Do you often take what is on the Internet as truth without thinking much about it? If yes, why? If no, why? Discuss this in your own words.

As an Internet user for the past decade, I have always relied on the Internet for informations and any of its kind. In my opinion, it is a strong channel of the media because it can spread news lightning fast. However, in considering whether or not it is reliable is another question.

After all these years of experiences of being an Internet user, I disagree with the idea that Internet is a reliable source of information. First of all, the news can be spread by anyone at all. That is, even a small child who just learned how to use a computer properly can have access to the Internet given the appropriate exposure. Normally， a kid of that age would not know much of the outside world, and if such a kid were to post an article in the Internet, nobody would know that it was a kid who posted it, unless he revealed it himself. This is another point that supports the above statement, Internet masks a real person’s identity. Anyone can post anything at all in the Internet, as nobody would know that it is him/her that published such a post.

Besides that, facts from the Internet are mostly not being referenced to an established data. Even if it has citations, the references are from the Internet itself. That being said, a post in the Internet that is being referred to by a person is not necessarily true itself. It is hard to show evidences to support the particular post in the Internet because anonymity is everywhere.

Conclusively, the Internet is a very good channel for information propagation but one should not put too much trust in it. Nowadays, even newspaper might not reveal authentic information due to politics, what more of the internet. One should take it as a reference and guideline, not trusting it as if it is a proven hypothesis.