[pjc50]

> does this mean that most news sites are just copying facts off one other?

This is how AP/Reuters/"newswire" content works. Since very few organisations can afford to have people everywhere, there's a sort of syndication model going on where the people that are in the right place for breaking news can sell it to a broker, who writes it up and then it appears across the rest of the media.

Press releases are even more of a thing. An organisation which wants to get in to the news will make a press release, which is basically a kit of quotes and "facts" that can be loosely re-written into an article.

It's also important to understand how limited journalistic "fact checking" really is. They're not detectives, nor scientists, and don't have the time to be either. Most of the time it consists simply of ringing someone being talked about, asking them "is this true", and printing the result.