Our.News

Solving the misinformation crisis, one crowdsourced rating at a time

The Problem

Political bias, clickbait, and fake news (real news called fake, fake news called real); it’s easy to feel powerless against the overwhelming flow of misinformation on the web. Most social news websites and news aggregators don't help: they rarely if ever consider the veracity of the news they republish, and have little incentive to do so, since a click on a false story is just as “good” — from a commercial standpoint — as a click on a true story.

The Solution

Our.News is a social news network and “thought rewards platform" that crowdsources news validation, and rewards participating users on a points system. Users — anyone can sign up for a free account — submit news links, and community members rate articles based on four factors: Spin, Trust, Accuracy, and Relevance. In return, they receive benefits and rewards for their participation in the form of digital currency ("OUR tokens”). The idea is to align incentives so that users can “push back against misinformation, by enabling the public to separate fact from fiction, and judge for themselves what's factual and unbiased, and what isn't."