Wrote: Fatbardh Dema
On Monday (January 12), a post (photo news) was published on the social media Facebook claiming that the price of bread would increase to 70 cents.
This claim was found published on many Facebook pages only as a photo story, without an article.
The pages that published this post are "Correct Press","Television","Albanian Renaissance","Watch Magazine","Towards News"and "Newspaper Seven".
What's wrong with this claim?
After conducting online research, hibrid.info found that these posts were made after the publication of the article by the online medium "BuletiniEkonomik.com", which bears the title "Bakery owners in the capital are abusing the situation without institutions, raising bread prices again."
In this article, this media outlet claims that it is about an increase in the price of bread at the "Milenium Bakery" bakery chain in Pristina.
The posts on the aforementioned pages do not specify that the increase in the price of bread was made only by a chain of bakeries in the capital. The lack of clarification of the news has left room for misunderstanding among readers, who misunderstand that it is about the entire territory of Kosovo.
Excerpt from the article published on "BuletiniEkonomik.com"
"In many bakeries in the capital, the price of standard bread, the most consumed by Kosovars, increased from 50 cents to 60 cents. In these days without power, in the "Milenum Bakery" bakery chain, a loaf of bread that actually weighed about 300 grams and that until the end of the year was sold for 0.49 cents, after the New Year the price is 0.69 cents, or over 40 percent more expensive compared to the price of the first ten days."
The posts from the aforementioned pages, as of the writing of this article, have collectively accumulated a total of 1117 reactions, 687 comments, and 31 shares. (see pictures below)
Analyze:
The claim on Facebook that the price of bread has increased to 70 cents is vague and misinforming.
The posts were published only as photo news, without articles, without clarifying that the claim of "BuletiniEkonomik" speaks of an increase in the price of bread only for the "Milenium Bakery" bakery chain in Pristina.
The lack of this clarification is noticeable in the comments on the posts, which has created a misunderstanding among readers who have believed that this is about a price increase throughout Kosovo.
Based on its work methodology, hibrid.info assesses these posts as "Manipulation of facts".
Reasoning:
“Factual manipulation” is a rating given to informational content that uses facts known to be accurate but interprets them in a distorted manner. These reports typically use accurate information to draw incorrect conclusions or claims, thereby misleading consumers of media content about the actual meaning of the facts presented.