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If you're interested in fact checking, be sure to check out http://www.politifact.com/ http://www.politifact.com/ . They put a lot of care and effort into what

If you're interested in fact checking, be sure to check out http://www.politifact.com/ http://www.politifact.com/ . They put a lot of care and effort into what they do. They are run by the Tampa Bay Times. If you have any questions, I can pass them on to the founder (Bill Adair) and he'd be happy to answer them for you.

sparkzilla 11y ago
As part of a project I worked on, I did a daily review of fact-check sites. Politifact is great if you're a liberal and want fact checks to suit your partisan view of the world. This is easily proven by looking at the people who comment on their fact checks on Facebook, who are overwhelmingly liberal. If you are actually looking for unbiased fact checks, you should look elsewhere.
- aaronkrolik 11y ago
  Facebook comments are perhaps the worst metric i can think of to measure a media company on. The data does not support your claims. Look at their factchecks. clearly nonpartisan.
  - sparkzilla 11y ago
    FB comments are just indicative. The actual quality of the fact checks, and the choice of topics are obviously partisan. The whole "fact checking" industry is simply a way to give a veneer of authority to those who are not willing to get outside their partisan bubble.
    - aaronkrolik 11y ago
      I fail to see how facebook comments are indicative of anything. And I am not commenting on the 'fact checking industry' I'm commenting on the pulitzer prize winning work of a single organization.
      - sparkzilla 11y ago
        A Pulitzer Prize winning organization whose "Lie of the Year" was proven to be false, and who probably knew it was a lie when they wrote it? Just because a newspaper receives a Pulitzer Prizes does not mean that it has no bias, or does not make mistakes. Here's the truth: all newspapers and media have bias, and to think that fact checkers don't have bias just because they say so is completely naive. When a site has at least 90% liberal readers (their FB comments are just one indicator), and is owned by a liberal-leaning newspaper, do you really think they are going to not going to skew their writing to suit their audience? Try doing your own fact checks (I did over 100) and you'll quickly see how their claims to truth are just a clever way to mask their own bias.
- coolgeek 11y ago
  Fact checks. Fact. Checks. If they don't suit your partisan view of the world, where exactly does the problem lie?
  - sparkzilla 11y ago
    When you start to look at how the fact checkers operate you'll see the same things over and over again, starting with leading questions, selective targeting of opponents, the use of selective data, selective interpretation of the data, ambiguous metrics (what does "half true" mean?) and in many cases wilful distortion of the conclusion that does not fit the agenda. Here's a couple of examples, the first being biased, and the second "Lie of the Year" being totally incorrect. There are literally hundreds of examples similar to these. http://newslines.org/fact-checks/did-barack-obama-vote-to-deny-rights-to-infant-abortion-survivors/ http://newslines.org/fact-checks/did-barack-obama-vote-to-de... http://newslines.org/fact-checks/is-jeep-moving-u-s-production-to-china/ http://newslines.org/fact-checks/is-jeep-moving-u-s-producti...
    - aaronkrolik 11y ago
      I'll just point out that your examples are not from politifact. I've never heard of newslines.org, but i'd trust their no-bylined factchecks about as much as I would trust a fact check from a random facebook commenter. I'm not defending every shitty news site out there pretending to do 'journalism', I'm defending Politifact's work.
      - sparkzilla 11y ago
        Sorry, I didn't explain but those were my analysis of those particular Politifact fact checks. You can verify the facts yourself. In both cases Politifact is clearly biased, and misleading. BTW, I also did fact checks on the fact checks about Romney too. In any case it seems you have drunk the kool-aid so I'll leave the discuss here.
  - wdr1 11y ago
    > If they don't suit your partisan view of the world, where exactly does the problem lie? I don't know anything about the bias (or lack thereof) of Polifact, but it's not hard to see how this is a problem. If I were to spot check every statement you made & only 10% of what your opponent said, even if you both had the same level of accuracy, you're going to look a lot more like the biggest liar.

sparkzilla 11y ago

As part of a project I worked on, I did a daily review of fact-check sites. Politifact is great if you're a liberal and want fact checks to suit your partisan view of the world. This is easily proven by looking at the people who comment on their fact checks on Facebook, who are overwhelmingly liberal. If you are actually looking for unbiased fact checks, you should look elsewhere.

aaronkrolik 11y ago
Facebook comments are perhaps the worst metric i can think of to measure a media company on. The data does not support your claims. Look at their factchecks. clearly nonpartisan.
- sparkzilla 11y ago
  FB comments are just indicative. The actual quality of the fact checks, and the choice of topics are obviously partisan. The whole "fact checking" industry is simply a way to give a veneer of authority to those who are not willing to get outside their partisan bubble.
  - aaronkrolik 11y ago
    I fail to see how facebook comments are indicative of anything. And I am not commenting on the 'fact checking industry' I'm commenting on the pulitzer prize winning work of a single organization.
    - sparkzilla 11y ago
      A Pulitzer Prize winning organization whose "Lie of the Year" was proven to be false, and who probably knew it was a lie when they wrote it? Just because a newspaper receives a Pulitzer Prizes does not mean that it has no bias, or does not make mistakes. Here's the truth: all newspapers and media have bias, and to think that fact checkers don't have bias just because they say so is completely naive. When a site has at least 90% liberal readers (their FB comments are just one indicator), and is owned by a liberal-leaning newspaper, do you really think they are going to not going to skew their writing to suit their audience? Try doing your own fact checks (I did over 100) and you'll quickly see how their claims to truth are just a clever way to mask their own bias.
coolgeek 11y ago
Fact checks. Fact. Checks. If they don't suit your partisan view of the world, where exactly does the problem lie?
- sparkzilla 11y ago
  When you start to look at how the fact checkers operate you'll see the same things over and over again, starting with leading questions, selective targeting of opponents, the use of selective data, selective interpretation of the data, ambiguous metrics (what does "half true" mean?) and in many cases wilful distortion of the conclusion that does not fit the agenda. Here's a couple of examples, the first being biased, and the second "Lie of the Year" being totally incorrect. There are literally hundreds of examples similar to these. http://newslines.org/fact-checks/did-barack-obama-vote-to-deny-rights-to-infant-abortion-survivors/ http://newslines.org/fact-checks/did-barack-obama-vote-to-de... http://newslines.org/fact-checks/is-jeep-moving-u-s-production-to-china/ http://newslines.org/fact-checks/is-jeep-moving-u-s-producti...
  - aaronkrolik 11y ago
    I'll just point out that your examples are not from politifact. I've never heard of newslines.org, but i'd trust their no-bylined factchecks about as much as I would trust a fact check from a random facebook commenter. I'm not defending every shitty news site out there pretending to do 'journalism', I'm defending Politifact's work.
    - sparkzilla 11y ago
      Sorry, I didn't explain but those were my analysis of those particular Politifact fact checks. You can verify the facts yourself. In both cases Politifact is clearly biased, and misleading. BTW, I also did fact checks on the fact checks about Romney too. In any case it seems you have drunk the kool-aid so I'll leave the discuss here.
- wdr1 11y ago
  > If they don't suit your partisan view of the world, where exactly does the problem lie? I don't know anything about the bias (or lack thereof) of Polifact, but it's not hard to see how this is a problem. If I were to spot check every statement you made & only 10% of what your opponent said, even if you both had the same level of accuracy, you're going to look a lot more like the biggest liar.