Monthly Archives: March 2020

Inaccurate headlines

This entry was posted in Commentary Writer ethics and tagged fake news New Hampshire news on by

Update:The Union Leader corrected the headline, possibly in response to my complaint. Kudos!

News websites want clicks to their articles. They’re what bring in advertising revenue. Too many of them mislead the reader or sensationalize the story for the sake of clicks. Sometimes they engage in outright falsehood. An example is an article on the website of the Manchester, NH Union Leader, which carries the false headline “Free staters continue to meet despite ban.”

The article is actually about the Free Keene organization, which has no connection with the Free State Project beyond being based in the same state. Most libertarians in New Hampshire regard Free Keene as a little crazy. Putting their health at risk to make a point isn’t very smart.
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COVID-19 and curve flattening for writers 1

This entry was posted in Writer ethics Writing and tagged coronavirus COVID-19 mathematics pandemic statistics on by

When we write about issues related to COVID-19 and other major health risks, we carry a serious responsibility. Most of us aren’t medical professionals or specialists in biological sciences, but we have to get as much right as we can. Giving false reassurances and spreading panic are both harmful. Advising ineffective or dangerous preventive methods is still worse.

When we write for hire, we present our clients’ opinions, not necessarily our own, but that doesn’t let us off the hook. A pandemic is too serious to spin and make excuses about it. If a client wants you to give out inaccurate information, please decline the assignment.

But anyone can give that advice. I’d like to talk here about a couple of technical issues that writers need to understand. The projected spread of the disease is a matter of statistics. You’ve seen a lot of advice urging us to “flatten the curve.” What does this mean, and why do we want to flatten it? You’ve also seen that the number of cases is growing exponentially. That’s true, but most people don’t clearly understand what it means.
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The target=_blank security issue

This entry was posted in Tools Writing and tagged HTML Internet technology writing on by

There’s a little-known security risk built into the design of HTML. It concerns links that open in a new tab or window. You make it happen by specifying target="blank" in an anchor (a) element. For example:

<a href="something.example.com" target="_blank">

The trouble is that when you do it, you put the page containing that link at risk. For some bizarre reason, the designers of HTML decided that the destination page should gain access to the window.opener property of the source page. This gives the target page — the one run by someone else considerable control over your page. For instance, it can redirect your page to another URL.
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