Internet Standing in the classroom
Free crowd-sourced media bias data for media-literacy units, journalism courses, and research projects. Distribution histograms, trust-weighting math, and a public API — designed to be examined, not just consumed.
For teachers, professors, and researchers · We respond to educator inquiries within 24 hoursIn the classroom
Media literacy units
Have students rate the same article on Internet Standing and compare to AllSides + MBFC. The disagreement between tools is the learning opportunity — none of them are infallible, all are useful in combination.
Class-as-rater exercises
Assign a different outlet to each student, have them write an Internet Standing review with evidence URLs, and discuss the resulting class-aggregated score. Concrete practice with bias evaluation.
Research projects
Use the free API to pull bias + accuracy data for the outlets on the record, as JSON. Suitable for senior theses, grad seminars, and computational journalism courses. Need a spreadsheet? Ask us for a CSV pull.
Sample lesson outlines
Lesson 1: Why bias measurement disagrees
Pick 3 well-known outlets. Compare their bias rating on AllSides, Media Bias / Fact Check, and Internet Standing. Discuss why the methodologies produce different answers and which you trust for what use case.
Lesson 2: Distribution vs median
Open an outlet's Internet Standing page. Point out the histogram. Ask: what would it mean if a quarter rated it Far Left and a fifth rated it Center? Bimodality as a data feature, not a bug.
Lesson 3: The brigading problem
Discuss the defenses (trust-weighting, distribution visibility, a daily cap on anonymous votes, and the score freeze when a brigade is detected). Have students design their own crowd-sourced rating system as a group exercise — what defenses would they add?
Lesson 4: Author-level vs outlet-level
Use Internet Standing journalist pages. Compare a single reporter's credibility rating to their parent outlet's. When and why do they diverge? Implications for byline-aware media literacy.
Want a downloadable PDF of these lesson plans (with student worksheets)? Email educators@web-jury.com.
Free educator account perks
Email us from a verified .edu address (or your institution's email) and we'll upgrade your account with:
- Higher API rate limits for your class or project (the public API is key-less with per-IP limits, so we arrange this with you directly)
- A CSV pull of bias + accuracy data for the outlets you study, prepared on request (the site itself exports JSON through the API)
- A custom "Educator" badge on your reviewer profile
- Direct line to the methodology team for research questions
Research-friendly
Internet Standing data is built for examination. The full methodology is documented, including the trust-weighting formula and brigading defenses. The vote distribution per outlet is public. The API returns the raw scores, not just the labels.
DOI assignment for citing Internet Standing data is planned. Until then, cite as: “Internet Standing, crowd-sourced media bias platform, web-jury.com, accessed [date].”
FAQ
Can students under 18 use Internet Standing?
Reviewing requires age 13+. Reading is open to all ages. For middle-school lessons, focus on reading + comparison exercises rather than account creation.
Do you have a "classroom mode" or LMS integration?
Not yet. We’re building toward Canvas + Google Classroom integration; until then, the API (and a CSV pull on request) is the integration path. Educator account holders get first preview when shipped.
Can I include Internet Standing screenshots in published research?
Yes. Attribution requested but not required for academic use. For commercial use see /press.
Bringing media bias into your classroom?
We respond to educator inquiries within 24 hours. Lesson plans, research support, custom data pulls — happy to help.