The algorithm for identifying fake news is actually pretty straight forward:
if I disagree with it then it's fake news
else it's just news
if I disagree with it then it's fake news
else it's just news
And yet in the social media world (Facebook was the big offender) links like this are just treated as "news" and presented to their users alongside other stuff. There is a gatekeeper role for these companies that used to be provided by the traditional media. And Facebook wasn't even trying. So we got Pizzagate.
https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?q=fake%20news,pizza...
The rumors and allegations against the Podesta brothers, the various associated instagram accounts and all the other information you can find in various youtube exposés (example: https://youtu.be/beqdw19Uj6E) were quickly trashed and ridiculed. Ben Swann's career got destroyed.
The concept of 'news', as torturously discussed in the Danah Boyd piece, is entirely dependent on what information is allowed to be discussed and in what context.
Most news outlets are extremely biased for political and advertising demographic reasons. The internet has been a wonderful medium for allowing people to discover and explore, and the only 'fake news' I see is created by Outbrain, Taboola and other click bait insurgents into the news media.
Which is (in a less dramatic way) pretty much how standard media operates when they want to promote a position.
Point being, effective fake news isn't all fake. It's 90%+ real making the critical 10% palatable.
I'm not really interested in arguing about details nor starting any kind of flame war and I certainly don't believe in an international pedophilia Democrat child sex ring run out of a Pizza joint. You can look into if you care to. But suffice it to say, there were real people and events that provided enough for the narrative to be built on. Well beyond the Podesta emails.
<edit>The other reason I'm not interested in discussing details is because I don't believe in the existence of a pedophilia Democrat sex ring and the details I'm talking about were largely innocent behaviors in my opinion and thus aren't worth trotting out in public where more people can go "humm... maybe there was something going on". Like I say, you can look into more if curious. But there was more going on than the mainstream news "fake news" accounts portrayed. Enough to build the narrative on.
After looking long enough at it, basically PizzaGate warrants just as much suspicion for me as any JFK theory at this point. I believe there's something to it. There is a mountain of little details that make it impossible to flat out deny it, I just don't go as far as levying accusations at people withouth knowing facts. Others have accused people w/o evidence beyond a reasonable doubt and I think that's wrong. I think the police should be interested in Pizza Gate, and I think a few of them are. But again I don't go further than that.
What people think bubbled over Pizza Gate was that guy with the gun who went in the restaurant. But actually that smelled like a hoax to me. It just seemed wildly incomplete and a convenient way to say "See what fake news does!" And that guy had a strange background with him, and the media chose NOT to go too deep into his story either. It was like they just needed that for their narative.
1. As a psyops to stop the potentially very damaging allegations against powerful senior Washington DC political operatives on the eve of an important election.
2. To repair the damage to the mainstream press, who were steadily losing paid readership.
Both of these objectives have been successfully achieved however you perceive it.
Meanwhile the mainstream press is flooded with click bait advertising while at the same time pushing 'we are the only credible, trusted news source' messaging to readers, along with begging requests for funding so they can continue with their work.
The reality is that investigative 'reporters' were either let go or resigned in disgust from the MSM around the time blogging became a viable means of disseminating writing and making money.
We are now in an era of crack downs on free speech and debate: it will be interesting to se whether the mainstream mastheads can regain their 'trusted voice' relationship with large numbers of readers, or whether there will be an increase in cynicism and mistrust. Pravda, the old Soviet newspaper/mouthpiece comes to mind.
An example of that
https://larussophobe.wordpress.com/2006/06/22/there-is-truth...
>1. As a psyops to stop the potentially very damaging allegations against powerful senior Washington DC political operatives on the eve of an important election.
If you're referring to "pizzagate", if you were paranoid you might also think that was the psyop. Paranoid people think a lot of things.
>Both of these objectives have been successfully achieved however you perceive it.
I'm not certain that's true. Damage to the mainstream press hasn't been repaired, and the people who believe in pizzagate still believe in it, and it was covered by the mainstream media, albeit briefly and as an example of, ironically, the fake news phenomenon.
> [Weird emails...] I believe there's something to it.
vs.:
> [Guy discharges an actual weapon] actually that smelled like a hoax to me.
Yeah. We're done here.
You're proving my point. Precisely BECAUSE somebody discharged a firearm, in your mind now the case is closed it's ALL fake news. I'm saying that the reporting on this guy is light, but we're supposed to dismiss the strange coded emails now. Nah I think I'll continue to keep my eye on it.
Lesson learned for anyone want to sweep something under a rug. Just pay some mentally ill person to discharge a firearm nearby, say they did it because Jodie Foster or Alex Jones told the place was suspicious and then CNN will ensure to brand the act as a "lesson of fake news" and impossible to discuss now.
To clarify (but not debate, like I said we're done): I'm pointing out that your willingness to believe in "something" about pizzagate based on nothing but email inuendo yet your inclination to disbelieve that a guy who shot actual rounds into the air and got himself arrested and charged was sincere are... sorta in conflict.
You aren't being serious. You're just believing what you want to believe. Feel free. Maybe there are some, um, "news" sources you can focus on to further reinforce your priors.
Side topic, St. Louis recently had a pizza incident make the news. Odd.
But that's the point. There seems to be a large number of people and organizations (including the US President) who are NEVER interested in issuing retractions or admitting fault - when something is pointed out as factually false, they just repeat the falsehood louder even when there is stuff like audio or video evidence that directly refutes it.
Sources should be critically evaluated constantly, but sources that are usually more off should be treated differently than sources that are usually more on.