Craig Silverman speaking at Western; worth a listen

This coming Monday, Craig Silverman is speaking at Western. He will examine spreading truth in this age of viral misinformation. Silverman, the founding editor of BuzzFeed Canada, has taken a great interest in misinformation and fake news and how the main stream media makes the problem worse.

To decide whether or not to attend this lecture, I googled Silverman's name and found an article by the man himself: How Lies Spread Faster Than Truth: A Study of Viral Content. I was amazed to discover that Silverman lays much of the blame for the spreading of false information on the MSM. A good call, in my book.

Silverman is a bright guy. Most editors I have known are. If I have any criticism of Silverman's work, it is that he does not go far enough. The MSM not only give Internet rumours legs, the MSM are the original source of some of the worst false news. I say worst because a falsehood spread widely by the media can be far more damaging than an erroneous post uploaded to a Blogger site.

When the MSM make a false claim and it gets carried by both papers and television news, the story can quickly take on the patina of Truthiness, to use the Stephen Colbert term. Think UFFI or head lice or even going topless at a Canadian beach.