Method
Twice a day (4 AM and 4 PM Pacific) the last 24 hours of reporting is pulled from wire services and international outlets, grouped into stories, matched to ongoing events, scored, and summarized.
Severity score
Five factors, 0–2 points each, summed to a score out of 10. Stories are ranked by score, not by how much coverage they got.
| Factor | 0 | 1 | 2 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Scale | Local | National | Multinational / global |
| Human | None | Disruption | Lives lost or at risk |
| Econ | Negligible | Sector / national | Global markets / supply chains |
| Escalation | Contained | Could spread | Actively escalating |
| Reversibility | Easily reversed | Lasting | Permanent / structural |
How many stories
There is no fixed number. Each edition scores a pool of up to 30 stories and shows every one rated 5 or higher: at least 5, at most 20. On a quiet day you'll see fewer; anything added to reach 5 is marked. On a heavy day you'll see more. Preferences lets you set your own regions, topics and minimum severity; major stories (8+) outside your picks still show unless you choose to hide them.
Verification
Confirmed means two or more news organizations reported it; Developing means one so far. "4 outlets · 9 articles" counts organizations and their articles separately, so one outlet running several stories counts once. Outlets that republish wire copy (AP, Reuters) can't always be told apart, so the outlet count is an upper bound on independent confirmation, not a guarantee. "Updated" is when the second outlet reported the development, not the time an outlet's feed claims.
Events
Ongoing stories are tracked as events. An event only re-enters the daily brief when there is a material new development; each day's entry covers only what is new, with the full history on the event page.
Tone
The default is Neutral. Preferences offers Constructive: a second version of each story, framed around responses, cooperation and progress when (and only when) the linked reporting shows them, in calm wording. It keeps every fact and score. An automatic check rejects any constructive version that adds a number not in the reporting or drops one from the neutral text; those stories show the neutral version instead.
Writing rules
- Only facts in the linked reporting; nothing added.
- Figures, accusations and intentions are attributed to whoever stated them.
- Conflicting figures are shown as a range with each source attributed.
- No loaded language, no speculation, no predictions.
- Excluded: sports, entertainment, opinion, and local crime without wider consequence.