How Koru Works

The Loop

Koru is news with a credibility loop built in. You vote: credible or not credible. Readers’ votes shape the article’s score. Your accuracy shapes your own credibility. Your credibility decides how much your future votes count.

A closed loop built on readers’ assessments. No editors. No gatekeepers. Careful readers gain influence. Reckless ones lose it.

Voting

Two choices: credible or not credible. Credible means the article is well sourced, accurately framed, and not misleading. Not credible means it’s wrong, distorted, or unsupported.

Vote on the article, not the position. A piece can sit uncomfortably with you and still be credible. A piece can match your view and still be weak.

Assessing credibility doesn’t always require investigation. It can mean recognising what matches your lived experience. “Budget affects you”? You feel the effect. “Local event happened”? You were there. When you have relevant knowledge, the judgement may already be formed in your head. Koru gives you one action to express it.

Scores

Articles, sources, authors, and users all carry a credibility score. Everyone starts at 50. Equal footing. A legacy publication and a first-time contributor enter the same way. Credibility is earned, not assigned.

From there, readers’ assessments shape the score. Green means credible. Red means not credible. Grey means there isn’t enough signal yet.

Your own score moves with your accuracy. Vote in line with the eventual consensus among readers and your influence grows. Vote against eventual consensus and it shrinks. You can’t buy it. You earn it through your contributions.

Story Clusters

Koru groups articles about the same event into clusters. One cluster, many sources. You see who reported first, where reporting agrees, and where it doesn’t.

Clusters separate the story from any single source. They make it harder for one outlet to define what happened, and easier to spot when the picture is contested.

Posting

When you publish, pick the type that matches what you’re writing. The type is a signal to readers and to the credibility system.

• Report. What happened, where, when, and how you know.
• Opinion. Your view. Argument, reaction, perspective.
• Analysis. Connecting facts, context, and likely consequences.

Don’t label opinion as a Report. Reports carry the most weight on your author credibility, in both directions. Don’t stretch weak evidence into certainty. If you’re unsure, say what’s known, what’s unclear, and what evidence is missing.

Publishing Is Permanent

You have a short edit window after publishing. After that, the article is locked. This is deliberate. People shouldn’t be able to rewrite claims after votes and comments arrive.

Your posts shape your author credibility. Strong work raises it. Repeated weak, misleading, or unsupported work lowers it. Your posting record is public.

Comments

Comments are for context, real questions, and challenging claims with reasons. Not for harassing authors. Not for punishing disagreement.

If something breaks the rules, report it. If something is wrong, explain why.

The Point

The most useful Koru users are not the loudest. They read carefully, vote consistently, and post with evidence.

Make credible information easier to find. Make low-credibility information carry a cost.