Today’s Eponymy in August is Betteridge’s Law. It’s a useful rule of thumb for wading through news journalism that’s often sensationalized to grab your attention.
Oftentimes you will see the headlines of news articles phrased as questions, e.g., “Is the Blockchain Economy Ushering in a New World Economic Order?” or “Did Science Finally Measure the Maximum Airspeed of an Unladen Swallow?” Betteridge’s Law states that if a headline is in the form of a yes/no question, then the answer is no; save yourself reading the article since you already know the answer.
Of course, the answer the article may be attempting to espouse is often *not* no. If there were a stronger argument to be made, though, the headline wouldn’t need to be phrased this way. The only reasons why this headline style is necessary or desirable are that the sources or arguments are tenuous (and thus the news outlet cannot honestly declare the thesis in the headline), or the answer is “no” after investigation by the journalist (but a headline that indicates the lack of news wouldn’t be very effective).
Ian Betteridge is hardly the first person to make this claim, but his name was attached to the principle after comments he made in 2009 while reviewing the TechCrunch article “Did Last.fm Just Hand Over User Listening Data To the RIAA?” Betteridge is a long time tech journalist with a sizable list of former editor, director, and content strategy roles. He currently is the director of content and audience development for Bauer Xcel Media.When the same principle is applied to academic papers, it is named Hinchcliffe’s Rule, for Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory physicist Ian Hinchcliffe.