Editorial Standards & Publishing Principles

The news, decoded. Not inflated, not rushed, not faked. Most sites will not tell you how they work. We will. These principles govern all original reporting, explainers, and analysis on headlinesdecoded.com. They are not aspirations for later; they are the rules we write to now.

What we publish, labelled so you never have to guess

• Reporting presents verified facts: what happened, who said what, and what the record shows.
• Explainers make a complicated subject clear, drawing on reporting and primary sources.
• Analysis is our informed reading of what the facts mean. It is labelled as analysis, and it still rests on evidence you can check.

What we promise you

• We decode, we do not sensationalise. Our job is to make a complicated story clear, not to make a simple story scary.
• We show you the facts and let you decide. We are not here to tell you what to think.
• We go to the primary source. We read the actual filing, report, or transcript, not just what other outlets said about it.
• Every article cites its sources, linked where we can, with what is confirmed, estimated, or still uncertain said plainly.
• Our images are honest. Every photograph is real; illustrations are clearly labelled. We will never show an invented image and let you believe it is a real moment.
• We cook every recipe before we publish it. The photographs are of the dish we actually made.
• We credit who got there first. When another newsroom breaks a story, we say so and we link to them.
• We correct our mistakes in the open, fixed and dated, with no quiet deletions.
• We tell you when we have a stake. Sponsorship, comped items, or any interest is disclosed where you can see it, and sponsored content is always marked and never dressed up as reporting.
• We write for everyone, not for experts. If we use a hard idea, we explain it.

And some things we will not do

• We will not fake a photograph.
• We will not run rumour as fact.
• We will not rewrite a press release and call it reporting.
• We will not chase outrage.

Holding us to it

A publication willing to write its standards down, in public, is one you can hold to them. If we fall short, tell us through Feedback and Complaints, and see how we fix errors under our Corrections Policy.