Americans Prefer Fake News

In the final three months of the US presidential campaign, the top-performing fake election news stories on Facebook generated more engagement than the top stories from major news outlets such as the New York Times, Washington Post, Huffington Post, NBC News, and others, a BuzzFeed News analysis has found.

During these critical months of the campaign, 20 top-performing false election stories from hoax sites and hyperpartisan blogs generated 8,711,000 shares, reactions, and comments on Facebook.

Of the 20 top-performing false election stories identified in the analysis, all but three were overtly pro-Donald Trump or anti-Hillary Clinton. Two of the biggest false hits were a story claiming Clinton sold weapons to ISIS and a hoax claiming the pope endorsed Trump, which the site removed after publication of this article.

https://www.buzzfeed.com/craigsilverman/viral-fake-election-news-outperformed-real-news-on-facebook?utm_term=.onmkwzBeYx#.qsAQva37GZ

I am waiting for the promised prosecution of Hillary Clinton by a special prosecutor. All the falsehoods. All the innuendo. Nothing stands in the way of justice now except the truth. So we will see if America will just forget the false accusations and innuendo, or will Rudy fulfill his promise of a special prosecutor for Hillary Clinton. I hope there is a special prosecutor who does his job.........fake news sold to rubes as truth.

A large part of the problem is the failure of journalism in the last ten years. It starts with google and online ads. Newspapers with a rich tradition of gathering the news fairly all across America had their economic guts destroyed with classified ad revenue dropping like a rock. I honestly do not know how to rebuild local newspapers with economic vitality based upon revenue which is generated from the internet. Profit will look for canned national stories, and less invested in the reporters who cover the school board, city counsel or statel level issues.

The biggest problem is that without a vibrant level of newspaper coverage, we are stuck with fewer and fewer news "producers". I personally am disgusted with cable news in the form of Fox, CNN, and MSNBC. It has become editorial and offers little facts and does not provide real news gathering.

I am incredibly encouraged by Vice News which is actually sending reporters out into the field and gathering facts. However, I do not know their economic model, and until the American newspapers decline can be stopped, we will face increasing false news and propaganda. The danger of this is that the truth becomes relative, and this is an essential component of the Orwellian model go doublethink and fascism. It is an uphill battle in the short term, but it begins at the local newspaper level.