What is true on the internet?

Recently, an Irish student called Shane Fitzgerald pulled off a hilarious stunt to test how serious journalists take information on Wikipedia. So after the death of Maurice Jarre, an oscar winning French composer, he put a quote on Wikipedia that says: "When I die there will be a final waltz playing in my head". The quotation wasn't real and there was no source linked to the quote. Nevertheless, newspapers and blogs all over the world published the wrong quote. This proves we live in a world where anybody can make (and break) the news. Read the article here.

I think there's too much copying on the internet. If I'm looking for different articles on a certain subject on the internet to check if the 'facts' are reliable, all I see is that articles that I read on one site are shamelessly copied to another website. Is there no respect for copyrights on the world wide web? At least take some effort in rewriting the facts you've found. Stay off the control-c/control-p buttons on your keyboard!

There's even faulty information of me on the web as a result of a hilarious coincidence: another Robin Stam is working as a designer in Holland. And he's a pretty good designer. So recently I saw on a website that I'm a Dutch designer and copywriter who lives in Germany and works in Amsterdam at an agency called Vijf890. Oh, and I'm also a creative director (I think neither of us has ever been a creative director). You can see this perfect blend of two Robin Stam's here. I actually looked on the website whether I can report this mistake, but the only option is to remove the profile entirely. Well, combining his resume with mine gives both of us a better image so I think I'll keep it like this. And combining both of our portfolio's on the website of Creatie doesn't bother me either.

The funny thing is, about half a year ago I did a bit of online hoaxing myself. One of my best friends Marvin Vis told me he's on IMDB, a renowned website about movies. Marvin works as a 3D designer at an agency called New Media Trix. Everybody who has anything to do with movies is on IMDB, so he's on there as well. Just for a good laugh, I published a very positive comment about one of the TV-shows that Marvin worked on and told that I truly admire the backgrounds made by him. You can read the comment here. It's a good example of how silly facts can sneak on the world wide web. Even half a year later, it's still on there... Waiting to be picked up by a journalist who doesn't suspect anything.