Editorial policy

This page documents the rules Coordinately holds tightly. They are written as discrete, testable claims so that a reader, a Quality Rater, or a future editor can verify that any given page meets the standard.

The procedural side of how these rules are applied — the workflow, the update cadence, the architectural-decision history — lives at /methodology. The master list of authorities we cite is at /sources. The per-tool and per-article accuracy disclosure is at /accuracy.

Source tiers

Every cited source falls into one of three tiers. The tier determines when a source is appropriate to cite.

Tier 1 — primary

The authoritative body that publishes the data, defines the standard, or performs the original research. Examples include the NOAA National Geodetic Survey (datums and reference frames), GPS.gov (civilian GPS performance), the US Geological Survey (projection mathematics, the 3DEP elevation dataset), the National Institute of Standards and Technology (time, measurement uncertainty), the International Earth Rotation Service (Earth orientation parameters), the European Space Agency (Galileo), the IANA tz database (time zones), the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (WGS84 ellipsoid, MGRS), the Institute of Navigation (peer-reviewed navigation research), and the Bureau International des Poids et Mesures (UTC).

All foundational facts and all numerical claims must cite a Tier 1 source. If a claim cannot be backed by a Tier 1 source, the claim is reworded to scope what we can support, or it is omitted.

Tier 2 — authoritative secondary

Widely recognised non-primary sources: Encyclopaedia Britannica, the Smithsonian, National Geographic, peer-reviewed academic textbooks, government statistical agencies (when not the primary source for the specific topic). Tier 2 is appropriate for historical context, for cartographic or geographic background that doesn't hinge on a specific numerical claim, and for context that helps a reader place a fact in its broader story.

A Tier 2 citation never stands in for a Tier 1 citation when one is available.

Tier 3 — supporting

Industry publications, recognised expert blogs, peer-reviewed papers in specialised journals when their findings have not yet propagated to a Tier 1 authority. Tier 3 sources are used only as supplementary context — to flesh out an argument, to point at recent research, to link to a deeper explanation. They never serve as the sole source for a factual claim.

What we never cite

Some sources are excluded as a matter of policy, not because they are all bad but because their inclusion would erode the discipline that makes the rest of the citations meaningful:

• Wikipedia, in any language. Use Wikipedia to find which primary source documents a fact, then cite that primary source directly.
• Other coordinate-tool websites. Sites like latlong.net, gps-coordinates.net, and similar are not citable as authorities, regardless of how authoritative they appear, because they do not themselves cite primary sources for their data.
• AI-generated summaries. Output from ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, or any other language model is not citable. Language models may be useful for finding a primary source; they are not themselves a source.
• Social media posts. Tweets, LinkedIn posts, Reddit threads, and similar are not citable, even when written by a credentialed expert. If an expert publishes on social media, cite their underlying paper, talk, or organisation page instead.
• Coordinately itself. Internal links exist to help a reader navigate; they are not citations. No page on this site cites another page on this site as an authority. If two pages state the same fact, both cite the same external primary source.

Citation format

Citations are inline links inside the article body, with the source name in the link text where it reads naturally:

Civilian GPS provides positioning accuracy of approximately 4.9 metres under open sky, per GPS.gov, though high-quality FAA receivers achieve ≤ 1.82 m horizontal, 95% of the time.

The link target is the page on the authoritative site that supports the specific claim — not the source's homepage, not a glossary index, not a generic landing page. A reader who follows the link must land on the source of the figure.

Every article also ends with a Sources block that lists every cited source with full URL and the date the source was last accessed. The access date matters: external sources occasionally revise their numbers (GPS accuracy figures, IANA tz database releases, NOAA magnetic-model updates), and the access date lets a future reader determine whether the cited figure is current.

Updates and the dateModified contract

When a Tier 1 source revises a number we cite, the article is revised. The revision changes the page's dateModifiedfield and the visible “Last updated” line in the byline. A /changelog entry documents the change.

Some sources update on a predictable cadence:

• IANA tz database — multiple times per year; the affected reference tables are regenerated quarterly.
• NOAA-NCEI World Magnetic Model — every five years; the affected articles are revised on each release. Current model: WMM2025.
• NSRS modernization (NOAA NGS) — rolling 2024-2027. Articles citing NAD83 or NAVD88 will be revised as the replacement frames (NATRF2022 and family) come online.

Errata and corrections

If a fact on Coordinately is wrong — a number, a citation, an anchor link, anything — write to info@coordinately.org. We verify against the primary source, correct the article, update the page's dateModified, and add an entry to /changelog documenting what changed. Corrections are not done silently.

We do not retract published URLs. Once a URL is shipped, it stays. If a slug typo is discovered post-launch, the canonical stays the same and the typo gets a 301 redirect — never the other way around.

AI tooling disclosure

AI tools may assist with drafting structure, suggesting article outlines, or pulling candidate citations. They do not authorise publication. No factual claim is published without a primary-source check by the human author. The byline (“By Steve K.”) is the responsible party for every published page.

When AI tooling is used in a substantial way (e.g., to draft an article's structure), no special disclosure is added beyond the standard byline. The discipline is the human verification, not the absence of tools.

Independence

Coordinately is currently unmonetised — author-funded and ad-free. The plan is to support continued editorial work through display advertising once the site qualifies for a reputable network (Google AdSense initially, then a higher-CPM network like Raptive once traffic scales). When advertising does go live, editorial decisions will continue to be independent of advertiser interests. We do not accept payment for inclusion in articles, for favourable mention in the source list, for sponsored links, or for any other content placement — today or in the future.

When we link to a service or vendor (Mapbox, MapTiler, USGS, OpenTopoData, etc.), we use the canonical URL without affiliate tracking parameters. If a service is mentioned in an article, the mention is editorial — driven by the article's topic, not by a commercial arrangement.

Where this policy comes from

These rules are not negotiated case-by-case. They derive from a small set of beliefs:

• Topical authority compounds when the source citations are dense, primary, and stable.
• AI search engines reward clear provenance more than they reward volume.
• Readers — including journalists, engineers, and students — return to resources that show their work.
• A small site can build trust faster than a large one if every page on the small site cites primary sources.

The full operational details — workflow, architectural decisions, update mechanics — live at /methodology.