At Facteroid, we believe good journalism begins with transparent sourcing. In an era of rampant, willful disinformation and dishonesty, it isn’t enough for news organizations — even the most established and authoritative — to expect readers to trust their reporting at face value. They, and we, must provide the opportunity for readers to verify claims and data for themselves.
Transparent sourcing is at the core of Facteroid’s reporting model. Our mission is to present concise, factual news events, free of opinion or editorializing of any kind and where primary sources are plainly cited and linked. There is no substitute for gathering the facts, nor should there be obscuring the origins of those facts.
Facteroid entries always link to primary sources, with direct links to the exact document or webpage the information came from.
The humble yet mighty hyperlink is our weapon of choice against the forces of disinformation and obfuscation. With it, we attribute all our news events with their primary source — not other reporting — so that readers, regardless of their political orientation, can evaluate facts on their own merit. Rather than aggregating news, our aim is to increase transparency in news, allowing readers greater access to original sourcing and, with it, greater truth and clarity.
Vague attributions do not help readers verify reported information. Exact links are important.
We always link to the exact document or webpage the information came from. Vague attributions like “Source: United Nations” do not help readers verify that the information was reported accurately.
Our commitment to transparency is why we built a Peer Review tool so that readers can check our work and alert us to any biased or uncredited piece of information that may have inadvertently slipped into a news event. We’ve also built a tool that allows readers to propose precise edits or corrections to news items, as well as submit additional citations and tags.
Every entry has a “peer review” section where you can give us quick feedback on the accuracy of that entry.
We believe in knowable facts and we’re committed to discovering them, including their source. We pledge that all the news we deliver is pegged to a citation pointing to the source of that information. It isn’t a solution to all of the trust issues plaguing journalism today, however the simple and sacred act of crediting our sources goes a long way in rebuilding credibility among readers, and may provide a model for others.