So what are Zombie newspapers, anyway? And what do they have to do with media literacy? Are they lurking around your neighbourhood, slowly infecting your computer with each slow, leg draggy step? Well, kinda.
With so many now-defunct newspapers around the world, there is a lot of newspaper content online or cached that can rise from the dead and be repurposed for whatever biased content or misinformation you want to put out there. The structure and content of the news site looks real…because it is. It’s just old and out of business, so no one is maintaining it. All you have to do is take that content and slip in a few articles about how Pakistan is responsible for all the terrorism you’re worried about. Or maybe “Hey my opponents say I’m a dictator, but I’m not such a bad guy. Just look at this article in this online newspaper about how great I am.”
We judge a lot of online content by how it looks. Or whether we recognize the provider. This allows purveyors of misinformation to do both. It’s incredibly important to dig deeper on both fronts to make sure the content you’re consuming is from the creator you think it is.
By using the Kermode app, the site you’re evaluating is analyzed for things you don’t readily have access to. Things like who registered the domain of the website you’re on, when was it registered, and where is the domain hosted. All of this information is crucial in spotting Zombie newspaper articles and the misinformation they produce.
Keep your media literacy, #digitalliteracy, and #digitalcitizenship game tight with Kermode!
