Facebook helps out the satire-challenged

Adam Tinworth
Adam Tinworth

This has been lurking in my tabs for a while. Facebook is starting to experimentally mark satirical articles – from The Onion in particular – as such:

“We are running a small test which shows the text “[Satire]” in front of links to satirical articles in the related articles unit in News Feed. This is because we received feedback that people wanted a clearer way to distinguish satirical articles from others in these units,” a Facebook representative told Mashable.

Some feel this isn’t needed:

@richjm Oh no. Nothing like ruining a good joke by having to tell people it's meant to be funny— LauraOliver (@LauraOliver) August 18, 2014

My counter argument? There’s an entire site devoted to examples of people not realising that Onion articles are humour:

Tumblr naz6fhBDry1qkt6yoo1 1280

critical thinkingFacebooksatireThe Onion
Adam Tinworth

Adam Tinworth Twitter

Adam is a lecturer, trainer and writer. He's been a blogger for over 20 years, and a journalist for more than 30. He lectures on audience strategy and engagement at City, University of London.

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Adam Tinworth

Adam is a lecturer, trainer and writer. He's been a blogger for over 20 years, and a journalist for more than 30. He lectures on audience strategy and engagement at City, University of London.