Re: Snopes & Webby

Bob, from my perspective, any metadata is better than none and I'll be 
happy to see what anyone can do with annotations. 
http://ambur.net/MetadataOrMalfeasance.htm

However, it seems to me that such efforts are at best a step along the 
way to more mature records. 
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Machine-readable_document

BTW, WholeStory's about statement is now available in StratML format at 
https://stratml.us/drybridge/index.htm#WHLSTR

Owen
https://www.linkedin.com/in/owenambur/


On 8/14/2021 11:34 AM, Bob Wyman wrote:
> On Fri, Aug 13, 2021 at 9:48 PM Owen Ambur <Owen.Ambur@verizon.net 
> <mailto:Owen.Ambur@verizon.net>> wrote:
>
>     While I do recognize the relevance of awards to tribal vanity and
>     solidarity, this evidence reinforces my bias against considering
>     them to
>     be a credible indicator of credibility:
>
>
> While plagiarism is a serious failing, I'm not sure that it is correct 
> to suggest that plagiarized content is any more or less credible than 
> original content. I assume that Snopes received its Webby award 
> because of a general perception that its content, however sourced, was 
> useful in determining the truthfulness of statements. If Snopes were 
> to post a plagiarised confirmation of its own plagiarism, that might 
> provide further evidence of their unacceptable behavior, but it would 
> also strengthen their position as a site that publishes truthful 
> evaluations of statements, memes, etc. Even if all of Snopes' content 
> was plagiarized, their credibility would depend on their skill in 
> choosing what to plagiarize.
>
> The important thing about credibility signals is to be aware not only 
> of what they indicate but what they do not indicate. Publishing 
> credible content does not imply that content is published either 
> honestly or legally. Credibility should be understood to be context 
> specific; limited to specific purposes and for particular periods of 
> time, etc.
>
> Nonetheless, users of Snopes might wish to know of Snopes' history of 
> poor content sourcing practices. (Those issuing awards for ethical 
> conduct might be particularly interested...) This confirms for me the 
> belief that we need a mechanism that allows one to associate 
> third-person, discoverable comments or annotations to a credibility 
> signal. It should be possible, on finding a signal of Snopes' 
> credibility, to create a new signal which says, in essence: "While 
> they may have once won an award for one thing, they are, or have been, 
> plagiarists." If credibility signals were provided as identifiable 
> elements, for instance via Verificable Credentials that record awards, 
> it should be possible to use the W3C Annotation protocol to associate 
> comments or qualifying statements with the identifiers of the 
> Verificable Credential.
>
> Snopes won the Webby. That fact can't be changed, however, it would be 
> useful if one could later make the statement "The winner of this award 
> has been found to have plagiarized content." Doing this would allow 
> others to better understand the meaning of, and the limitations of, 
> Snopes' Webby award.
>
> Is there any reason why the W3C Annotation protocol would not be a 
> reasonable mechanism for publishing signals about signals 
> (meta-signals)? Is there a better mechanism for publishing 
> discoverable, third-party statements about credibility signals?
>
> bob wyman