Remember, Russian Dressing Isn’t Even Russian!

Watch for these #fakenews Liar’s Tricks before you forward that post to all your friends…

  • Change the order of events. Reverse cause and effect to make the perpetrator the victim.
  • Accuse the accuser. If you’re guilty, blame your innocent opponent before the news breaks.
  • Stretch the analogy. You can generalize all you want if you reinforce the reader’s existing opinions.
  • Focus on a side issue. Pick one that’s hot so you can distract from the real story.
  • Release late Friday. Or after the closing bell.
  • Confuse with “alternative facts.” If you can’t quash the rumor, create multiple bogus versions of events to bury the story in noise.
  • Point to anomalies as trends. This scorching day means more drought to come.
  • Use a pitchman. Lying people are more interesting than honest graphics.
  • Animate your charts. Shorten attention spans and reduce study time.
  • Use nonstandard chart formats. Make eye-catching puzzles out of your boring facts.
  • Abuse the Net Promoter Score. Just because they sent you a survey doesn’t mean they intend to improve anything.
  • And, no matter what you do, leverage emotion! Leverage anger or strong sentimentality to cloud the logic and make it go viral.

 

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