Xark!

Our fact-checking dilemma: What could journalists do right now?

The day after President Clinton's speech to the Democratic National Convention, the Associated Press produced a “fact-check” that could be best described as the perfect parody of the systemic flaws I described last week. Rather than offering a limited, measured evaluation of the factual claims in the speech, the AP treated its fact-check as an opportunity to conflate fact with conflicting opinions of Bill Clinton's legacy. As Talking Points Memo headlined its post on the article, “True, but also, Lewinsky!” 

Such absurdities line up nicely with my critique of the fact-check status quo and it's useful as evidence in this “What About The Facts?” conversation we're finally having. But the problem with my proposed solution to our fact-checking problem is that my information-standards system doesn't offer any short-term options for the failure we're experiencing right now. Even if we were deploying the first semantic content-management systems in newsrooms today, the emergent features I described would still take years to develop. 

So what could we do, right now, with only the resources news organizations have on hand?  

My latest thing: CHS Uptown Bikes

Back when I was working as a mechanic in a bike shop, I used to wonder whether a journeyman mechanic could make a living by offering a mobile repair service. Someone needs a tune-up, you schedule an appointment and show up with your toolkit, parts and stand. Low overhead, only one employee to pay. 

Only it's not that simple. Dig into the business plan for something like that and it's easy to see how you could wind up starving. Quickly. 

So it wasn't until this summer, while fixing a neighbor's bike, that the thought of trying a variation on the mobile repair idea -- except only part-time, and on a very limited geographical basis -- crossed my mind.

When I ran those numbers, they came up OK. Not as something you live on, but as something that fits pretty well within the freelance-writer-new-media-street-hustler life I've been living.

So after building a site and investing in some additional tools during the month of August, today I unveiled my CHS Uptown Bikes service. And a few minutes later, I booked my first service call. 

I'm withholding judgment, obviously. I'll need do do quite a few jobs just to pay for my TS-2.2 truing stand, for instance. But we're off and rolling, and we'll see where this leads.

P.S.: If you love me, order one of our T-shirts. Pleeeeeeese...