On Monday evening, Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales launched Wikitribune, an independent site (not affiliated with Wikipedia or the Wikimedia Foundation) “that brings journalists and a community of volunteers together” in a combination that Wales hopes will combat fake news online — initially in English, then in other languages. “The news is broken, but we've figured out how to fix it,” he said in a promotional video posted on the website's homepage, which does not yet carry any news stories. He also argued that social media networks, where an ever-increasing number of people get their news, were designed to show users what they wanted to see, confirm their biases and keep them clicking at all costs.
Wikipedia co-founder Jimmy Wales announces plans for a crowdfunded news website, Wikitribune, that will publish stories by journalists, with contributions, including fact checking, by volunteers to, among other goals, counter the recent spread of so-called "fake news".