Essays and deep dives on misinformation, propaganda, and how information spreads — from the team behind Solitaire FactStack.
In 1938, newspapers told the country that a radio play about Martians had sent America into mass hysteria — but the evidence suggests the real exaggeration came from the papers, not the listeners.
In 1987, a talk show host figured out that manufactured outrage keeps people watching. The same trick just moved from TV to your phone.
Your feed isn't showing you everything — it's showing you what keeps you scrolling. Here's what the research actually says about how much that shapes what you believe.
Newspapers didn't always separate fact from opinion — someone had to invent that idea. Here's why the distinction matters more than ever, and how framing sneaks in as a third category people forget to check for.
In 1954, a journalist wrote the book on how statistics get twisted without technically lying. Decades later, the tricks are exactly the same — just faster.
Stanford researchers put historians, undergrads, and professional fact-checkers through the same test. The fact-checkers won by a landslide — and it wasn't because they knew more.