This year we want you to join team Chequeado and vote with your donation the fact-checking project you want Chequeado to put into action.
What is Chequeado?
Chequeado is the main project of Fundación La Voz Pública. We are a non-partisan, non-profit fact-checking website that works to promote access to information and open data. Our mission is to strengthen democratic discourse, promote the value of truth, and increase the cost of lying.
We produce news articles and lead investigations based on open data to check the validity of statements made by politicians, experts and prominent social figures. In addition to publishing news, we have an Educational program that teaches the public how to debate and monitor the public discourse, as well as an Innovation Lab that develops new ways of producing and sharing content, and increasing community engagement. Since our launch in 2010, we have become an established media site in Argentina, distinguished by our innovative initiatives to promote access to information, such as live fact-checking events and civic tools to promote citizen participation.
How do I join?
Support us with a donation and vote the project you want to be part of.
You can also help us spreading the word and sharing this campaign in Facebook and Twitter!
Which projects can I support?
- Bringing Chequeado to the rest of the country
Since 2010, we have established Chequeado as a name associated with innovative, serious and independent journalism. However, we are aware that we also have a bias: we write from Buenos Aires and, even unintentionally, we are mainly read in BA and other big cities. We want to change this, and for that we need your help to produce 2 fact-checking articles per month from different provinces, so that we have the whole country covered in twelve months.
- Educating the public on fact-checking
In our educational program, we want to teach fact-checking to everyone that is interested in learning how to participate in the public debate with more data and facts, to balance opinions and counteract bias. In order to do so, we train journalists in fact-checking and data journalism, and we organize educational activities with teenagers that are just joining civic life and the public debate. With your help we want to train 300 teenagers, so that next time someone asks who checks Chequeado there are many hands raised.
- Following up on the campaign promises
Politicians tend to make many promises, many of which are delayed months or years, if they are fulfilled at all. However, there is no media outlet in the country that is concerned about checking the promises that cause so much indignation when broken. For this reason, Chequeado wants to research and fact-check 20 promises made by main political leaders and to monitor their fulfillment. In this way, we are going to help you have more information and tools to hold the authorities that govern our country accountable.
- Chequeado Science to battle pseudoscience
Science is relevant to our health, our food, the environment and new technologies, among many other aspects of our lives. However, every day there is more pseudoscientific unreliable information that affects our daily decisions. Help us produce 12 more fact-checking articles on scientific issues to have greater access to high quality scientific knowledge and to highlight the importance of checking the validity of the information that goes around and that we repeat many times without knowing.
- How is “Pobreza cero” going
Pobreza Cero, the federal government’s initiative to eradicate poverty, can only be evaluated with verified data. However, the publication of data on poverty was discontinued by the government in 2014. This hinders efforts to measure the evolution of the rate of poverty in the country. Chequeado will use your support to address this issue through a series of 10 articles, in which we will analyze the current economic situation, explain how Argentina compares to other countries, and find alternative ways to measure the poverty rate.
How will you spend the money?
In Chequeado we fact-check the public discourse to increase the cost of lying and encourage information to be based on data and facts, not on opinions and bias. Everyday we face the challenge of all the unreliable and untruthful information that is said and spread. For this reason, we want you to help us continue fact-checking and also to tell us what information you want checked.
The funds raised will be used to do the project with the most votes, and to kick off the others. Each donation is a vote, regardless of the amount you chose to give. Your support will help us finance the work of our team, to search and fund experts on the issue, and to present the information in a clear and attractive way. All the work done will be published in our website and social networks so everyone can have access to it.
We want to fact-check the information that you believe is most important, and for that we need your support.
Why should I support Chequeado?
- So we can continue to produce relevant and reliable news, free of political or corporate influence.
- So we can continue to provide up-to-date information that is free and easily accessible to everyone
- Because we prioritize establishing trust with our readers, and provide the sources to all our publications so our readers can evaluate and validate all our work.
- Because we have created a rapidly growing community of informed news readers, with over 155,000 Twitter followers and 55,000 Facebook friends.
- Because we have partnered with other media outlets to reach out to a wider audience. We appear every Tuesday in “No Vuelvas”, hosted by Juan Di Natale and Eduardo de la Puente in FM Rock & Pop 95.9; every Wednesday on “Maria O’Donell Continental” of Radio Continental; and “Va De Vuelta”, hosted by Román Lejtman of Radio Nacional; and every Thursday on “Mañana Sylvestre” hosted by Gustavo Sylvestre in Radio del Plata. Since 2016 we are in TV every Thursday in the news show “50 minutos” hosted by María O’ Donnell in Canal 26, and in LNpm in La Nación. We are constantly exploring new and innovative ways to format our work, such as the GIFS developed by the site UNO
- Because our work is recognized internationally. We are the recipients of the Gabriel García Márquez Award for innovation from FNPI.
- Because we are leaders in the global fact-checking network movement, and our fact-checking methods have been replicated by more than 7 other Latin American countries.
Why a crowdfunding campaign?
To ensure our independence and sustainability, we resort to a different financial model from that of traditional media outlets. To have our funding be more diversified and pluralistic, we need your help.
We are transparency and open data advocates in what we do, and in how we do it too. Read more about how we finance our work and check out our own transparency and accountability page.
Who makes Chequeado?
We are a team of young professionals dedicated to improving the quality of the public debate through greater access to information and open data. Laura Zommer, a journalist, lawyer, and transparency and access to information activist, is our executive director and editor-in-chief. Pablo M. Fernández is our Innovation director, and together with our programer Mariano Falcón, they help experiment with new tools and make our community grow. In the newsroom we have four experienced fact-checkers: Matías Di Santi as journalistic coordinator; Olivia Sohr as special projects coordinator, and the journalists Ariel Riera and Manuel Tarricone. H Merpert is our Education coordinator and he works so there are more fact-checkers and to generate awareness about the proper use of data in the public debate. Noelia Guzman coordinates our Institutional Development program and, together with our communicator Iván Echt and administration manager Mildred Iriarte, ensure the sustainability of this project.