perpetual notion

we all know the internet is an immense wealth of information. of course, with information comes misinformation. this was recently illustrated to me in the form of two chan emails. I shall highlight them now:

1. don't buy gas from a certain company so that we can drive gas prices down. this makes no sense and would never be effective as Snopes clearly explains.

2. microwaving things in plastic containers can kill you. this one supposedly includes microwavable dinners whose packages are specifically designed for this purpose. I highly doubt that anyone would be allowed to sell anything in a package that could harm you in this way. the letter specifically mentioned JOHN HOPKINS in the title and in the message body. the real Johns Hopkins issued a statement disproving this and explaining that this false information was wrongly credited to researchers from the institution.

you can't trust everything you read on the web, nor can you always trust information that others decide to forward to you. so before you decide to send that startling piece if information to all of your family and friends, do a simple web search or look at one of these reputable sites:

Urban Legend Zeitgeist

Snopes

thank you.