Just Stop...

So, this comes up every now and then and today happens to fall into the "now" category, so I figured I would stop and jot a few thoughts down. You see, the Internet is a vast and wondrous land chock full of more information than an army of sentient sponges could absorb...

*sings* Who lives in a pineapple under the sea...?

Sorry, got a little distracted by the word sponge (OH SHINY!!). Anyway, there are two halves to this net-enabled whole: Those who provide the information and those who just suck it all in. Now, we are, by nature, a viral species when it comes to information. We like to give it just as much as we like to get it (actually, the same could be said for other things, but I'll leave that alone for now). With that said, no one really falls solely under either header. We all seek information and we all end up sharing our findings in some form or another. So what I'm about to say applies to everyone. Get your shit straight. Simple enough, right? Let me define it in the context of this post though. Before putting something on the web, be sure it is, to the best of your knowledge, accurate. I know, I know, that can be difficult sometimes, but it is easy to see when someone didn't at least make a reasonable effort to get their facts straight. There is no requisite exam to receive Internet privileged. So anyone could be reading what you put out there, including that massive section of the populace who don't know enough to even tie their own shoes and will actually take what you say at face value. What's worse is I'm only referring to those who honestly were just too lazy to fact check their work. I'm not even looking at those who purposely go out of their way to spread false information. That's a whole other post that, if I was to actually write it, would probably read something like "something something something TROLL something something something motherfucking idiot something something something get off the net". But I digress...

Some of you may ask where this is coming from. Essentially, it's a situation where someone writes a news article that is so chock full of bad information that there really is no reason for it to have ever been posted. And the sad part is that it's passed off as a factual news piece, where the unsuspecting reader will find it, read it over, and walk away knowing less than they did when they started. It's a terrible practice that is all-to-common these days where millions of sites are interested more in their hit count and ad revenue than their own integrity.

So please, if this applies to you, just stop. Really...just stop...