Users of the service installed a browser toolbar called Spinoculars, which allowed them to see, share, and edit the spin out of any news story.
Votes with a higher impact came from a panel of journalism students and media professionals called "Referees".
SpinSpotter Inc. was founded by Todd Herman and its chief executive officer was John Atcheson; the company identified them as politically conservative and liberal, respectively.
[2] In early reaction to the beta release, Language Log concluded that the service appeared to be overly reliant on user input and that its spin-spotting software didn't actually do anything at all.
[3] The New York Times reported that there appeared to be few phrases in SpinSpotter's database of spin and that the service's algorithm cannot account for context or tone.