To attract readers,
many early
newspapers
exaggerated stories
or printed entirely
fabricated news.
Fake News: It’s Real and It Matters
arrested thirty-three of the city’s Jews and burned them at the stake.
Similar situations occurred hundreds of times over several centuries,
resulting in thousands of Jewish deaths.
News began to spread much more quickly after 1439, when
German goldsmith Johannes Gutenberg invented a printing press
with movable type. This invention led to the widespread printing and
distribution of broadsides (large sheets of paper printed with song
lyrics and other text), newspapers, and books in Europe and North
America. Printed materials played a major role in disseminating
new ideas and information. For instance, in the sixteenth century,
German religious professor Martin Luther used printed pamphlets
and other documents to criticize the Catholic Church, which led
to the creation of the Protestant branch of Christianity. In North
America during the eighteenth
century, colonists used pamphlets
and newspapers to criticize their
rulers in Great Britain. This
criticism inspired colonists to
fight for their independence in the
American Revolution (1775–1783).
Newspapers and other printed
materials also disseminated fake
news. To attract readers, many early
newspapers exaggerated stories or
printed entirely fabricated news.
For example, in 1835 the
New York
Sun
—previously known for its serious
reporting—ran a series of wildly popular articles that turned out to
be fake news. These articles detailed the supposed discovery of life
on the moon by Sir John Herschel, a well-known British astronomer.
According to the articles, Herschel used a telescope to view all kinds of
exotic moon life, including unicorns and batlike winged humanoids.
11
