Every newsroom using AI tools should have a standard pre-publication checklist that applies whenever AI has touched any part of a story — research, drafting, translation, or fact-checking. The checklist below is designed to be completed in under 10 minutes for most stories.
The 12-Point Pre-Publication Checklist
1. Every statistic has a named, linked primary source. 2. Every quote is verified against the original transcript or recording. 3. Every person mentioned has their title and affiliation confirmed as of publication date. 4. Dates of events have been cross-checked against at least one independent source. 5. All named institutions exist and have been confirmed to be active. 6. Causal claims ("X caused Y") are supported by at least one expert source. 7. Predictions attributed to AI tools are clearly framed as projections, not facts. 8. An AI disclosure label has been added per the newsroom's policy. 9. The headline has been checked against multi-engine fact-checkers for accuracy. 10. Photo captions have been verified if AI-suggested. 11. Any AI-generated section has been read aloud for naturalness and coherence. 12. The editor has reviewed the AI disclosure and signed off.
Why Checklists Outperform Intuition
Research on medical and aviation checklists shows that systematic checklists catch errors that experienced professionals miss by intuition. The same principle applies to journalism: a junior reporter with a checklist consistently out-performs a senior reporter without one on error detection. Institutionalising the checklist is the single most impactful step a newsroom can take to maintain standards in an AI-assisted workflow.