclined to
paint the most favorable picture of its expertise and credibility possible.
Verifiability
people reading and editing articles must be able to check that the information comes from a reliable source
Information is made by
people. Flawed, biased, imperfect people
original research
presents new scientific data not previously published
catfishing
pretending to be someone else online
When very serious corrections are made, sometimes a
publications editor in chief, public editor or ombudsman will step in to help explain what went wrong.
disinformation
purposely misleading or false information
There are over 34.8 million
registered wikipedians, about 134,000 of whom have edited in the past month.
There are some wikipedia pages are especially prone to vandalism due to
sensitive or controversial topics. As a result they end up becoming a protected or semi protected page that limits who and when a page can be edited.
net negative
there is more bad than good
Wa-Po Fact Check
trusted fact checking site hosted by the Washington Post
We may not have time to fact check everything we read but we should always fact check things before
we share them.
What makes the average person think a website is legitimate?
well designed logo, references and citations, professional photography, no grammatical errors or typos
