You’d think it was some sort of comedy site rather than proper science journalism!
They do actually pride themselves on trying to get their facts straight (I couldn’t find a link, but a recent article stated how they really do try not to BS people) - their favourite form of humour in list articles is the amazing truth—but they’re not particularly robust at research, usually stopping at Wikipedia. So, yeah. Comedic truthiness as memetic hazard, made worse by the actual sincerity of the writers.
Actual news sites, however, can more reasonably be accused of an unacceptable degree of negligence. Ben Goldacre has started an initiative to get news sites to link to primary sources.
You’d think it was some sort of comedy site rather than proper science journalism!
They do actually pride themselves on trying to get their facts straight (I couldn’t find a link, but a recent article stated how they really do try not to BS people) - their favourite form of humour in list articles is the amazing truth—but they’re not particularly robust at research, usually stopping at Wikipedia. So, yeah. Comedic truthiness as memetic hazard, made worse by the actual sincerity of the writers.
Actual news sites, however, can more reasonably be accused of an unacceptable degree of negligence. Ben Goldacre has started an initiative to get news sites to link to primary sources.
Actually, cracked.com is often surprisingly really good at finding really obscure research that I could never find from Wikipedia or any other source. They found an amazing article about deer that raided bird nests to get calcium, for example (http://www.cracked.com/article_19126_5-adorable-animals-that-are-turning-to-dark-side.html).
For another article, for example, they really managed to scour many obscure sources from google books.
Plus, it’s often the best means of communicating research to other people who don’t like reading science articles.
Yes, but that by no means exempts them from public opinion!
Also, the article may or may not be here.