8/23/2026

10:10 a.m. – I woke up and the first thing I did was open TikTok and Instagram. I also replied to some messages from my friends.

11:00 a.m. – I checked Outlook to see if I had any important work emails.

12:00 p.m. – Lunchtime. I usually watch some YouTube videos while eating. That day I watched some replays from the F1 Dutch Grand Prix.

12:20 p.m. – I opened Instagram and looked at a few posts about the race.

2:30 p.m. – I opened X to see what was happening in the world. X is my main platform for news, I treat it like a place that I can find all the news outlets together. False information is very common on it, but I can reply to a post and tag It’s AI grok to check whether a claim is true, and I do that very often. One account I follow a lot is Mario Nawfal. That morning he posted that Trump had “managed to have Canada and Iran aligned against the U.S. at the same time“, and he thinks that Trump is destroying America’s standing on the world stage. The wording was sharp and one sided, so I did not take it as a fact but more like a strong opinion.

2:45 p.m. – I went to TikTok for a longer break.

3:00–4:00 p.m. – I returned to my laptop, logged into Canvas, and worked on that week’s assignments. After I finished, I checked my email again.

4:30 p.m. – I logged into my PS5 and played games for a while.

6:20 p.m. – During dinner, X pushed me a Reuters post about U.S. tariffs on Canada. Ontario Premier Doug Ford said President Trump “is the type of person that would steal your lunch money.” I always pay attention to the tariff news because my job is relate to the international logistics and can be affect by the import costs and supply chain changes, so I wanted to know what was actually happening. The post was short and emotional, so I looked at other sources. Then I found out that talks between US and Canada had broken and a 50% tariff on many Canadian goods would effect from August 22.

7:40 p.m. – I took my dog for a walk and listened to music on Spotify.

After I wrote this diary down,I think it is clear that I fact the news very often. A large part of the posts come from the same kind of accounts, a person who post all day, use strong words and mix a real headline with their own conclusion. Mario Nawfal is one example, I follow him because he is fast, but he also frames stories in a very sure way. That is why I have to check him all the time. It is not that I think every X post is all fake, It’s just because their tone makes me questionable.

I also noticed a pattern. When a news sounds shocking or is something that can affect me, I will definitely go check it on different sources and share to my friends if I think I have to . However, If it’s a game replay or a funny video, I would just watch it. So I’m actually not fact checking everything, I only check the posts that sound urgent, political. And I think Tagging Grok on X really helps, it’s a great way to help people to avoid false information.