Weekly Quiz: Print Revivals, AI Hallucinations, and Data Leaks

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const title = "Weekly Quiz: Print Revivals, AI Hallucinations, and Data Leaks"; const date = "May 16, 2026"; const data = [ { image: "https://walrus-assets.s3.amazonaws.com/img/WEB_NewfoundlandNewsGap_MAY2026-scaled.jpg", title: "As Newspapers Shutter in Newfoundland, a Student Publication Steps Up", url: "https://thewalrus.ca/as-newspapers-shutter-in-newfoundland-a-student-publication-steps-up/", question: "A student newspaper in Newfoundland and Labrador recently released a one-off print issue that reflected on its history, including its 1990s peak period. That issue featured a retrospective interview with a former editor-in-chief who has since gone on to become a television news anchor. What is the name of the former editor-in-chief of Memorial University's Muse who is now an anchor at NTV?", options: [ "Michael Connors", "John Harris", "Lee Hurley", "Rebecca Jennings", ], answer: "Michael Connors", correct: "The Muse’s one-off print issue, released earlier this year, is a culmination of the assertive return its student journalists have made. Throughout the issue, the paper makes a case for its own existence with articles about the feminist history of the publication, an interview about its 1990s heyday with former editor-in-chief and current NTV anchor Michael Connors, and a piece about the importance of print journalism from the perspective of Craig Wescott, who edits one of the province’s last remaining newspapers: the Shoreline.", incorrect: "The Muse’s one-off print issue, released earlier this year, is a culmination of the assertive return its student journalists have made. Throughout the issue, the paper makes a case for its own existence with articles about the feminist history of the publication, an interview about its 1990s heyday with former editor-in-chief and current NTV anchor Michael Connors, and a piece about the importance of print journalism from the perspective of Craig Wescott, who edits one of the province’s last remaining newspapers: the Shoreline.", }, { title: "The New York Times Got Caught Using AI Hallucinations in Its Reporting", url: "https://thewalrus.ca/the-new-york-times-got-caught-using-ai-hallucinations-in-its-reporting/", question: "Recent AI reporting scandals have revived concern about fabrication in journalism, especially as generative tools produce plausible but false quotes that can slip into print. This has led to renewed comparisons with earlier cases where fabrication was treated as a major ethical breach. Which reporter became infamous in the late 1990s for fabricating stories at The New Republic, later becoming a defining case of journalistic misconduct?", options: [ "Jayson Blair", "Stephen Glass", "Catherine Porter", "Matina Stevis-Gridneff", ], answer: "Stephen Glass", correct: "Generative AI programs—ChatGPT, Gemini, Claude, Grok, and the like—hallucinate, a term referring to their tendency to present fabrications as facts. Fabrications used to be a mortal sin in journalism. The New York Times’ own Jayson Blair left the paper in 2003 under a dark cloud of scandal after it was revealed he had regularly invented details for his reporting. The flagrant fabrications of Stephen Glass at The New Republic in the late 1990s were sufficiently scandalous enough to merit a Vanity Fair feature and a Hollywood film adaptation. But the minimizing treatment of Matina Stevis-Gridneff’s fake Poilievre quote suggests that in the AI era, fabrication may no longer be a career-ending transgression—at least, not for everyone.", incorrect: "Generative AI programs—ChatGPT, Gemini, Claude, Grok, and the like—hallucinate, a term referring to their tendency to present fabrications as facts. Fabrications used to be a mortal sin in journalism. The New York Times’ own Jayson Blair left the paper in 2003 under a dark cloud of scandal after it was revealed he had regularly invented details for his reporting. The flagrant fabrications of Stephen Glass at The New Republic in the late 1990s were sufficiently scandalous enough to merit a Vanity Fair feature and a Hollywood film adaptation. But the minimizing treatment of Matina Stevis-Gridneff’s fake Poilievre quote suggests that in the AI era, fabrication may no longer be a career-ending transgression—at least, not for everyone.", }, { image: "https://walrus-assets.s3.amazonaws.com/img/WEB_AgricultureCuts_MAY26.jpg", title: "Ottawa Is Shutting Down Seven Agriculture Labs. Farmers Will Pay the Price", url: "https://thewalrus.ca/ottawa-is-shutting-down-seven-agriculture-labs-farmers-will-pay-the-price/", question: "Canada’s publicly funded agricultural research system dates back to the 1800s, with experimental farms studying everything from crop disease to soil health and livestock management. Agricultural and resource economics professor Richard Gray says that long-term research investment has paid off enormously for Canadian agriculture. What minimum benefit-to-cost ratio does Gray associate with that research?", options: [ "Five-to-one", "Ten-to-one", "Fifteen-to-one", "Twenty-to-one", ], answer: "Twenty-to-one", correct: "Canada has a lengthy history of agriscience—the sites at Nappan and Indian Head, both established in 1887, were two of the country’s first experimental farms—and the long-term, non-commercial studies on plant breeding, agronomics, soil health, and livestock management done by the AAFC over the past century and a half paid dividends for Canadian agriculture at a minimum of a twenty-to-one benefit-to-cost ratio, according to Gray’s research. “When it comes to genomics and understanding the aesthetics of crops, Canada’s ahead of most countries,” he says, adding that such accrued agricultural research has been done specifically for the conditions faced by the nation’s farmers.", incorrect: "Canada has a lengthy history of agriscience—the sites at Nappan and Indian Head, both established in 1887, were two of the country’s first experimental farms—and the long-term, non-commercial studies on plant breeding, agronomics, soil health, and livestock management done by the AAFC over the past century and a half paid dividends for Canadian agriculture at a minimum of a twenty-to-one benefit-to-cost ratio, according to Gray’s research. “When it comes to genomics and understanding the aesthetics of crops, Canada’s ahead of most countries,” he says, adding that such accrued agricultural research has been done specifically for the conditions faced by the nation’s farmers.", }, { title: "Alberta Separatism Fuelled by Russian Networks and US Influencers", url: "https://thewalrus.ca/alberta-separatism-fuelled-by-russian-networks-and-us-influencers/", question: "On April 30, 2026, a court injunction forced the Centurion Project to take down a database containing the personal information of millions of Albertan voters. How were investigators able to confirm which organization’s legitimate copy of the electoral list had been leaked to the Centurion Project?", options: [ "Metadata embedded in the file revealed the date and device it was copied from", "A whistleblower inside the Republican Party of Alberta provided documentation", "The database used a unique encryption key assigned to each authorized recipient", "Each electoral list contained unique fake names that allowed investigators to trace the source of leaks", ], answer: "Each electoral list contained unique fake names that allowed investigators to trace the source of leaks", correct: " On April 30, 2026, Elections Alberta obtained a court injunction forcing the Centurion Project, an Alberta separatist organization, to take down a publicly searchable online database containing the personal information of 2.9 million Albertan voters. Elections Alberta said the Republican Party of Alberta’s legitimate copy of the electoral list unlawfully ended up in the hands of the Centurion Project. Every electoral list distributed by Elections Alberta is “salted” with fictitious names that allow investigators to trace any leaked copy back to its source. The salt confirmed the list’s origin.", incorrect: " On April 30, 2026, Elections Alberta obtained a court injunction forcing the Centurion Project, an Alberta separatist organization, to take down a publicly searchable online database containing the personal information of 2.9 million Albertan voters. Elections Alberta said the Republican Party of Alberta’s legitimate copy of the electoral list unlawfully ended up in the hands of the Centurion Project. Every electoral list distributed by Elections Alberta is “salted” with fictitious names that allow investigators to trace any leaked copy back to its source. The salt confirmed the list’s origin.", }, ];