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Describe what you do in five words or less:

Tell deep, accurate, vivid stories.










What makes a ‘trusted’ source?

Experience in the field. An openness to conversation. A willingness to help corroborate their own stories with other material or sources.










How do you fact check information?

The Internet is a surprisingly good tool to gut-check things that others have told you.

There are experts in the field whom I can request to review material that I've gathered. Magazines employ their own fact checking teams who re-report the story exhaustively.










Opinion versus news: how do you tell the difference?

It's in the language: in the flow of adjectives and phrases that turn a piece towards opinion, in the spare balance of sentences that turns a piece towards news. The best long pieces are able to combine aspects of both.










Tips for spotting untrue or misleading information?

Corroborate everything. Ask the same questions of multiple people. Read more than you think you need. There's no short-cut that can take the place of this kind of verification.










What's your favourite verb?

As a writer, reader, and editor of journalism, it's "said": short, strong, and an instant indication that there are other, real people populating a story.

Corroborate everything. Ask the same questions of multiple people. Read more than you think you need.

–Samanth Subramanian
proactivecitizen.org