I've recently seen lots of people tweeting this supposed newspaper clipping. An olde-timey warning about wearing flu masks. But is it too good to be true? The first thing to do with any image of a text quote is to search for the text. Look, I'm not saying tumblr isn't great, but… I wouldn't exactly trust it as a primary source! That said, tumblr has a neat feature which makes it easy to see where a popular image originally was posted. In this case it appears to have originated at Y…
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There are lots of celelbrities and famous academics on Twitter. Then there's Professor Richard Feynman. Who died in 1988. Every so often, one of "his" pearls of wisdom is regurgitated into my Twitter feed. Prof. Feynman@ProfFeynmanWhen you are dead, you don't know you are dead. It's pain only for others.It's the same thing when you are stupid.❤️ 19,612💬 139♻️ 013:57 - Sat 22 February 2020 Except - and I hate to be a party pooper - this is a joke by the Belgian comedian Philippe Geluck. It has…
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I was unreasonably annoyed by some media commentator on Twitter complaining about the BBC. So I decided to use data to prove someone wrong on the Internet. In a recent article, the BBC described Christine Lagarde thusly: The role is likely to test the silver-haired 63-year-old, who has admitted before that she lacks economic experience. The commentator was disgusted that she'd be described as "silver-haired". He wondered out loud "I bet the BBC don't refer to men in this way!" Luckily,…
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One of the most important tools in the war for your attention is the ability to critically examine media and discover its provenance. Take this example - a friend of a friend was tagged in this Facebook post, and so it appeared on my feed: WOW! Right! Nature is Coooooool! Or is it? If "The Planet Today" were a reputable source of news, they would tell us who the photographer was. Or where the shot was taken. Or... well... anything about the photo. But they're just a clickbait farm, so …
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