Standards

Editorial standards

The standards under which The Diamond Edit sources, fact-checks, recommends, and criticises.

1. No commercial relationships

The Diamond Edit carries no advertising, no affiliate links, no sponsored content, and no paid placement. No dealer covered in these pages has ever paid the column or received a discount on coverage. When a dealer is recommended, it is on the column's editorial judgement — not on commission.

2. Named human sources

Every column quotes at least one named human source — a dealer, a gemmologist, a regulator, or a buyer with a verified transaction. Anonymous sourcing is reserved for cases where naming would directly harm the source's livelihood, and is flagged in the piece itself.

3. Fact-checking before publication

Every claim of fact in a column is checked against at least two independent sources before publication. Claims about specific dealers (location, age, certifications, ownership) are verified against the dealer's own published material AND a second source — the Diamond Dealers Club (diamonds.org.za), CIPC records, or a third-party quotation.

4. Right of reply

Any dealer named adversely in a column is given written notice and seven days to respond before publication. Their response, if provided, is published in the piece — verbatim or summarised, at their election.

5. Corrections

Errors are corrected promptly, the correction is logged on the corrections page, and the original claim is struck through rather than silently rewritten. Material corrections trigger a republished RSS item.

6. Refresh cadence

Columns are dated. Where a piece concerns a dealer's status (in business, certified, located at a given address), the column is re-verified at least once every twelve months. The verification date is published in the byline.

7. AI-assisted drafting, human-edited

Drafts may be assembled with AI assistance (research synthesis, fact aggregation, prose drafting). Every published piece is read and edited by a human before publication. The byline carries that responsibility.