Lateral Research & Fact Checking

Woah!  Wait!  Wikipedia? 

Yes, Wikipedia! 

But I thought Wikipedia was evil and terrible and people could edit that and make it terrible and horrible and misleading and--

Slow down. Wikipedia isn't that bad. It's usually very basic information. Once upon a time, we'd get that information from encyclopedias, like Brittanica or World Book. But instead of being confined to books on a shelf, Wikipedia has become the largest encylopedia ever. 

Oh, so it's just an encylopedia. 

Sure. Encyclopedias are great places to get started with research. And Wikipedia does have some great links and resources at the bottom you can use to further your research. 

But what about the whole editing by evildoers? 

Well, "evildoers" is a bit harsh. But yeah. It could be. Remember that lots of people edit these entries for good. So most changes are caught pretty quickly, especially on the more prominent topics, like country information. Also, you can see a history and discussion on a tab at the top to see what the editors are saying to each other.

So Wikipedia's not that bad?

Nope. Just remember that's it's a starting point. Use the citations at the bottom. And also look for key terms in your topic that you can use as new search terms to deepen your research.

Okay, so you have Wikipedia in a new window. Sweet. Look up the publication or author of what you found. This is a great guide for finding out about bias. For example, you might find an article that says that people are dying from driving small cars because people keep smashing into the tiny cars. When you research the publication, you might find that it's published by an autocompany that only makes big trucks.  See how they would want to mislead you? They want you to buy their big trucks, so they use disinformation to manipulate you. 

So look up whoever published the article. And if you can't figure out who published it, consider it suspicious. Question the legitimacy if there's no clear publisher. Or if it's a made-at-home YouTube video with no credentials, then also be suspicious because anyone can publish anything. I mean, are you going to trust this guy? Or anyone who says, "Smash that like button"? Are they credible, or just trying to get likes?