Arsenic Life. The Artistic Kraken. An island of garbage the size of Texas floating in the Pacific. These are just a few of the recent facepalm-inducing examples of media kerfuffles spurred by bad science, bad reporting, or a combination of the two. Hardly a week goes by without a foul-up about a new scientific paper or conference talk, and the misinformation spreads far and wide thanks to syndicated reports posted by major news services. Blogs are a quick and easy way to respond to bullshit claims, but, most of the time, a post just isn’t going to bring in the same audience as a sensationalized article on the landing page of FOX News, the Daily Mail, or Yahoo! If scientists and writers want to respond to overblown claims, they need to find a prominent platform, and fast. In this session, we'll come up with tips about the best ways to quickly and effectively respond to hyperbolic news reports and bad science. Given the right tools, scientists and writers can change the news cycle. And this session will also find ways that scientists, journalists, and bloggers can assist each other in responding bullshit reports that make us all headdesk.
