How the reading meter prices a page
Every page has a price of a few pence, set by what kind of page it is and how fresh it is; you pay the share of it you read, never less than a tenth. The table below is the one the meter charges from.
On this page
This is the table the meter in your browser charges from: both are made from one data file (data/billing/prices.json), so this page and the meter cannot disagree. The model is the one newsroom.sgit.ai and php.oct.2026.newsroom.sgit.ai run, with this site's own kinds of page mapped onto it. Your reading account shows what you have read and what it cost.
The formula
price = max(floor, round(base[type] x freshness[tier])), then x the share of the page read (never under a tenth) x the reader's usefulness rating (1 free, 3 the price, 5 double), with a floor of 1p. You start with £5.00 of credit in this browser.
What a page costs, read to the end
| Page type | Priced as | Base | Fresh (up to 1 day, x2) | New (up to 7 days, x1.5) | Current (up to 30 days, x1) | Archive (older, x0.5) | Pages | Why |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| article | article | 6p | 12p | 9p | 6p | 3p | the signed, dated articles | A signed article is the newsroom's own judgement, with its limits and sources: the reference's article, unchanged. |
| company | analysis | 3p | 6p | 5p | 3p | 2p | a profile per company (/companies/<id>/) | A profile is assembled from several sources, re-checked at the source, with the company's sessions, people and related companies: work a reader cannot do from one page. |
| topic | analysis | 3p | 6p | 5p | 3p | 2p | a field, theme or beat (/topics/<id>/) | Every company in a field, counted and compared, with the field's sessions: the same kind of work as a profile. |
| story | story | 2p | 4p | 3p | 2p | 1p | the curator's story candidates | Assembled from the curator's captures by agents: the reference's story. |
| event | story | 2p | 4p | 3p | 2p | 1p | a page per agenda item (/events/<id>/) | One programme item with its speakers, place and source, assembled from the programme by agents; it decays because it matters most in the days around it. |
| index | story | 2p | 4p | 3p | 2p | 1p | list pages that gather other pages (none yet use this type) | A list assembled from the data, priced as the pages that assemble. |
| person | evidence | 1p | 1p | · | · | · | a person as the summit lists them (/people/<id>/) | Name, role and organisation as listed, with the listing's source: a reference page, priced at the floor so checking who someone is never costs more. |
| organisation | evidence | 1p | 1p | · | · | · | an organisation named by a source (/organisations/<id>/) | A name as a source wrote it and where it appears: reference, at the floor. |
| place | evidence | 1p | 1p | · | · | · | a venue, stage or city (/places/<id>/) | Where something is: reference, at the floor. |
| evidence | evidence | 1p | 1p | · | · | · | a capture and its source | The reference's evidence, unchanged. |
| data | evidence | 1p | 1p | · | · | · | pages about the JSON API and the data | Reading how the data is made is checking: at the floor. |
| site | site | 1p | 1p | · | · | · | the front page, the summit, about, the brief, the release history, this billing page | The site's account of itself: metered at the floor, because there are no free pages but the meter's own, and never more. |
| account | account | 0p | 0p | · | · | · | your reading account, top up, topped up, your vault | The meter's own pages are free: the one exception to no free pages. |
A dot means the price does not decay: that kind of page costs the same at any age. The page's own date (<meta name="page-date">): for an article the day it was written, for a page made from data the day its source last changed. The age is worked out in the reader's browser, so the same release serves the same table to everyone.
How fresh a page is
- Fresh (up to 1 day old, x2). The first day: when the content is news and a reader is deciding something now.
- New (up to 7 days old, x1.5). The first week: still the current state of a developing story.
- Current (up to 30 days old, x1). The base price: settled enough to rely on, recent enough to act on.
- Archive (older, x0.5). The record: worth reading, priced for the reader doing history, never free.
The rules
- Every content page is metered. The only unmetered pages are the meter's own: your account, top up, topped up and your vault.
- The price depends on two things only: what kind of page it is, and how fresh it is. Not on who is reading, not on demand, not on the topic.
- Fresh costs more and the price halves into the archive, never to zero. Reference pages and the site's account of itself do not decay and stay at the floor.
- A page costs its price times the share of it you read, never less than a tenth; once per page per browser session; rating it re-prices it from free to double.
- Nothing is ever blocked. The balance can go below zero, and a reader can decline to pay for a page and say why.
- Everything is kept in your browser. Nothing is sent anywhere unless you choose: a top-up (on Stripe's own page) or your vault.
- This table is published here and the meter is generated from the same data file, so the page and the meter cannot disagree.
Rating a page
At the foot of every metered page you can say how useful it was, on five steps that start in the middle. The step sets the price: 1 is free, 2 is x0.5, 3 is the price, 4 is x1.5, 5 is x2. Not paying at all, with a reason, is there too: the charge is refunded and the reason kept in your history, in this browser.
Topping up
One payment of £5.00 on Stripe's own page adds £5.00 to the balance in your browser: no account, nothing renews. The page the payment returns to adds the credit once per payment reference and cannot check the payment: unverified by design, as on newsroom.sgit.ai. Top up.
The reference table
The kinds of page the reference model prices, and why. Each of this site's types above is priced as one of them, at its base.
| Reference type | Base | Decays | Why |
|---|---|---|---|
| article | 6p | yes | A conclusion someone signed, written against a stated state of the evidence: the most judgement per word on the site. |
| briefing | 5p | yes | The most compressed form of the work: one page for one reader's decision. |
| analysis | 3p | yes | Work a reader cannot do by reading one source: counting, comparing, converting times. |
| story | 2p | yes | Pages assembled by agents; the reader pays for the assembly. |
| evidence | 1p | no | Reference pages: the value is in checking, and checking must never cost more at the moment it matters most. |
| site | 1p | no | The site's account of itself: metered at the floor, never more. |
| account | 0p | no | The meter's own pages. Charging a reader to see their bill is not a price. |
For agents: the meter's config, with every price, is api/v1/billing/meter.json. The component is newsroom.sgit.ai's sg-meter v1.5.0, vendored unedited at assets/components/sg-meter/v1/v1.5/v1.5.0/.
Plain text of this page: billing.md · For AI agents: llms.txt