Bitter divorce fuels Snopes’ slow demise

NY Post ^ | July 25, 2017 | Keith J. Kelly

[Oshkalaboomboom]

The bitter 2015 divorce of David and Barbara Mikkelson is the fuel that ignited the battle for the popular fact-checking Web site, Snopes, which is now resorting to a GoFundMe drive to keep it afloat.

The showdown takes on added gravity because the popular site, owned by Baday, is one of the outlets that Facebook turns to for verification of stories when it receives complaints of fake news.

Fans of Snopes have been responding in droves since Monday, when the company said that Proper Media — both tech partner and part-owner after buying Barbara’s shares in 2016 — has been withholding ad revenue.

David Mikkelson said the company was in danger of running out of money and asked for readers to help it raise $500,000.

By 5:30 p.m. on Tuesday, the GoFundMe site had already raised more than $530,000.

Proper Media, meanwhile, claims in a San Diego state court lawsuit that David Mikkelson is spending money wildly and should be removed as a director and officer.

“Mikkelson has for years been looting Bardav, to the detriment of its shareholders, first his ex-wife Barbara and now Proper Media,” the suit claims.

[Oshkalaboomboom]

I used to like Snopes when USENET was the main media and alt.folklore.urban was an entertaining place to read about different urban legends and old wive's tales. That was before it got political. Now I hope it collapses and gets replaced by something more balanced.

[pepsionice]

For the first decade, it was a fairly non-political type site and had some value. I think around 2004...it started to dissolve into some chaotic platform with an agenda.

Same with National Geographic and Readers Digest.

[JudgemAll]

Facebook uses this fraud to verify the veracity of their thread wandering trolls? Facebook policy of not indentifying harrassing trolls vs genuine thread makers aside, it explains a lot of their stupid choices

Do not rely on Facebook to feel acceptable in society... oh lord, many do unfortunately

[Vince Ferrer]

Hey, that’s another half million down the drain for progressives.

[jonrick46]

David and Barbara Mikkelson . . .

. . . "Gee! Something stinks!"

Maybe it's David:

David and Barbara Mikkelson founded Snopes' in 1995. They divorced in 2015, and now Barbara Mikkelson claims that David embezzled $98,000 from Snopes' bank account to spend on prostitutes and himself, according to the Daily Mail.

David has since remarried, to Elyssa Young, who has also been known as Eryn O’Bryn, a professional escort and porn actress.

David Mikkelson with new wife Elyssa Young. This proves that Snopes lacks credibility and should not be fact checker for anything let alone Facebook.

[StACase]

For the first decade, it was a fairly non-political type site and had some value.
I think around 2004...it started to dissolve into some chaotic platform with
an agenda. Same with National Geographic and Readers Digest.

And "Scientific American"

[Lumper20]

Facebook collects and sells more INFO about everyone who uses the site then any other. It is a total scam to find out everything about it’s users and sell that INFO.

[CardCarryingMember.VastRightWC]

Ah yes, how many hours I wasted back then on usenet, arguing politics & religion. As well as arguing the merits of text editors & OS's (but I repeat myself).

I used to use the unix "news" program from a command line in the early 80s, and then "tin" replaced it some time in the early 90s with a superior hierarchic UI. Of course, its market share of internet social networking declined once "MOSAIC" and its companion NCSA server came out.

Web search engines like yahoo & altavista were so much faster at finding things then the old usenet way of "go subscribe to these dozen newsgroups, find the official FAQ for each one, and grep through them all for what you want".

Back then we all had email addresses that gave the pathway from your nearest server to ihnp4 (Bell's best-known email backbone node = "Indian Hills Network Processor 4"). So the email looked something like: hpcnd!hpccc!hplabs!ihnp4!.......

[Jeff Chandler]

Is this true? I’ll have to find some place to find out.

[CardCarryingMember.VastRightWC]

And even Popular Science. I stopped subscribing to them when they worshipped the Obamassiah on one cover, soon after a laudatory writeup on Michael “Hockey Stick Boy” Mann, and how his life was in danger from violent Climate Change Unbelievers.

[Jeff Chandler]

For 98 large he coulda done better than that.

[Nicholas Sharpe]

Aren’t porn actresses supposed to be pretty, at least in a trashy sort of way?

I’m no great catch but I could do better than that and I haven’t got his money.

[naturalman1975]

Bang Bang Bang

[jonrick46]

If you look for images of Elyssa Young A.K.A. Eryn O’Bryn, you will find some that look pretty good. The one I posted with David Mikkelson shows how beauty is transitory and Elyssa reveals to what extent it can go. Life is short.

[SaveFerris]

ping

[SaveFerris]

Maybe he just wanted to fact-check if she had been a prostitute. /SnopesLiberalsObamaTools

[anton]

I looked. she’s a pig. Maybe if one went back to 1992 . . .?

[FreedomPoster]

NatGeo had devolved by at least the mid- to late- 1990s, when I kicked them to the curb.

[Samurai_Jack]

Angels never know it’s time
to close the book and gracefully decline,
the song has found a tale.
My what a jealous pool is she.

The face in the water looks up
and shakes her head as if to say
that it’s the last time you’ll look like today.

[elcid1970]

Snopes is as pro-Muslim as islamicity.com. Hope they both fold. Death to jihad!