Blog Post #2
To better understand and evaluate misinformation in the media, I spent some time with two educational tools designed to help people spot misinformation.
The first tool I examined was News Literacy Project’s RumorGuard
Rumor guard evaluates media claims using five factors: source, evidence, context, reasoning, and authenticity. Rumor guard fact checks and posts their checks on their website, along with other information on how to spot phony claims.
I watched AI videos depict extreme police takedowns in London. While the individual checks were valuable, I didn’t leave the site with a better grasp of phony claim evaluation. The site gave me broad factors to look for, but I’m not sure I would be finding them on my own. So I didn’t find it as helpful as I had hoped. For example they say that “the video includes jumbled letters, incorrectly displayed timers and people who seem to vanish into thin air.” I found a couple of examples in the video (I did like the police officer that did the crazy spinning jump), but without the site telling me it was fake, I wouldn’t have known. While the factors are valuable, the site does more telling me what is fake, than helping me evaluate what is fake.
The next tool I evaluated was Bad News .
Bad News is an interesting game unlike the others I’d played. You learn about disinformation by using it to gain followers. You can master several fake news techniques, like impersonation, emotion, polarization, conspiracy, discredit, and trolling. You are the one knowingly spreading disinformation.
I may just be partial to Bad News because it felt a little simpler to me. But I also liked that it didn’t just give me examples of fake news, it showed me how to make fake news and how easy it actually could be to spread disinformation. Because I was making the decisions it helped me understand better some quick easy ways to spot disinformation.
Both of these tools could be used to teach people media literacy, while I liked Bad News a lot better, I’m not sure either of them will have a real role in eradicating misinformation. Misinformation is such a prevalent problem. According to Hive Mind “Many people are exposed daily to misleading or incorrect information on social networks and in the media, making it crucial to learn how to identify fake facts.” The scale of fake news and misinformation makes me think that it will most likely remain a problem no matter how much you try to eradicate it. The main issue with that is how rapidly things are evolving. I think specifically AI evolves so quickly that even if the next generation knows how it works it may advance to a level where the games and things we have now won’t work.
There will definitely be a lot of things that can solve this problem. It’s not to say there won’t be a role for educational games and things. I think that educational games paired with other things will help. I think that educational games will affect mostly younger kids who don’t consume a lot of news. However I do think it will have an effect on them and maybe if they remember it later in life it’ll help more than I believe.
I think that generally most of the games are fun and overall helpful. I think it’s important to have them. Even though I’m not fully sure if they’ll be helpful I think it’s important to try to combat misinformation any way we can. Having these games and any other kind of tools we have can all help even if each one just helps a little. All of them together can help a lot. According to Game Against Misinformation, “By familiarising yourself with misinformation you are less likely to be manipulated. One way to prebunk is to game!”