Research Articles

Facebook has been cracking down of fake news in similar ways to the ones I suggested last semester:
http://www.techradar.com/news/fighting-fake-news-how-google-facebook-and-more-are-working-to-stop-it

"In December 2016, Facebook launched new tools for users to report low quality or offensive content as well as fake news. 

Facebook didn't stop there; it partnered with third-party fact checking organizations like Snopes, Politifact and the Associated Press to flag stories as disputed. What’s more, a warning will pop up when users go to share disputed content with a link to find out why the content is flagged. Facebook also launched a guide for spotting fake news that appeared at the top of users’ News Feeds. The guide included basic steps and tips on how to vet sources and recognize fake news, but only appeared in 14 countries for “a few days” in April. “When people click on this educational tool at the top of their News Feed, they will see more information and resources in the Facebook Help Center, including tips on how to spot false news, such as checking the URL of the site, investigating the source and looking for other reports on the topic,” said Adam Mosseri, Facebook’s VP of News Feed, in a blog post at the time."

The Typography of an article helps users to determine, sometimes incorrectly, if it is reliable or not:
https://qz.com/1018086/this-design-detail-determines-if-you-trust-your-news-sources/

"If you’re on a train and catch a glimpse of a newspaper over someone’s shoulder, chances are you can recognise which publication it is without being able to see the masthead. “The average person can tell you very quickly. That’s because establishing familiarity through font is part of a publication’s branding. You might not know a newspaper’s typefaces by name, but no matter what words are written, you could tell which publication they belong to. “The role of typography and design, in all of this, is to really remind you that you are in the place you trust,” says Garcia, who also runs a design studio whose clients have included the Wall Street Journal and the Washington Post. This is why many national publications don’t use standard typefaces such as Times New Roman or Georgia, instead working with a team of designers to create their own."

Because of this, fake news websites and articles use similar fonts to trustworthy newspapers in order to seem more believable.

Pinterest Inspiration and Artist Influences

I've been collecting and writing little blurbs for images I'm finding on Pinterest, as a way to collect all of my image-based references. I find it helpful for seeing at a glance things that can spark off ideas, as images collected together cause links in the mind between them, generating more rich and varied ideas than one would have without them.

My Pinterest board is:
https://nz.pinterest.com/mehannahfortune/newsbusters/

Examples of things I've found so far:

Ideas for thumbnail sketches, posters and my diorama

Interactive, experience-design based media making an impact on people, treatment of type and visual elements

Feedback Week 2 (Diorama)

I wrote down feedback from what people said and suggested for the future about my diorama. Then I addressed the questions in orange to see where to take my project next.

• What's the most extreme version?
  When Karl said this he suggested "some kind of portal that transported you to the news frontline or something" so there is really a very extreme idea scope to work with. I'll need to brainstorm it.
  
• VR version of the diorama?
  Might be difficult to jump between the two different viewpoints.
  
• 'Raw' news?
  
• Where would you put this diorama?
  I made this as a way of testing if people could understand the idea of two perspectives on the same issue really simply, without words explaining it. I wasn't envisioning my final output to look at all like a diorama, but I guess it's a new avenue I could explore? The difficulty here is mass-production.
  
• How do you get people to look? How can you break the ice so that people feel comfortable going up to look?
  Signage, arrows and colourful wayfinding environments around the diorama to direct people towards it? If it were to be on the street or in an art gallery it would need different ways of coaxing people to engage with it.
  
• Headlines or facts inside the diorama? Makes people want to go back and forth? News quotes diorama – the same but with news headlines.
  I could make a second version of the diorama with headlines from online news articles instead of tiny figures – looking from one side to the other you could see how one issue can be portrayed in so many different ways that give the reader very different opinions on an issue based on what they've read. It might be a little more boring, how can I make that fun? Could be a good one to prototype though.
  
• Needs a FORM next.
  Aka how will I take the essence of my idea and create something new from it?
  
• How do you make people realise the two sides?
  Signage and wayfinding? I like that they are opposite each other because it means that I can draw directly on the backs of the figures to show that they are literally the same things (people, objects) but seen from a different perspective/viewpoint. Essentially I've created a visual pun.
  
• What's the live-on? How can NEW perspective be added?
   Literal new perspective? Like a third opinion on the figures? I think a different form of portraying my ideas might suit more opinions better. Need to brainstorm and thumbnail this further.
  
• A newspaper with two stories in one
  Like another thumbnail sketch idea I had. Might develop this one further too.
  
• Can you BE somebody else, and see the story from their perspective?
  VR headsets? Or a giant paper mache puppet of someone (say, Trump) that you put your head inside and see a TV screen showing footage of his perspective? How can this be mass-produced? (is that really a big enough issue to dictate my ideas?)
  
• Need more transparency about where the news is coming from.
  
• A globe diorama that spins?
  
  
• Make it REPRODUCIBLE
  A difference between Fine Art and Design. A diorama as it currently stands wouldn't work on a big enough scale for the target audience I'm trying to reach. Ideally my solution would be impacting in a global scale to educate people against and stop the spread of fake news, so one tiny diorama does nothing (which I am aware of, this is an early test). How can I make my further iterations of working on this design problem, and ultimately my final outcome, something mass-produceable on a global scale?
  
• Put opacity on the posters so that they're less scary? Or split each side into two people so that you understand it's a wider issue?
  The second option might be better, it's less scary but transparencies would have the same effect. Even so, having one instantly recognisable face that represents an opinion is more impactful, I think.
  
• Can do heaps of things that work together
  Aka a campaign with lots of different touchpoints.
  
• "Anyone's a news artist now"
  
• Young people view most news on Facebook. There's more of a discussion online
  Should I make my resolved idea a digital one? The good point of this is that it's carbon neutral so good for the planet, but I find that physically based experiences are often more impactful
  
• Inflammatory headline
  Create my own? Find the most ridiculous and reimagine them to life, so that people see how entirely stupid and incredible they are?
  
• Headlines condition you to think a certain way.
  
• Ask Wellington Live Facebook page (millions of followers) about credibility and trust
  
• People don't remember what you say, but how it makes them feel. How can you get people to change their minds?
  Essentially this is Experience Design. This is how I want to tackle the issue. The crux of my problem!
  
• Older people trusted the newspaper as fact so they are more likely to trust fake news the same way. Hard to persuade
  Should I be focussing on educating older generations instead of young people? They're more likely to be conned on the internet, trust what they read as fact without questioning it, and fall into fake news schemes.
  
• Equality = macrotrend
  Play to this advantage?
  
• Why do people make fake news?
  Need for validation, or to sway others to side with a particular viewpoint not by elevating their viewpoint but by belittling and defacing the viewpoints of others.
  
• Could I target the fake news makers?
  It'd be very difficult to reach them. Mostly they're motivated by money or a strong political belief, so it'd be very tricky to make an impact on them. Hard to measure if it had worked or not, either. But it would stop fake news at the crux of the problem.
  
• Critical thinking not taught in high-school?
  That's what I'll be aiming to teach, in a simple form. To educate young people on how to comprehend what they read/see.
  
• Who is justified to filter the news? A computer programme because it has no bias like a human would? But then a human programmed it.
  Is it possible to have a filterless news? There would be a lot of meaningless drivel in it though.
  
• CONTRAST. Opens world views. Reading opinions different from yours opens your environment and filter bubble.
  
• Opposite opinions fuel people.
  Somewhere to debate news? Or redesigning/enhancing platforms that already do this to make them more accessible? But can or should you even debate news? It should be solid fact, you can't exactly debate that.