Our methodology
Signal first. Context always. Humans accountable.
The Trend Monitor is AI-assisted, not autopublished. Automation helps us gather and organize evidence; editors remain responsible for what becomes a public briefing, article, deal, or recommendation.
From signal to briefing
A four-stage publication workflow
Each stage can stop publication. That restraint is deliberate: a smaller set of defensible briefings is more useful than a busy feed of unverified claims.
- 01
Collect signals
We monitor public indicators across search, news, markets, shopping, travel, and consumer behavior. A single spike is a lead to investigate, not a conclusion.
- 02
Assess the evidence
Sources are checked for recency, relevance, independence, and confidence. Weak or stale support keeps a topic out of public view.
- 03
Add editorial context
AI can help organize research and identify patterns, but an editor decides what the evidence supports, what remains uncertain, and whether the briefing is useful.
- 04
Publish with safeguards
Public records must pass freshness, review, sourcing, and disclosure checks. If a required check fails later, the site fails closed instead of showing the item.
What scores mean
Decision support, not prediction
Scores help rank editorial attention. They are directional summaries of available evidence, not forecasts, financial advice, or guarantees that a topic will keep growing.
- Momentum
- How quickly attention is changing across available signals.
- Usefulness
- Whether the topic can help a reader understand a real decision or trade-off.
- Confidence
- How strongly the current evidence supports the public framing.
- Risk
- Uncertainty, sensitivity, or other reasons to narrow the claim or hold publication.
Publication gate
Before anything goes public
- The public claim is supported by current evidence.
- Source context and uncertainty are visible to the reader.
- An editor has approved the public framing.
- Commercial relationships are disclosed where they appear.
- Expired deals, stale evidence, and unsupported ads are withheld automatically.
See the standard in practice