Category: Prank Busters

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Is a Picture Still Worth a Thousand Words?

Learn to spot fake AI photos while you still can:

“Digital Forensics Expert Provides Helpful Tips for Spotting AI Generated Images,” by Lori Dorn, Laughing Squid, July 22, 2025.

“During a truly informative TED talk, Professor Hany Farid of UC Berkeley shared his expertise as a digital forensics expert to give helpful tips in spotting whether or not an image was AI generated.

Digital forensics expert Hany Farid explains how he helps journalists, courts and governments find structural errors in AI-generated images, offering four practical tips everyday individuals can use when facing the internet’s war on reality.

Farid explains how AI does not understand the physics, geometry and other real world issues, so it will inevitably make mistakes in perspective, an anomaly that can be tracked. One such error is that of the vanishing point, in which parallel lines, such as railroad tracks, will seem to converge the further it is away from the eye.

Read the whole article here.

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Fiddle File #10

fiddler-75Editor’s Note: Ask The Fiddler is a lifestyle advice column that aims to remedy more chaos and confusion than it creates. Questions may be submitted to us here at Art of the Prank, and good luck.

The Fiddle File #10

Here we go with another madcap roundup of hoaxes, scams and damn fool idiocy making the rounds these days. Take heed. Some of these fiddles may soon be showing up on your computer, phone or even up close and personal. Check it out:

Kentucky & Etc: Take it off? You got a gig serving burgers and fries. Now the restaurant manager is ordering you to submit to a strip-search. Here”s the history of a very bizarre hoax, pulled time and again.

FaceBook: What makes you click? Here are some hoax headlines that have steered the curious into a marketing scam: Huge plane crashes into bridge? – Terrible roller coaster accident! – 99% Can’t Watch More Than 15 Seconds – Half Girl Half Snake! – Terrible accident with pencil! – HUGE pimple explodes – Shark eats living man! – Spider lives under skin!

plane-crashes-bridge

FaceBook, email: Here”s another example of the “What makes you click?” hoax. Continue reading “Fiddle File #10”

Related posts:

  1. Fiddle File #9
  2. Fiddle File #3
  3. Fiddle File #2
  4. The Fiddle File: Scam Report
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Fiddle File #9

fiddler-75Editor’s Note: Ask The Fiddler is a lifestyle advice column that aims to remedy more chaos and confusion than it creates. Questions may be submitted to us here at Art of the Prank, and good luck.

The Fiddle File #9

Here we go with another madcap roundup of hoaxes, scams and damn fool idiocy making the rounds these days. Take heed. Some of these fiddles may soon be showing up on your computer, phone or even up close and personal. Check it out:

superstarEverywhere: Got what it takes to be a supermodel? There are plenty of sharks out there to assure you of that, all you need is some up front money. Article is from a Canadian perspective but the advice is universal.

Cleveland: The nice stranger will give you half the proceeds if you let him cash a check using your debit card. Sounds like an easy way to pocket some loot. And it is, for the scammer.

Staten Island: Ah, for a good night”s rest. WTF, the bed”s on fire. And your “prankster” roomy is facing a handful of charges.

Baltimore: Looking to make a few extra bucks? Become a hoaxer bounty hunter. Coast Guard offers $2000 for the right info on this trouble-maker.

FaceBook: What are friends for? Overseas con artists think they”re for exploiting through impostor accounts set up using your info.

Continue reading “Fiddle File #9”

Related posts:

  1. Fiddle File #10
  2. Fiddle File #3
  3. Fiddle File #2
  4. The Fiddle File: Scam Report
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Fiddle File #8

fiddler-75Editor’s Note: Ask The Fiddler is a lifestyle advice column that aims to remedy more chaos and confusion than it creates. Questions may be submitted to us here at Art of the Prank, and good luck.

The Fiddle File #8

Here we go with another madcap roundup of hoaxes, scams and damn fool idiocy making the rounds these days. Take heed. Some of these fiddles may soon be showing up on your computer, phone or even up close and personal. Check it out:

Los Angeles: Poor dear, is an evil curse keeping you from finding true love? No problem, for something just short of a million bucks this psychic will fix you right up. Think so?

Your Computer: The email says your package is on its way. But you didn”t order any package. Well, better check. Nope, better not, unless you want to be phished for personal and banking info.

Atlanta: Whew, sure glad Home Depot has public restrooms. Whoa, sure hate that some jerk decorated the seats with glue.

Your Computer: You”re active in online communities like Facebook, MySpace, Flickr and LinkedIn. Yum, scammers love you.

Everywhere: A good selection here, “The Twelve Scams of Christmas,” nefarious activities by scammers which you may encounter this season.

Continue reading “Fiddle File #8”

Related posts:

  1. Fiddle File #9
  2. The Fiddle File #6
  3. The Fiddle File #5
  4. The Fiddle File: Scam Report
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The Fiddle File #7

fiddler-75Editor’s Note: Ask The Fiddler is a lifestyle advice column that aims to remedy more chaos and confusion than it creates. Questions may be submitted to us here at Art of the Prank, and good luck.

The Fiddle File #7

Here we go with another madcap roundup of hoaxes, scams and damn fool idiocy making the rounds these days. Take heed. Some of these fiddles may soon be showing up on your computer, phone or even up close and personal. Check it out:

Washington State: I read the news today, oh boy. Fake article posted about son”s alleged suicide.

China: Do these eggs taste kind of funny to you? I mean, not funny ha-ha, funny yuck.

Vancouver BC: The on-line date you haven”t met yet has hit you up for $500,000 in loans. Talk about screwed without a kiss.

Washington DC: Sorry to hear you slipped on a banana peel. By the way, that”s a felony.

Watch the video

Louisiana: You jokingly yell to your sleeping friend that the car is on fire and about to explode. His panic reaction leads to a near-death experience.

Continue reading “The Fiddle File #7”

Related posts:

  1. Fiddle File #10
  2. Fiddle File #9
  3. Fiddle File #8
  4. The Fiddle File #5

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