How to lie: A case study

Lying is easy. Lying is fun. Lying is profitable. Lying is the way of life for those who want to hide the truth. The question is, how do you lie effectively? Let's look at an example of the best techniques in action. The company using these techniques at the moment does not have to be named.

The first thing you do when lying is to tell the truth -- not the whole truth, but just enough to make the lie itself seem true - a half or quarter truth. Truth: "I hate the auto-movie ads on the site as they blow my ears off or disturb everyone around me. The intrusive pop-ups are also a problem" Lie: "Michael Dinowitz doesn't want any ads on the site"

The second thing is to quote a person. Using some abstract entity in a lie is too impersonal. You need to give the lie a human face, make it feel like it's "one of us". Adobe is a massive company and is just too big and abstract for anyone to take personally. On the other hand, Michael Dinowitz and Sean Corfield are both people who can be identified with.

This brings us to the third point of a lie: Use named, recognizable people. You can use anyone you want in a lie to help make the lie more believable but if you use people whose names are well known in a community, then your lie becomes more personal and therefore, more believable. If you combine this with a half-truth (see point one) that might be heard from these people, then all the better. You don't even have to have the half-truth come from both as long as you group the people together. This makes the lie seem even more real as "they are both saying it," even though neither did.

Finally, take a disparaging quote against the named people from someone else and don't allow the quote to be challenged. This is the most powerful technique, especially if you can make the person quoted seem like an expert. He doesn't have to be, as most people don't bother to investigate who said what.

Oh, I almost forgot an important technique. Make your lie fit into a lie told by someone else. This falls under the theory that if something is said often enough, it is seen as true, whether it is or not. "ColdFusion is dying" is a lie told often enough to have gained a life of its own despite every fact that refutes the lie.

So there you have it. The techniques used to smear people and deflect blame. The techniques that should never be used against people who LOVE to expose lies for what they are. The techniques that fail when used against a thriving, intelligent community such as ours.

When will the company in question learn that simple fact?