NNSquad - Network Neutrality Squad
[ NNSquad ] Twitter and the Web: From Rumors to Rubbish in a Flash Hotlist
Open Thread: From Rumors to Rubbish in a Flash Hotlist
by Meteor Blades
Thu Mar 04, 2010 at 09:17:34 PM PST
If Twitter had been around in 1937, Orson Welles could probably have dispensed with the hassle of a radio production of War of the Worlds and just tweeted the nation into a panic.
That, at least, is one message from Thursday's tale of how the "news" cycle now works. It started with an exclusive story at Radar Online regarding the imminent retirement of Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts.
That story spread throughout wwwLand like wildfire, getting picked up by the Huffington Post and some other sites and texted everywhere.
But it was all a prank. As Peter Daou subsequently tweeted: 2010 news cycle: Radar story went from nothing to buzz to raging rumor to bust to inside joke to total mockery in an hour.
David Lat over at Above the Law tells the back story in Anatomy of a Rumor. When he read Radar's story, he first checked with some obvious contacts:
One of our SCOTUS experts actually laughed out loud after we (sheepishly)asked, "Have you heard anything about a possible Roberts retirement?" This source noted that JGR would sooner die - literally - than give Obama the chance to appoint his successor.
Then he learned the whole affair had started in a first-year law class taught by Georgetown University Law Center Prof. Peter Tague. From a student Lat learned:
Today's class was partially on the validity of informants not explaining their sources. [Professor Tague] started off class at around 9 am EST by telling us not to tell anyone, but that we might find it interesting that tomorrow, Roberts would be announcing his retirement for health concerns. He refused to tell anyone how he knew. Then, at around 9:30, he let everyone in on the joke.
Lat continues:
Note the timestamps on the Radar posts. The first one came out at 6:10 a.m., i.e., the Pacific Time equivalent of 9:10 a.m. Eastern time. The retraction came out at 6:36 a.m., i.e., the Pacific Time equivalent of 9:36 a.m. Eastern - shortly after Professor Tague let his class in on the joke.
Whether Tague knew his students were going to IM and text and tweet his announcement all over wwwLand isn't known since he hasn't responded to Lat's inquiries. But his point surely got made.
In a world where nearly every public utterance moves faster than greased lightning, the desire to be first with some startling tidbit means the most ludicrous rumors will continue to wind up on blogs and other Web sites before the fact-checkers can warm up their keyboards. We've all seen it many a time. But that doesn't stop it from recurring.
(Psssst. Martians have landed near Santa Fe. Don't tell anyone.)
http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2010/3/5/843159/-Open-Thread:-From-Rumors-to-Rubbish-in-a-Flash