The platform
Publishing on VeriTaus
What a column on the record includes, from the byline to the archive.
A newspaper of record earns its name through three habits: it signs its work, it dates its work and it files its work where it can be found again. VeriTaus applies those habits to independent columns. The inventory below is arranged as a reader meets it, from a single story outward to the archive, then to the reader, and finally to the presses that print it.
I. On the page
Byline and dateline
Every story states who wrote it and the day it was published. When a story is revised, the date of the revision is printed as well, so the record of what was said, and when, stays intact.
Photographs in the copy
A story may lead with a cover photograph and carry further images within the text. Those images are stored on the site itself, beside the words they illustrate.
A contents list for long reads
Longer pieces are given a table of contents. Readers can see how the argument is built and go directly to the section they want.
Citations that go where they say
Links inside a story are ordinary links. Columnists can credit their sources, and point to their own website, exactly as they would in print.
II. In the archive
A column at its own address
Each columnist is given a column at /your-handle/, headed by a portrait, a brief biography and, optionally, a link to a personal website.
A front page for the column
The top of the column can hold a short introduction and a selection of links chosen by the columnist, so that the column opens like the front page of a body of work.
Sections of the columnist’s choosing
Columnists may divide their work into sections. Every section has a page of its own, and tabs on the column let readers move from one to the next.
Filed by date, page by page
Stories are dated and filed in a paginated archive. A piece from several years ago is located as readily as one from last week.
Topics that cross columns
Stories can be tagged with topics. Each topic page brings together related stories from every columnist who has covered the subject.
III. For the reader
Open to all
No subscription, no sign-in and no cookie banner stand between a reader and any column or story.
Letters, read before printing
A reader may reply to a story with a name and a comment. Each one is read and approved by a moderator before it is shown.
A feed per column
Every column publishes an RSS feed at /your-handle/feed.xml; the platform as a whole publishes one at /feed.xml.
IV. At the press
Server-set pages
Each page is produced on the server as plain HTML and CSS. It arrives quickly and sits comfortably on a phone, a tablet or a desktop.
Type that respects diacritics
Headlines and text are set in typefaces that fully cover Vietnamese and other accented scripts, so no character is ever set in a substitute font.
Nothing watching the reader
The platform carries no advertising, no analytics and no tracking pixel, and it gives readers no cookies.