Basics
1. Articles must be original and not consist of text substantially copied, rehashed, plagiarised, adapted, aggregated, or syndicated from other sources.
2. News articles should contain at least 300 words of original editorial, excluding quotes.
3. Blogs, Previews and Reviews should contain at least 700 words of original editorial, excluding quotes.
4. Multimedia articles (where the main content is video, audio or images) should contain at least 100 words of original text. (Quotes copied from other publications/social media are not counted).
5. You should take reasonable steps to avoid obvious mistakes in your spelling, grammar and punctuation.
6. Your prose should read well, and the message of your articles should be well constructed and easy to follow. Sentences shouldn’t be very long . The use of sub headings is appreciated, as it improves the readability of the article.
7. Using sectarian, racist, defamatory or libellous language; hate speech; excessive or inappropriate profanity or insulting language is strictly prohibited.
Substantiation and attribution of claims and quotes
1. Claims and Quotes (including rumours) must always be substantiated with credible sources and the source must be clearly attributed. You must attribute the publication from which you source any claim or quote.
2. Quotes and claims have to be traced to the origin. If there exists reason to doubt a claim or the authenticity of a quote or the interpretation, then you should not report it as fact. The reader must not be in doubt whether the story is a speculation or a fact.
3. Specific credible sources should always be attributed, which means that language such as “according to reports”, “reports in Spain say”, “allegedly”, “it is thought”, “we understand” should be avoided. Attributing a publication (or other source) only once at the beginning of an article will generally be insufficient.
4. In the case of information obtained exclusively, you must state the means by which it was obtained (e.g. in response to email questions, by telephone or face-to-face interview) in conjunction with the name of your publication (e.g. ‘in an interview with The Daily Football’, or ‘answering questions posed by The Daily Football by email’ or ‘A club insider told The Daily Football’). You must do this whether you are in a position to disclose the source’s name or not.
5. In the case of non exclusive information, The origin of the quotes or information, given to or observed by reporters from more than one publication, must be stated. In the case of sources that are publicly available online, your articles must clearly link to them. Links should point to the exact page, whether in English or in another language, where the claim or quote can be seen (i.e. the original article). Where you have transcribed or taken your information from a broadcast (web/tv/ radio), you must attribute the broadcaster and the context, (such as the TV or radio programme) and its transmission time.
6. For avoidance of doubt, when producing round-ups of news from other publications you must still fully reference each source.
Headlines
Articles must feature relevant headlines, which must be factually accurate and not sensational or misleading. Headlines must accurately describe the nature of the articles that follow.
1. Following practices make a headline misleading. These practices are prohibited.
1.1. The strategic inclusion of keywords and/or omission of pertinent information. (e.g. ‘Arsenal target agrees deal’ when the deal concerns an unmentioned club and not Arsenal; ‘Liverpool star set to leave’ when the unnamed individual is not an established star of the Liverpool first team.)
1.2. Using a question mark to present speculation as a potentially substantiated claim (e.g. ‘United star to leave in summer?’ when this is a speculative opinion piece and not based on substantiated information).
1.3. Not adequately warning that the article is a joke or spoof, and not meant to be taken seriously.
1.4. The paraphrasing, condensing, or otherwise misrepresentation, of an original quote. Quotes may only be incorporated into a headline when reproduced verbatim (exact use of words).
1.5. Keyword stuffing is the practice of deliberately incorporating words (or keywords), that are not of primary relevance to the story, in the headline.
1.6. Exaggerated and sensational language — such as ‘shock’, ‘amazing’, ‘unbelievable’, ‘outrageous’ — used in headlines must be fully justified in the articles that follow. You may use ‘Exclusive’, ‘Revealed:’, and ‘Breaking news’ only when your publication is genuinely breaking the news exclusively (i.e. before all other publications), as opposed to when repeating it. Exclamation marks and block capitals may not be used at any time.
2. Following practices need to be followed while creating a headline
2.1. Claims made in the headline must be clearly attributed within the article text.
2.2. Language implying conclusiveness — such as ‘confirmed’, ‘done deal’, ‘agreed’ — may only be used if the information has been officially confirmed.
2.3. Valuations (for example: footballer transfer fees) must derive from a recently completed deal or else be attributed to an authoritative source within your article.
2.4. In the case of a pictorial article, video article, or a round-up summarising other articles — this must be made explicit by prefixing the headline with one of the following tags: ‘Pictures:’, ‘Photos:’, ‘Gallery:’, ‘Slideshow:’, ‘Video:’, ‘Watch:’, ‘Round-up:’.