Resource Review - Snopes and Purportal

(This is part of a year long series of resource reviews I've been doing. 52 resources in 52 weeks. You can see all the reviews in one place here)





Snopes.com and Purportal.com - Two sites to check on Urban Legends and other online nonsense.

OVERALL - Our youth spend truly amazing amounts of time on the internet and can be naive about the information that they find there. Urban Legends have an amazing ability to hang on and we need some way of coming back to the facts whenever possible. These two sites can give you the information you need.

WHAT'S IT ABOUT? I just recently got a version of an Urban Legend that I first got back in the 1980's when it arrived by FAX! It was completely wrong then and it's just as wrong now. Snopes is the best source (in my opinion)for the facts on so many stories, legends and spams. It is amazingly comprehensive and detailed. Purportal is more of a search engine that includes Snopes plus several other sites having to do with spam, emails, frauds, phishing plus viruses and malware. It's a great resource.

RESERVATIONS Snopes is so comprehensive that sometimes it's hard to figure out where to even start looking. Purportal has the problem of most search engines in that you have to come up with the right search terms to actually find what you're looking for.

RECOMMENDATION Fighting for the truth is a part of what our ministry is all about. So is helping our young people to walk in the right knowledge. While not directly spiritual these two sites are great resources to have on hand.