After the United States Postal Service misattributed a quote to Maya Angelou on a commemorative stamp, many suggested that the Postal Service “had simply believed too readily what they read on the Internet.” Now, for the New Yorker, Ian Crouch argues that although the Postal Service received approval from the Angelou family to publish the quote, the stamp points to the influence of the Internet on misattribution, as the Internet causes “minor falsehoods [to] metastasize at an alarming speed.”
The USPS Doesn’t Know Its Angelou Quotes
Jake Slovis
Jake Slovis is a writer and educator. He holds an MFA in creative writing from Rutgers University-Newark and is currently a lecturer in the Department of Humanities and Social Sciences at New Jersey Institute of Technology, where he teaches courses focused on visual narrative and composition. His work has appeared in The Millions, Carolina Quarterly, and elsewhere.