The history behind the chocolate hoax (2015)
cjr.org
cjr.org
Everyone else ran it without even contacting us, even though our info was on the page. When your business model is based on impressions, fact-checking is an unnecessary expense. Ad revenue is what matters.
The funny thing is, the content farms masquerading as blogs don’t have as much power anymore because they have to pay just to have their stories seen. So it doesn’t seem to work as much anymore (based on a few more experiments we did).
Might be a better source as it contains picture examples of some of the publications.
Notably the article also included additional legitimate research from Roy Morgan that chocolate doesn't increase BMI. The additional (phoney) research that it also reduces weight came from a fake but real seeming "Institute of Diet and Health", which had a real looking website and utilized the legitimate PhD of Harvard Educated Bohannon to sell it.
I'd imagine real companies using this ploy to sell fake research would:
a) not risk fraud charges by setting up a fake institute
b) have to find a real PhD willing to risk their reputation and future credibility on tying their name to a fake study.
What would have been more interesting was if they merely took a real, relatively benign, study on nutrition/health and spun it to something far more than it is, then sold it to some papers. Even using the existing authors (as some companies like Exxon have paid scientists to - not lie - but pump up legitimate studies in their own benefit.
The authors went a step farther by including a completely fake institute which somewhat bothers me.
(Apparently) Chocolate has such a strong taste/odour that it covers many smells/flavors, and you may end up eating outdated or reduced quality (e.g.) baklava.
As for the hoax.. Peter Steiner drew it in 1993:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Internet%2C_nobody_know...