It is very easy to write a bad science story. It is tantalizingly easy.¹ Often that is because writing a nuanced story requires a level of scientific explanation that will far exceed a reader's patience and a newspaper's wordcount. It's also easy because reporters let those folks who are stuck churning out releases for journals and universities do the hard work. There are whole sites devoted to these releases and they are superb. There are unintentionally hilarious headlines ("Double-teaming a whole-genome hunt") and more quantum-physics-related superlatives than you can shake a stick at. They are also full of puns ("Engineering could give reconstructive surgery a facelift"), so there's that too. It's the job of the press release writer to suck the reporter in-and it's the job of the reporter to be mildly entertained by the puns (and impressed by the ability of the writer to summarize an excessively complex story) and then factcheck it, gather some reaction quotes and send it off to the boss. Problem is, it's tricky. READ MORE