As a class project, I think the Lateral Reading technique allows the students to inquire at depth into what the net offers and how to build their own recognized (and reliable} experts. Almost the very first thing I notice on every search is how many diverse sources will all reference a single source while very often being too lazy or time constrained to send their own staff. Following people who only follow their friends creates a suspiciously self-referential loop of reporters reporting on reports rather than reporting on the news.

This is not only a poor use of the vastness of resources that could potentially appear on the net, it gives the impression of multiple independent observers agreeing on how something went down. Fair enough that we ourselves were not there and we must trust someone to cover it as directly as possible but do rate accuracy or truthfulness or agreement?

Or maybe our minds are built to accommodate the variable tellings of the world that each individual inevitably gives from their own viewpoint / personality / biases and we reassemble it in our own minds anyway making multiple repeats superfluous? Alternately, the whole structure built around assigning the role of truth tellers to those who agree on what they saw sounds dangerous.