5 ms·

Snopes stopped being impartial a few years ago in favor of being more clickbaity. There was a whole lot of drama and it's been under different ownership since.

mcv 7y ago
My impression is that only part of the ownership has changed, and that's part of the reason for this lawsuit. David Mikkelson owns 50%, while Barbara Mikkelson sold her 50% to the shareholders of the company that handled Snopes' advertising. Those people have since been in a legal battle with David and/or Snopes, and now acquired Salon, which apparently they're now using to continue their legal battle? It's not really clear what Salon has to do with the whole thing, other than that it got acquired by the people suing David Mikkelson/Snopes.
- throwaway1777 7y ago
  Both are true, only part of the ownership changed, but it’s not the site it was before.
  - dkonofalski 7y ago
    >it’s not the site it was before How so?
    - beerandt 7y ago
      Well for one thing, the majority of the articles seem to be done by completely 3rd party authors, without mention of vetting, conflicts, or bias. >More troubling is that we simply don’t know who contributed to a given fact check. David noted that Snopes’ “process is a highly collaborative one in which several different people may contribute to a single article,” but that “the result is typically credited to whoever wrote the initial draft.” David did not respond to a request for comment on why Snopes only lists a single author for each of its fact checks, rather than provide an acknowledgement section that lists all of the individuals who contributed to a given fact check. It's the same problem Wikipedia sometimes has. Selectively pick sources that confirm the story you want to convey, and ignore the others. The other big problem recently is to spin something that's true as being false, by slightly changing the question, to be broad enough to encompass an "out." Also this story covers most of the history of what's in the linked article, from over 3 years ago. https://www.forbes.com/sites/kalevleetaru/2016/12/22/the-daily-mail-snopes-story-and-fact-checking-the-fact-checkers/#1766211b227f https://www.forbes.com/sites/kalevleetaru/2016/12/22/the-dai...
      - dkonofalski 7y ago
        >spin something that's true as being false, by slightly changing the question Do you have an example of this?
        ceejayoz 7y ago
        Here's an example: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/fact-checker/wp/2017/10/02/bernie-sanders-claim-that-the-worlds-six-wealthiest-people-have-as-much-wealth-as-half-the-worlds-population/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/fact-checker/wp/2017/10/... The claim is correct, and the article even acknowledges that. They then throw in a bit about "negative wealth" amongst the world's poor and somehow award it "Three Pinocchios" as a result.
        dkonofalski 7y ago
        This article is not from Snopes. The question is about the integrity of Snopes and whether or not they re-frame questions to fit a political spin. The Washington Post has been found to have done this on numerous occasions.
        beerandt 7y ago
        Here's one- The original claim was about a viral tweet- a photo at the Whitehouse with 33 X's over the faces of supposed congressmen that had been voted out since voting against Obamacare. Since there were 33 x's, and that many Republicans had been voted out of Congress, they said true. But in the original picture, many of the X's were reelected, and many weren't even in Congress to begin with. The author has since retracted the tweet, and admitted it was fake. But Snopes just rephrased the question and left it as true. https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/gop-obamacare-repeal-election/ https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/gop-obamacare-repeal-elect...
        dkonofalski 7y ago
        >Since there were 33 x's, and that many Republicans had been voted out of Congress, they said true. That is not at all what the article you linked states. Not only does the article confirm that some of the X's in the picture were not in Congress but it provides a specific list that shows that, for those who were, the claim is accurate.

mcv 7y ago

My impression is that only part of the ownership has changed, and that's part of the reason for this lawsuit. David Mikkelson owns 50%, while Barbara Mikkelson sold her 50% to the shareholders of the company that handled Snopes' advertising. Those people have since been in a legal battle with David and/or Snopes, and now acquired Salon, which apparently they're now using to continue their legal battle? It's not really clear what Salon has to do with the whole thing, other than that it got acquired by the people suing David Mikkelson/Snopes.

throwaway1777 7y ago
Both are true, only part of the ownership changed, but it’s not the site it was before.
- dkonofalski 7y ago
  >it’s not the site it was before How so?
  - beerandt 7y ago
    Well for one thing, the majority of the articles seem to be done by completely 3rd party authors, without mention of vetting, conflicts, or bias. >More troubling is that we simply don’t know who contributed to a given fact check. David noted that Snopes’ “process is a highly collaborative one in which several different people may contribute to a single article,” but that “the result is typically credited to whoever wrote the initial draft.” David did not respond to a request for comment on why Snopes only lists a single author for each of its fact checks, rather than provide an acknowledgement section that lists all of the individuals who contributed to a given fact check. It's the same problem Wikipedia sometimes has. Selectively pick sources that confirm the story you want to convey, and ignore the others. The other big problem recently is to spin something that's true as being false, by slightly changing the question, to be broad enough to encompass an "out." Also this story covers most of the history of what's in the linked article, from over 3 years ago. https://www.forbes.com/sites/kalevleetaru/2016/12/22/the-daily-mail-snopes-story-and-fact-checking-the-fact-checkers/#1766211b227f https://www.forbes.com/sites/kalevleetaru/2016/12/22/the-dai...
    - dkonofalski 7y ago
      >spin something that's true as being false, by slightly changing the question Do you have an example of this?
      - ceejayoz 7y ago
        Here's an example: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/fact-checker/wp/2017/10/02/bernie-sanders-claim-that-the-worlds-six-wealthiest-people-have-as-much-wealth-as-half-the-worlds-population/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/fact-checker/wp/2017/10/... The claim is correct, and the article even acknowledges that. They then throw in a bit about "negative wealth" amongst the world's poor and somehow award it "Three Pinocchios" as a result.
        dkonofalski 7y ago
        This article is not from Snopes. The question is about the integrity of Snopes and whether or not they re-frame questions to fit a political spin. The Washington Post has been found to have done this on numerous occasions.
      - beerandt 7y ago
        Here's one- The original claim was about a viral tweet- a photo at the Whitehouse with 33 X's over the faces of supposed congressmen that had been voted out since voting against Obamacare. Since there were 33 x's, and that many Republicans had been voted out of Congress, they said true. But in the original picture, many of the X's were reelected, and many weren't even in Congress to begin with. The author has since retracted the tweet, and admitted it was fake. But Snopes just rephrased the question and left it as true. https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/gop-obamacare-repeal-election/ https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/gop-obamacare-repeal-elect...
        dkonofalski 7y ago
        >Since there were 33 x's, and that many Republicans had been voted out of Congress, they said true. That is not at all what the article you linked states. Not only does the article confirm that some of the X's in the picture were not in Congress but it provides a specific list that shows that, for those who were, the claim is accurate.