Editorial policy

Zeitline uses a hybrid editorial system in which people and technology work together.

Our systems monitor public trend data, identify emerging topics, gather relevant reporting, organize information from multiple sources, and may assist in preparing article drafts. Language models can be used to summarize information, structure articles, and improve clarity.

Technology does not independently determine what is true or guarantee that information is accurate. Before publication, our editorial process applies checks designed to evaluate sourcing, corroboration, factual consistency, duplication, relevance, and whether an article contains enough reliable information to be useful.

Zeitline does not operate a traditional newsroom. We do not have reporters attending events or conducting interviews for the publication. Our coverage is based primarily on publicly available reporting and information from established sources.

We disclose the use of machine-assisted systems because readers deserve to understand how the information they are reading is produced.

We do not copy or republish source articles. We use headlines, summaries, structured information, and factual reporting from sources to inform our coverage. We do not reproduce full articles. We do not intentionally fabricate quotes, statistics, events, or sources. Claims must be supported by identifiable reporting or other appropriate evidence. We do not invent authors. Articles are attributed to Zeitline rather than fictional journalists with invented biographies or credentials. We do not present machine-generated information as independently verified fact. Information produced or summarized by technology is subject to our editorial checks and sourcing requirements. We respect publisher access restrictions and applicable terms. Where a source disallows automated access or requires a specific access method, we do not bypass those restrictions.

We evaluate claims based on the number and quality of independent sources supporting them. Simply counting URLs can be misleading because the same wire report or syndicated story may appear across many different websites.

As a general rule, a story should draw on at least two independent publishers before being treated as sufficiently corroborated for publication.

When a claim is supported by fewer sources, the article makes that limitation clear. Where appropriate, claims are attributed directly to the reporting source rather than presented as independently established facts.

When credible sources disagree, we do not attempt to hide the disagreement. The article identifies the conflicting reporting and explains what is known and what remains uncertain.

Zeitline monitors a range of public information and news-discovery sources to identify stories and understand how they are being reported.

These may include:

News publishers and syndication feeds — including established international and regional publishers and licensed or publicly available feeds where applicable. Bing News and other news-discovery services — used to identify relevant coverage across a wider range of publishers. GDELT — an open index of worldwide news coverage used as a discovery and monitoring tool. Wikipedia — used for background information, terminology, and entity identification. It is not treated as primary evidence for breaking-news claims. Google Trends and Wikipedia pageview data — used to understand which topics are receiving significant public interest.

The specific sources used can vary depending on the subject, country, language, and availability of reliable reporting.

We aim to use source material to understand and report what has been published, not to reproduce the work of the original publisher.

We do not consider publication to be the end of the editorial process.

When credible information shows that an article contains a factual error, misleading statement, outdated information, or other significant problem, we review the affected material and make an appropriate correction or update.

When a correction materially changes the understanding of a story, we aim to make the change transparent rather than silently replacing the original information.

Developing stories may also be updated as additional independent reporting becomes available.

Our goal is simple: use technology to help us move faster and understand more information, while keeping human judgment, transparency, sourcing, and accountability at the center of the publication process.

Photographs come from Wikimedia Commons, Openverse and comparable free libraries. We do not use AI-generated imagery. Where no appropriately licensed image exists, the article runs without one.

Each image carries a visible credit naming its creator and licence.