A hilarious example of new media blowing up entirely fictional stories into a feeding frenzy which then is debunked, becomes the butt of jokes, and now lives on as a cautionary tale – in under an hour.
I give you the 35-Minute John Roberts Retirement. Clearly the Feiler Faster Thesis is only getting, er, faster.
Erroneous rumors (or, for that matter, the truth) spreading like wildfire end up whipping up hysterical mobs. Gotta be a concern for authoritarian governments – if people don’t trust the media, they’re going to give that much more credence to whatever whispers they hear.
