no spin zone

Rebecca keeps a useful list of antidotes to the special-interest spin in which everything seems to be drenched these days:

Snopes is an old favourite, hunters of urban legends (now in 41 flavours) since 1995. They include "common fallacies, misinformation, old wives' tales, strange news stories, rumors, celebrity gossip, and similar items" in their expansive definition of "urban legend". The site is maintained as a hobby by Barbara and David Mikkelson; they take some advertising (they say they have no direct contact with the advertisers, and appear to take ads only through Burst!Media) and accept donations. Of particular interest in these days of Democratic Primaries and Looming Federal Elections is their politics page.

Spinsanity is the creation of Ben Fritz, Bryan Keefer and Brendan Nyhan, all of whom disclose activity and affiliations with "Democratic and progressive politics". It's not clear where (other than their own pockets) they get the money for the site; the site is an Amazon affiliate and they accept donations.

FactCheck.org is a project of the Annenberg Public Policy Center of the University of Pennsylvania and accepts no funding from "business corporations, labor unions, political parties, lobbying organizations or individuals". Their mission is to "monitor the factual accuracy of what is said by major U.S. political players in the form of TV ads, debates, speeches, interviews, and news releases."

The Columbia Journalism Review's Campaign Desk offers political reality checks by medium, angle (Fact Check, Hidden Angle, Local Story, Echo Chamber, Money Trail, Spin Reducer, Distortion, Tip of the Hat and Cheap Shot), issue or candidate. Their stated goal is "to straighten and deepen campaign coverage almost as it is being written and produced" and they focus "not on what politicians say and do, but on how the press is presenting (or not presenting) the political story". No mention of funding sources.


-->

RSS Feed

Links:
spousal unit
me
copyright anything
Bloglines account
Simpy account
Connotea account
OpenWetWare userpage
monthly irregular column on 3QuarksDaily


Please sign the petition in support of the European Commission's proposed Open Access Self-Archiving Mandate

Please also sign the SPARC/ATA Petition for Public Access to Publicly Funded Research in the United States


blogroll:


Write me:
sennoma AT ureach DOT com

Archives:
October 2008
September 2008
August 2008
July 2008
May 2008
April 2008
March 2008
February 2008
January 2008
December 2007
November 2007
October 2007
September 2007
August 2007
July 2007
June 2007
May 2007
April 2007
March 2007
January 2007
December 2006
November 2006
October 2006
September 2006
August 2006
July 2006
June 2006
May 2006
April 2006
March 2006
February 2006
January 2006
December 2005
November 2005
October 2005
September 2005
August 2005
July 2005
June 2005
May 2005
April 2005
March 2005
February 2005
January 2005
December 2004
November 2004
October 2004
September 2004
August 2004
July 2004
June 2004
May 2004
April 2004
March 2004
February 2004
January 2004
December 2003









Design thrown together haphazardly by frykitty.
Powered by the inimitable MovableType.