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Fact-checking Guide

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This document defines how factual verification is conducted within the Craftpedia ecosystem. It applies to all languages, all regional portals, and all types of craft-related articles.

The aim of this guide is to ensure that Craftpedia articles meet a high standard of historical and cultural accuracy, aligned with museum-grade documentation practices.

Purpose of This Guide

The Fact-checking Guide establishes:

  • what must be fact-checked;
  • where reliable information should be sourced from;
  • which sources are acceptable or unacceptable;
  • procedures for identifying and correcting inaccuracies;
  • best practices for verifying terminology, dates, origins, and cultural contexts.

Fact-checkers ensure that Craftpedia remains a trustworthy, academically oriented digital resource.

Role of the Fact-checker

The fact-checker focuses on content accuracy, not language quality.

Their responsibilities include:

  • verifying historical facts, dates, origins, and attributions;
  • checking claims about techniques, materials, and regional variations;
  • confirming terminology against museum and academic usage;
  • identifying unsupported or ambiguous statements;
  • ensuring citations are present where needed.

A fact-checker must not:

  • rewrite text for style (this is the proofreader’s job);
  • introduce new facts not supported by reliable sources;
  • rely on unverified websites, blogs, or commercial descriptions.

What Must Be Fact-checked

Fact-checkers must verify the following categories of information:

Historical Background

  • origin periods and centuries;
  • dynasties, eras, historical transitions;
  • dates of major developments or technological innovations.

Geographical Information

  • correct region, prefecture, province, or cultural group;
  • accurate mapping of regional variations;
  • confirmation of cross-border influences (e.g., China → Korea → Japan).

Materials and Techniques

  • accurate description of raw materials;
  • correctness of chemical or physical properties (e.g., clay composition, metal alloys);
  • proper identification of techniques used in each craft tradition.

Terminology

  • correct craft names (in English and original language);
  • appropriate transliteration;
  • correct spelling of historical periods and dynasties;
  • correct use of terms such as “stoneware,” “porcelain,” “lacquer,” “casting,” etc.

Cultural Significance

  • claims about rituals, symbolic meaning, and religious use;
  • statements about social status or community role.

Modern Developments

  • information about current artists, studios, or revival movements;
  • connections to museums or exhibitions;
  • references to contemporary usage.

Numerical Claims

  • dates
  • production counts
  • population or workshop numbers
  • chronological ranges

Any statement that relies on numbers must be verified.

Acceptable Sources

Fact-checkers must rely on authoritative, reputable, and academically grounded sources.

Primary Categories of Acceptable Sources

  • museum publications and catalogues;
  • university presses and academic monographs;
  • peer-reviewed journal articles;
  • archaeological reports;
  • official documents from cultural institutions;
  • major historical dictionaries or encyclopedias;
  • authoritative government cultural heritage descriptions.

Acceptable Online Sources

  • museum websites (e.g., British Museum, Tokyo National Museum, Met Museum);
  • university-hosted resources (.edu);
  • digitized museum catalogues;
  • established scholarly organizations (e.g., UNESCO, ICOM).

Sources That Require Caution

  • commercial websites (shops, auction houses);
  • artisan self-descriptions;
  • tourist websites;
  • blogs and informal forums.

These sources may contain useful insights, but cannot be used to verify factual information.

Unacceptable Sources

  • Wikipedia (may be used for orientation, but not as a citation);
  • machine-generated content;
  • AI-written descriptions without human verification;
  • promotional or marketing texts;
  • unreferenced claims from random websites.

How to Check a Fact

Fact-checkers should follow a structured process:

  1. Identify the claim.
  2. Locate one or more reliable sources that confirm or deny it.
  3. Compare terminology and phrasing across sources.
  4. Ensure that the meaning is correctly reflected in the article.
  5. Document the source in the article’s references section.
  6. Flag ambiguous or disputed claims for editorial review.

If conflicting information appears:

  • prefer museum or academic sources over all others;
  • document the inconsistency in an editorial note if necessary.

Handling Disputed or Uncertain Information

Some crafts have multiple origin stories, conflicting dates, or ambiguous terminology.

In such cases:

  • present the most widely accepted interpretation;
  • acknowledge alternative interpretations when academically recognized;
  • avoid definitive wording for uncertain claims;
  • clearly attribute perspectives to sources.

Example:

Some scholars attribute the origin of the technique to the late 16th century, while others suggest an early 17th-century development.

Checking Translated Articles

For translations:

  • check that factual meaning has not shifted;
  • verify that no new “facts” were added during translation;
  • confirm that craft names, place names, and period terminology match authoritative usage;
  • ensure that culturally sensitive terms are correct.

Common problems in translations:

  • mistranslated technical terms;
  • incorrect period names;
  • wrong regional references;
  • loss of detail about materials or techniques.

What to Do When an Error Is Found

If a fact-checker discovers an error:

  • correct the factual statement;
  • update the reference section accordingly;
  • leave an edit summary explaining the correction;
  • notify translators if other languages are affected;
  • record major corrections on the article’s discussion page.

Fact-checkers should avoid:

  • rewriting large portions of the article without coordination;
  • removing text unless it is demonstrably incorrect or unsupported.

Citations and References

Every article must include:

  • at least one authoritative reference;
  • citations for statements of high significance (origin dates, major features, historical claims).

Fact-checkers must ensure:

  • references are properly formatted;
  • sources are clearly identifiable;
  • references correspond to actual claims in the article.

Version Control and Coordination

Fact-checkers should:

  • monitor changes to key articles;
  • communicate with translators when factual updates are necessary;
  • ensure that factual corrections are reflected across all language versions;
  • keep lists of references commonly used for major craft families.

Large edits or reinterpretations should be discussed with:

  • editors,
  • translators,
  • proofreaders,
  • or the project lead (where applicable).

Common Pitfalls

Fact-checkers must be careful about:

  • relying on Wikipedia instead of its cited sources;
  • accepting simplified or romanticized interpretations;
  • assuming regional terms are interchangeable;
  • trusting commercial sites for historical claims;
  • confusing similar crafts (e.g., export porcelain variants);
  • overlooking conflicting dates or regional attributions;
  • assuming that a museum’s terminology must match local terminology (e.g., British Museum terms vs. Japanese terms).

When Fact-checking Is Complete

A fact-checker may consider the article ready when:

  • all major factual statements are verified;
  • terminology and transliteration are correct;
  • references are present and authoritative;
  • any uncertainties are clearly documented;
  • no contradictions or unsupported claims remain.

Version History

  • 1.0 – Initial release (English)