Standards · the house rules
The rules we keep in the workshop.
The parent standards cover everything we publish: sourcing, corrections, independence, advertising, how to complain. These are the workshop rules on top of them, for the people and the software inside the house. They are short on purpose.
Ten rules
Short enough to keep on a busy afternoon.
Each one says what to do, and why. The first four are the ones every room of this workspace carries: nothing ships unsigned, claim lines marked, no passwords ever, the software is Samia bot.
Nothing ships unsigned.
Every post, ad, page, email and piece carries the name of the person who approved it, and the time. Samia bot builds, queues and reminds; it never publishes anything a person has not signed.
Why: so that when something is wrong there is a name to ask, and that name is ours.
Claim lines are marked.
Any sentence with a number, a date, a name or a cause gets a source line in the draft, as it is written. A second person checks every line against its source before the piece is scheduled. checked: true only when they sign; otherwise it stays false.
Why: journalism must be journalism, and client pages are held to the same bar.
No passwords, ever.
We never ask a client or a colleague for a password. Access is granted to a named account with the least it needs, read-only where possible, and removed when the work ends. If a password arrives in a message, delete it and say so.
Why: a password in a chat is a leak waiting for a date.
The software is Samia bot.
In front of clients and readers, the software that runs campaign rules, queues approvals and assembles reports is called Samia bot. Internal code names stay internal. It works in the workshop; it never writes what goes on the shelf. People do.
Why: one honest name, and no mystery about who made the thing.
Sample means sample.
Sample businesses are Saffron Table, Brightside Dental, Northwind Heating & Air and Meridian Law, always labelled sample. A real client's name never appears on a public page or in a sample.
Why: clients trust us with their numbers. We do not spend that trust on a demo.
Consent before cameras.
No face, voice or name without a signed release, filed in the asset library with the select. No children without a parent's signature, and never in an ad. A release can be withdrawn; when it is, the select is pulled.
Why: people are not footage.
Plain words.
Short sentences, specific numbers, say what it costs and what we will not do. No world-class, cutting-edge, unlock or elevate. No fake urgency, no countdowns, no pre-ticked boxes.
Why: the reader can tell. So can the client.
Corrections are public.
A mistake is corrected on the piece, logged on the public corrections page, and answered at [email protected] within one working day. The log is never edited after the fact.
Why: trust is built in the corrections column.
Caps hold.
Ad spend never passes the agreed monthly cap. A campaign that costs more per result than the pause line in its plan is paused within 72 hours and rebuilt at our cost. Raising a cap is the client's decision, in writing.
Why: the no-waste promise is a promise.
Clients own everything.
The domain, the site, the accounts, the content, the photographs and the dashboard belong to the client from day one, in accounts in their name. If we part ways, nothing is held.
Why: we want clients who stay because the work is good.
Words
Not these. These.
The short list that keeps the voice plain and the names right. Samia bot flags the left column in drafts; a person makes the change to the right.
Not these
world-class, cutting-edgesay what it doesunlock, elevate (as a verb)open, improve, raise, or the specific thingthe old "Good News" nameProgress & Solutions, or the Progress letterthe Journalthe Magazine
Not these either
AI-powered, automated researchSamia bot, where a client must know; otherwise the people who did the worklimited time, hurry, last chancethe date and the number, if there is oneguaranteed resultsthe promise we actually put in writingour team of expertsa founder and the people he works with
Where the rules live
The public versions.
Readers and clients see these pages; this one is the staff's. If they ever disagree, the public page wins and this one gets corrected.
Editorial standards
Sourcing, corrections, independence, advertising, how software is used in the workshop and never on the shelf, how to complain.
The corrections log
Every correction, in public, with the date and what changed. Empty until the first edition, with the policy above it.
Writing for us
Paid per piece, rates agreed before commissioning, and the claim-line habit explained for writers.
Privacy
What the forms store and where, no cookies beyond preferences, no analytics yet, how to be deleted.
Staff
Sign in with Cloudflare Access once the domain is live.
A one-time code to your staff email, the same way clients reach their dashboard. A rule that is unclear, or one we broke? Say so; the rules get corrected the same way the pieces do.