After the Queen jumped out of a helicopter with James Bond to open London 2012 you would think journalists would be a bit more cautious about a video which appeared yesterday showing former weatherman Michael Fish, 68, base-jumping from a 200-feet high London office block.
Not so. The tale was reported, without any caveats such as “appeared to jump”, in the Daily Mirror, Daily Express, Huffington Post UK, the Ecologist and others.
It even popped up in print in the Evening Standard’s diary last night.
All these outlets reported the far-fetched yarn as fact.
A call to eco fashion brand Rapanui, which organised the stunt to raise awareness about global warming and, presumably, themselves revealed that the story was in fact a spoof.
I know it’s the silly season, but surely stories have to be at least a little bit true?
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