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Life & fun · December 31, 2013

My year in side projects

My year in side projects launched on December 31, 2013 with 27 votes, #409 of 927 launches that month and more than 75% of that year's launches. The site was still online in September 2026, 12 years on.

Visit ianww.com ↗My year in side projects alternatives

In plain words

Verified Facts is a generator that creates random conspiracy theories that are plausible enough to be mistaken for real ones. Created as a side project in 2013, it generates fictional conspiracy narratives for entertainment purposes. The tool became unexpectedly popular, producing over half a million conspiracies and attracting significant viral traffic after being shared widely on social media.

written from the facts on this page · September 2026

From the sources

Side projects are a good way to stay sane and keep sharp. 2013 was a crazy year - my side projects were a lot of fun and they opened many opportunities. Verified Facts generates random conspiracy theories. They sound crazy but they're close enough to real ones that it can be hard to tell the difference. This was a lot of fun to make. It went viral with over a half a million conspiracies generated. The highlight was when Neil Gaiman tweeted it to over a million people. Viral traffic spikes can be thrilling and nerve-wracking. We endured it with no downtime on a ec2 micro thanks to some clever caching + redis on top of mongo. 11 months later, the site ranks well for many conspiracy searches…from ianww.com

Does a similar job

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  • AC
    a conspiracy theory generator2013 · verifiedfacts.org · ▲181

    Find information, resources and relevant links for verifiedfacts.org. This domain may be for sale.

  • I made a platform for journalists to “open source” their fact checking2019 · sourcedfact.com · ▲593

    A publication dedicated to full transparency in fact-checking. Every source document is available with annotations to guide the reader, and every fact-checking conversation is out in the open.

  • Proven – An alternative to Twitter's verified accounts, with HN support2018 · github.com · ▲334

    🔑✅ An alternative to Twitter's verified accounts powered by Keybase. - dschep/proven

  • I'm 16 and building an AI based startup called Factful with friends2024 · factful.io · ▲222

    Hey HN! My name is Andrew, and I'm thrilled to share with you a project I've been working on called Factful. I'm a high school student with a passion for tackling misinformation online. Inspired by the need for more reliable content verification tools, I decided to create Factful. It's an AI-powered web app designed to revolutionize how individuals and organizations verify content. Unlike traditional grammar checkers, Factful provides a comprehensive analysis that goes beyond just grammar. It evaluates context, factuality, coherence, and more to ensure the accuracy and credibility of…

  • Metafact2018 · ▲112

    Verify facts with the world's scientists

  • Bullshit Detector – agent skills that fact-check videos and articlesJul 2026 · github.com · ▲65

    Agent skills that fact-check the internet: claim-by-claim verification with sources and a 0-10 BS score for any YouTube video, article, tweet, or PDF - SerhiiKorniienko/bullshit-detector

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Source: Show HN post ↗

Launched alongside, December 2013

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