One rule runs through this handbook: a number appears with its source and its date, or it does not appear. This page explains how that works in practice, which sources are refused, and what happens when a fact cannot be checked.
C.1The hierarchy of sources
Not all sources are equal, and the chapters treat them differently. In descending order of weight:
| Rank | Kind of source | How it is treated |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Filed statutory documents: company accounts on a public register | Quoted as fact, with the filing date |
| 2 | Binding platform texts: terms of use, contracts, developer terms | Quoted verbatim, with the document's own last-updated date |
| 3 | Official administration pages: tax, social security, regulators | Quoted with the verification date printed on the page |
| 4 | Dated journalism in an identified outlet | Attributed to the outlet, the writer and the date |
| 5 | Vendor pages: pricing, features, published statistics | Labelled as a claim by that vendor, quoted, dated |
| 6 | Job postings and recruitment pages | Reported as offers, never averaged into a rate |
Anything below rank six is not used. That includes listicles, comparison blogs run by agencies or tool vendors, salary pages without a stated sample size, and any figure whose only trace is a search result snippet.
C.2What is refused, and why
- Numbers without a source. A plausible figure with no page behind it is dropped, and the gap is named instead. This is why chapter 7 is mostly a list of unknowns.
- Averages built on nothing. A salary aggregator that publishes a figure based on one reported salary is reported as exactly that, not as a market rate.
- Second hand quotes. Where a quotation could not be read on the page it belongs to, the chapter says so and attributes the quote to whoever did read it.
- Vendor claims presented as measurements. Every figure a company publishes about its own product is labelled as that company's claim. Where a company's own pages disagree with each other, both figures are shown.
- Compliance claims. No tool is described as compliant with, allowed by or approved for any platform, because no such status is published by any platform.
- Legal conclusions. Official texts are quoted and left to stand. Interpretation is a lawyer's job, not a website's.
C.3When a source cannot be read
This happens more than you would expect, and the handbook prints it rather than papering over it. Three cases came up while writing this edition, all on 14 September 2026.
- The OnlyFans Acceptable Use Policy and Community Guidelines are served as an empty page to anything that does not run scripts, and no rendered archive copy was found. Chapter 5 therefore states what those documents say: nothing, because we could not read them.
- The OnlyFans Referral Program Terms could not be read for the same reason, so the widely quoted referral rate does not appear anywhere on this site.
- The BBC article quoted in chapters 4 and 7 could not be read on bbc.com, which blocks automated reading. The quotations were checked on a syndicated copy, and the source list says so explicitly rather than implying we read the original.
C.4Dates
Every chapter carries a published date and a checked date in its margin. Every table carries a source line with the date the pages behind it were read. Where a source document states its own date, for example "last updated August 2024" on a set of terms, both dates appear: when the document says it changed, and when we read it. Prices and platform rules in this industry move quickly, so a figure without a date is not a fact, it is a rumour with a decimal point.
C.5Derived figures
Occasionally a useful number is arithmetic on published numbers rather than a published number itself. Those are labelled as derived at the point of use, with the inputs shown, so you can redo the calculation or reject it. The clearest example is in chapter 7, where the average earnings per creator account is computed from two filed figures, then immediately explained as misleading. Showing the arithmetic and its limits is more useful than either printing the number silently or hiding it.
C.6Corrections
If something here is wrong, we want the source. Write to [email protected] with the page, the sentence and the link that contradicts it. Corrections change the page and the checked date on it. If the error is material, the change is described on the page itself rather than made quietly. The full process is on Contact.