3 ms·

Easy, parody and satire doesn't pretend to be the truth?

• arethuza 7y ago
  It can be very difficult to tell the difference between 'truth' and parody online - (AKA Poe's Law) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poe%27s_law https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poe%27s_law e.g. I do find myself wondering in some discussions on HN whether people honestly believe what seem to be rather extreme views or are simply parodying those views.
  • rat9988 7y ago
    If there is a difficulty to tell the difference between the truth and the parody, then the parody should tone it down.
    • arethuza 7y ago
      What about something like: "Angus man who tried to fly drone into Perth Prison claimed Romanian circus stole his chihuahua" Without using Google - truth or parody?
      • TeMPOraL 7y ago
        In absence of punishment for fake news, I'd assume it's parody. The presence of such punishment would let you think, "they didn't label it as parody so either they have lots of money to burn on fines, or it might actually be true".
        • arethuza 7y ago
          https://www.thecourier.co.uk/fp/news/local/perth-kinross/1007095/angus-man-who-tried-to-fly-drone-into-perth-prison-claimed-romanian-circus-stole-his-chihuahua/ https://www.thecourier.co.uk/fp/news/local/perth-kinross/100... Also a creative writing challenge based on combining this with some other headlines: https://www.antipope.org/charlie/blog-static/2019/10/creative-writing-challenge.html https://www.antipope.org/charlie/blog-static/2019/10/creativ...
          • TeMPOraL 7y ago
            In this case it turns out to be true. But (absent fake news punishment) in general, you can assume that such a funny-sounding headline is completely bullshit, because legitimate news only hits such headlines by accident, whereas there are tabloid and celebrity gossip sites that produce such headlines on a daily basis.
    • mvdwoord 7y ago
      In some (if not most) cases it would have my preference the truth would tone it down. ;)
    • michaelt 7y ago
      What about parody that a reasonable person would recognise as such, but a small number of fools might not? For example [1] or [2] [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3m5qxZm_JqM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3m5qxZm_JqM [2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HWfKdKWJEkM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HWfKdKWJEkM
      • TeMPOraL 7y ago
        Both videos could be clipped differently, to reveal the fact that we're dealing with parody by e.g. stating so in the opening and closing seconds. It wouldn't ruin the joke. In fact, the only reason not to include clear markings is when you're hoping people will get confused about it.
        • michaelt 7y ago
          Of course one could add a disclaimer identifying them as parody - but that response dodges the question of whether those videos should be illegal in the absence of such a disclaimer
  • TeMPOraL 7y ago
    It's less difficult when jokes are labeled as such. So I guess satire in Singapore will be fine, but will have to be unambiguous about what it is. It sounds similar to how in civilized places you're supposed to make it clear to the viewers that an ad is an ad.
• hgfdytrwsx 7y ago
  Bad parody is easy to distinguish.