The Truth Is Out There

The Large Hadron Collider was switched on last week amid lots of ill informed speculation and scaremongering from those claiming that the end of the world is nigh, the use of the web to spread fears that flicking the switch on the LHC could create a Black Hole that could swallow up the Earth was of concern to inventor of the internet Sir Tim Berners-Lee. Okay so the switch-on did happen to coincide with earthquakes in Iran and China but thats all it was, coincidence, in fact both stories were hardly reported. I found out about the Iranian quake by text message as it was happening from a friend in Dubai who had to leave her office block when it started to shake, the tremor was felt right across the Gulf States.

The Worldwide Web is the catalyst for wrong information, when Sir Tim invented the web I bet he hadn't reckoned on Wikipaedia for instance. A great idea in concept, someone posts a definition or an article about a subject or a famous person and anyone, yes anyone else can go into that article and add to it or embellish the definition. Many entries have found to be false, thus making the whole thing a website of misinformation, I have been told by a senior lecturer that some university students have actually copied and pasted wikipaedia extracts into their coursework. Thats not to say Wikipaedia is all bad, the majority of information in there is valid but some is wide of the mark.

There are also plenty of conspiracy theory websites out there, full of circumstantial, anecdotal and photographic evidence but how can we the web users separate the truth from fantasy? As the web evolves the user needs reassurance that what they are reading is factually accurate. When making a purchase online the safety certificate and the "padlock" logo both give you the signs that it is safe to use that site similarly a certificate or logo from the Worldwide Web Consortium could give a credibililty grading to a site, stars out of ten perhaps? The BBC getting nine and the Daily Mail with three, you get the picture? I found a story where John Terry was the FA spokesperson for a Respect Referees Campaign, surely some mistake?

Many millions of people use the web for information every day and the not so well developed countries are in the early stages of using the web, for an African schoolchild logging on and finding a site that claims the HIV/AIDS virus is manmade by the CIA could be potentially harmful to a developing society.
The most popular conspiracy theories at present are The US Government planned the 11th September attacks, Princess Diana was murdered by the British Royal Family, The Apollo Moon Landings (my favourite this one, as I don't believe the Americans actually landed on the Moon). Global Warming or Climate Change was invented by scientists when the Cold War ended so they wouldn't lose their funding, and most unbelievable of all Arcadi Gaydamak, the Jerusalem based Russian-Israeli businessman, has said for the first time that he, rather than his son Sacha is the owner of Portsmouth Football Club. He claims that the club are up for sale for £300m and that the new stadium will be built in conjunction with the Dubai Royal Family (£300m! a tad overpriced?)

So we'll wait and see where the Hadron Collider takes us, it may be that the Cern scientists will discover free renewable energy from their LHC experiments and pass the benefits onto mankind, now then that's a conspiracy theory that I'd like to start.