Well-meaning friends continue to forward emails containing warnings about a host of hazardous products (microwaves, plastics, etc.) or spectacular events (sharks flying out of the water to grab low-flying helicopters, etc.). Ninety-nine percent of these are hoaxes and well-known urban legends. About ten years ago, when the internet became an increasingly important referencing resource for academic papers, I took a course on how to validate the information one finds in that virtual world. A great site that I came across is snopes.com. This site is constantly investigating and reporting on thousands of internet stories, analyzing their sources, and their relative truth. For me, it has become an invaluable tool for checking any story I want to forward, as well as validating information I receive from others.