hoaxwebsiteevaluation

The assignment was to evaluate a hoax web site based on criteria we were given and then summarize the findings. I evaluated the History of the Fisher Price Airplane web site.

http://www.weathergraphics.com/tim/fisher/

Author: The author doesn't appear to have any expertise on the subject and the home site is weathergraphics.com which has nothing to do with this article. His educational background is not demonstrated and I cannot figure out his occupation other than he manages the weathergraphics.com website.

Site: this site is provided through another web site with the author's web space. It does provide an email address for contact information.

Links: there are not links provided on the site.

Date: the copyrighted date of the site is 2004. There is a "fake" posting of someone who commented on his inaccuracies which gives a 2005 date on it. The email is not legitimate as well as it doesn't have a name before the @ sign.

Expert Review: the author tried to make it look like someone credible commented on the site, but as mentioned above - it's not legitimate.

Pictures: not copyrighted. Some not referenced. One of the photos look fake as it appears he put a copy of a fisher price plane on a runway with a real plane. Some of the pictures came from a different web site.

Accuracy: using Fisher Price people to discuss a plane that doesn't exist supports the "hoax" of the site. I was able to search airplanes and find out that the plane doesn't exist that is discussed on the site. There was never a soviet or a fisher price plane which is referenced on the site.

Overall, I could see that this site was a hoax as I started viewing the photos on the site and reviewing information. I am not sure if someone would see it as a hoax right away if they did not know it was a hoax site.