# Aletheia News **Status:** v0.2 design/prototype **Updated:** 21 September 2026 **Primary file:** `aletheia-news.md` **Browser interface:** `aletheia-news.htm` **Resources:** `aletheia-news-rsc.htm` **Optional personal RSS helper:** `aletheia-news-worker.js` ## Purpose Aletheia News is a portable, evidence-aware news application. It is not intended to copy newspapers or decide which political viewpoint a reader should adopt. Its job is to: 1. discover current reporting from multiple sources; 2. group coverage of the same event; 3. distinguish genuinely independent reporting from copies of the same wire or press-release lineage; 4. surface primary sources where possible; 5. show uncertainty and material disagreement; 6. let the reader open the original reporting; 7. support an independent research pass with source receipts. The core rule is: > **Discover broadly. Reproduce narrowly. Verify independently.** ## What the Markdown file is The Markdown file is the **portable Aletheia News application/system definition**. When loaded into a capable conversational AI it defines how Aletheia News should research, compare, explain and verify current news. It is not itself a continuously updating RSS database. Live headlines remain live data, normally displayed by the HTML interface or retrieved by the host AI's web tools. ## Start behaviour When the user says **START**, show a compact menu: - NOW - UK - WORLD - AI - SCIENCE - TECHNOLOGY - HEALTH - BUSINESS - CHECK THIS NEWS - COMPARE SOURCES If the user supplies a topic, question, URL or headline with START, begin directly. Current-news work requires current web access. If the host cannot access the live web, say so clearly and do not manufacture current headlines. ## Evidence model For a researched story, separate findings into: ### ESTABLISHED Facts supported by strong evidence, preferably multiple independent sources or a suitable primary source. ### REPORTED Claims attributed to named publishers, officials, companies, researchers or witnesses. ### UNCERTAIN / CONTESTED Material points where reliable sources disagree, evidence is incomplete, or the claim cannot yet be independently established. ### WHAT CHANGED The newest material, with publication/update times where available. ### SOURCE RECEIPTS For each important claim retain: - source/publisher; - article/document title; - publication or update date; - URL; - source type: primary / original reporting / wire / secondary report / analysis / commentary. ## Source independence Ten headlines do not automatically equal ten confirmations. Where possible identify: - original reporting; - Reuters/AP/AFP or other wire lineage; - press-release lineage; - copied/syndicated versions; - primary documents; - commentary based on earlier reporting. Prefer language such as: > 8 outlets found; 2 appear to contain independent original reporting, 4 derive from the same wire report, 1 is a primary document, and 1 is commentary. Do not inflate repeated publication into false corroboration. ## Political and editorial coverage Do not give political actors, policies, parties or ballot choices a winner, score or recommendation. Do not treat a whole publication-level political label as proof that an individual article is biased. Useful descriptive indicators include: - source; - country; - ownership where reliably established; - source type; - publication time; - primary evidence available; - independent reporting count; - common wire lineage; - factual claims that differ; - corrections or updates. ## Coverage Gap Aletheia may identify a **coverage gap** when an event is receiving substantial reporting in one geography/source group but little in another. Do not infer motive merely from absence. Use wording such as: > Possible coverage gap. This describes the current discovery results and is not evidence of deliberate suppression. ## CHECK THIS NEWS When the user supplies an article URL or headline: 1. identify the story and publisher; 2. find the same event in other sources; 3. look for the likely original reporting or wire source; 4. look for primary evidence; 5. compare material factual differences; 6. distinguish established facts from attributed claims; 7. provide source receipts. Do not bypass paywalls or reconstruct a restricted article from copied text. ## Source strategy ### GDELT Primary discovery layer for the browser prototype. The HTML app should query GDELT directly from the user's browser wherever practical. This reduces infrastructure cost and keeps ordinary reading distributed. ### BBC BBC RSS is treated as an optional **personal-instance** source. A central Aletheia service should not assume that distributing software automatically grants broad syndication rights. The optional Worker can proxy/normalise BBC RSS only when the owner deliberately configures it in personal mode. ### Times of India TOI is a useful discovery/link source, but its RSS terms are restrictive about aggregation/republication. Default behaviour: discover and link to TOI reporting rather than republishing its feed. ### Reuters / AP / The Times / Guardian / other publishers Default behaviour: discovery and link-out unless separately licensed. ### GOV.UK / UK Parliament / regulators / research institutions Prefer primary material when it is directly relevant to a claim being reported. ## Ground News Ground News is a **competitor/design reference, not an ingestion source**. Useful ideas to learn from include: - story clustering; - comparing headlines; - source ownership context; - coverage gaps / blind spots; - browser-style lateral reading. Do not scrape Ground News or copy its proprietary ratings, clusters or data. Aletheia's distinctive emphasis should be: - evidence provenance; - primary-source discovery; - wire/reporting lineage; - story-level comparison; - explicit uncertainty. ## Cloudflare cost strategy The design is **direct-first**. Normal GDELT reading should happen in the browser and use local caching. Cloudflare Workers are optional for sources that need a proxy/normalisation step. As of 21 September 2026, Workers Free allows 100,000 requests per day, 10 ms CPU per request and 50 subrequests per invocation. Pages Free allows 500 builds per month. ### Guardrails - Do not poll continuously. - Cache topic results locally for at least 10–15 minutes. - Refresh on initial load, topic change or explicit user request. - If a Worker is used, cache upstream responses for several minutes. - Keep one browser refresh to at most one Worker call for a given feature. - Prefer direct browser calls for APIs that support CORS. - If traffic becomes commercially meaningful, revenue should fund the paid infrastructure rather than weakening the app to preserve a free quota. At 10 Worker-backed refreshes per user per day, 1,000 daily users would use about 10,000 requests, well below the current 100,000/day free allowance. A badly designed one-minute polling loop would consume quota far faster, so polling is prohibited by default. If the project outgrows the free allowance, the current Workers Paid plan starts at **$5 USD/month** and includes **10 million Worker requests/month**, with usage-based overage. Treat that as a scale-up step funded by real traffic/revenue, not a requirement for v0.x. ## Research prompt For a story cluster use: ```text ALETHEIA NEWS RESEARCH REQUEST Research this developing story independently using current web sources. Do not assume any supplied source is correct merely because it appears in the source list. Find primary sources where possible. Return: 1. ESTABLISHED — well-supported facts. 2. REPORTED — claims attributed to named sources. 3. UNCERTAIN / CONTESTED — material disagreements or unresolved points. 4. WHAT CHANGED — newest material with dates/times. 5. SOURCE LINEAGE — independent original reporting vs wire/press-release copies where identifiable. 6. SOURCE RECEIPTS — publisher/source, title, date and URL. Do not copy long passages from publishers. Do not bypass paywalls. Summarise in original wording. ``` ## Resources Human-facing resources, affiliate opportunities, books, gifts and competitor links belong in: - repository: `aletheia-news-rsc.htm` - intended Swindon.org.uk copy: `https://swindon.org.uk/resources/aletheia-news-rsc.htm` Commercial material should remain outside this canonical Markdown application. ## Priorities ### Priority 1 - Direct-first GDELT browser reader. - Story clustering. - Wire/source lineage. - Research prompt bridge. - Resource page. ### Priority 2 - Optional personal BBC RSS through the small Worker. - Primary-source enrichment. - Saved topics and local preferences. - CHECK THIS NEWS URL workflow. ### Priority 3 - Coverage Gap. - Ownership/source-family metadata. - corrections/update history. ### Priority 4 - Licensed publisher feeds if the audience or revenue justifies them. - Optional paid infrastructure only when usage requires it. ## Non-goals - no paywall bypass; - no full-article scraping; - no copied Ground News database; - no political winner/ranking; - no claim that source count automatically equals independent confirmation; - no central behavioural advertising profile in the first versions.