Akon’s criminal past has been exposed as a fraud by The Smoking Gun:

"Police, court, and corrections records reveal that the entertainer has created a fictionalized backstory that serves as the narrative anchor for his recorded tales of isolation, violence, woe, and regret."

Note: government records available to the public busted Akon.  These guys are applying some basic research skills utilized everyday by journalists and librarians made much easier by the growing accessibility of such documents online.

David Carr at the NY Times recently included this angle in a profile of The Smoking Gun’s three person operation:

"Mr. Bastone…said the idea for the site was his fascination with rummaging around courthouses and city property records and a notion that it might attract an online audience. Nowadays, that obsession finds expression on his desktop."

"’Sitting here, we can monitor cases and filings as if we were sitting in the courtroom,’ he said.  So far, the Smoking Gun crew is still doing the most looking."

"’We figure that people who come to the site sort of get it; we consider them to be sophisticated and in on the joke,’ said Mr. Goldberg. ‘But I would never have thought this far down the road that we would be all alone.’"

So who’s up for tearing through all the rap game bullsh*t with some records research?