Facebook's tirade against fake news could hurt satire, says Vancouver writer

When Donald Trump became the Republican Party's official presidential nominee last July, Vancouver satirist John Eganstarted putting pen to paper.

He wrote an article outlining Obama's plan to move his family to Canada should Trump take office. The pieceoriginally published under The BurrardStreet Journalsoon became election fodder.

"I noticed that a bunch of these conservativeblogsin the U.S. had actually just reprinted my article word for word without any kind of disclaimer saying that it was satire or saying it was a joke," he told stand-in host Gregor Craigieon CBC's BC Almanac.

The piece was picked up by dozens of fake news websitesand it was one of many bogus stories flooding social media channelson election night.

And while Egan commends Facebook'srecent plan to tackle the proliferation of fake news, he hopes satire won't get caught up in the mix.

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Saving satire

Egan is currently involved in his own battle against fake news sites that unapologetically ran with his material. He's filed over 50 notices of copyright infringement but says many sites still display the article.

"I was pretty annoyed with it because people were stealing my hard workand profiting from it. And not telling people it was a joke, and creating such a massive storm."

He says at one point, representatives from the White House even had to debunk the rumour that Obama was moving north.

Egan admits the whole experience has been frustratingand he commends Facebook's recent announcement to filter out fake news.

Last week, the social media giantoutlined plans toinstilthird-party fact checkersand make it easier for users toreport fake news when they see it.

The move came after concerns that fake news circulating on social media could have possibly swayed the U.S. election results.

But Egan is worried satirical content will also take a hit.

"I'm afraid that satire will get caught up in that, because it is really hard to differentiate between the two," he said.

From programslike the Daily Show to websites like the Onion, Egan says satire has long provided audiences with unique social commentary thatpokes fun at our culturewhile simultaneously raisingawareness about hot-buttonissues.

He thinks it's important for audiencesto be diligent and take control over the content itconsumes rather than lose it all together.

"Research everything, question everything you read even what you read from more traditional news media. That's really the only way we can tackle it, because banning certain types of news that raisesall sorts of questions about freedom of speech."

With files from CBC's BC Almanac

To listen to the full interview, click on the audio labelled:Facebook's tirade against fake news could threaten satire, says Vancouver writer