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Ethics Policy

MetaNewsr™ is the most widely read news source about the digital revolution of money in the twenty-first century. Our objective is to unite the worldwide community of investors, inventors, and users of cryptocurrencies, blockchains, and other decentralized technologies by informing, educating, and connecting them. This comprises smart experts as well as inquisitive beginners. We have 3 million monthly website visits, 6,000+ yearly conference participants, 200,000 email subscribers, and thousands of readers of our research papers since our founding in 2013.


Independence of the editor: MetaNewsr™ is a completely owned subsidiary of the Birchwood Group, LLC, which is one of the industry’s leading private investors and a supplier of trading and other investment services. We are self-contained from the main corporation.
BWG has no say in editorial or content choices, and our journalists cover BWG and its portfolio firms and investments with the same zeal as they would any other topic.


BWG and MetaNewsr™ have agreed to follow a strong independence policy that prohibits BWG personnel from pressing MetaNewsr™ journalists for favorable coverage or treatment and encourages MetaNewsr™ staff to report any such efforts. The policy’s complete language may be seen in Appendix A below.


Certain MetaNewsr™ personnel, including editorial staff, may earn BWG equity in the form of stock appreciation rights, which vest over a multi-year period, as part of their pay. Journalists from MetaNewsr™ are not permitted to buy BWG shares outright.


Our office is on the same floor as another BWG business, Genesis Trading, in New York City, but on a different level, three floors away, with different access cards. The building used to house BWG’s headquarters, however it has since moved to Connecticut.


Disclosure: All MetaNewsr™ articles contain a disclosure of our corporate ownership at the bottom, along with links to the complete listings of BWG’s portfolio businesses and cryptocurrency assets, in the spirit of transparency. (These lists may be seen in Appendix B below.) Certain MetaNewsr™ personnel (including editorial staff) may get BWG SARs as part of their pay, according to this blanket declaration.


Journalistic standards: Whether surfacing fresh material or evaluating and confirming information from other sources, we aim for the highest levels of truth, fairness, impartiality, and responsible reporting.


Our reporters understand that their work has the potential to damage people’s and companies’ reputations, and that they must be patient and persistent when seeking feedback from the subjects of their articles. Any topic typically has at least two sides, and MetaNewsr™ will always search for a varied spectrum of knowledgeable, balanced viewpoints.


All factual inaccuracies in published articles will be remedied as soon as they are discovered, and all changes and revisions will be noted at the bottom of the article. When an article’s fundamental premise requires a correction, the disclosure will be posted at the top and shared on social media, ensuring that the correction reaches the same audience as the initial inaccuracy.


Reporters on MetaNewsr™ must declare any cryptocurrency investments of $1,000 or more on their profile pages, update these disclosures when major changes occur, and highlight any possible conflicts of interest in their stories. They should minimize their own coverage of assets or firms in which they have a financial stake, as well as subjects in which they are active as activists, to prevent such conflicts. Above all, they are not permitted to utilize our platform for their own personal advantage. (For further information, see “Personal Investing” below.)


Editors and reporters may never accept money for coverage or special treatment from any firm or person. Journalists are not permitted to accept gifts from corporations or persons who are covered by MetaNewsr™ or are likely to be covered by MetaNewsr™. (Items of nominal value, such as a T-shirt, cap, or coffee mug, as well as food or drinks that may be consumed within 24 hours, may be exempt.)


Opinion pieces are always clearly identified as such, with a design that is unique from news reports, whether produced by outside authors or staff personnel.
For fear of punishment from the powerful, we, like other reputable media agencies, do not divulge the identity of sources who talk to us on the condition of anonymity. We are, however, cautious about depending on anonymous sources. All reports originating with an anonymous source need at least one additional source with direct knowledge of the material, and frequently more, depending on the story’s sensitivity.


Furthermore, we will protect the anonymity of trustworthy sources who have built a reputation in the crypto community using their online aliases. We feel that when accomplished software engineers and other powerful persons tie their comments to their well-known pseudonyms, they have reputational skin in the game. In many circumstances, the relationship is enough to ensure a high level of responsibility. As a result, unless there is a compelling public interest, we will not divulge anyone’s identify without their agreement. We oppose a journalistic approach that damages the lives or careers of seemingly insignificant people for the sake of clicks or moral points.


MetaNewsr™ prioritizes its most asset – the confidence of its readers – in all of its investments. Our journalists, researchers, and market analysts must be honest and responsible to the public, as well as strive to maintain high ethical standards.


MetaNewsr™, on the other hand, understands that workers may choose to make their own wealth management choices. With this in mind, MetaNewsr™ collaborated with compliance and legal counsel to create a set of tight criteria that strike a compromise between the company’s goal and our workers’ financial liberty.


Above all, these rules aim to make certain that:

• Information received by MetaNewsr™ workers while performing their jobs is not utilized for financial benefit.
• MetaNewsr™ employees may conduct market research via activities such as the acquisition, sale, or usage of cryptocurrencies or crypto assets.
• MetaNewsr™ workers have financial sovereignty over their own wealth, as long as those choices are made public.


Our rules are created to establish strict transparency standards in order to maintain our audience’s confidence.


Any employee who purchases, sells, or trades cryptocurrency for less than $1,000 must tell MetaNewsr™ compliance officer within 24 hours of the transaction. Any employee who buys, sells, or swaps more than $1,000 in value must tell the compliance officer at least 24 hours in advance.


These notifications will be evaluated by the compliance officer upon receipt to verify that the transaction complies with our rules and guidelines. Items such as the employee’s recent meetings, publications, and company outreach activities will be considered. All crypto asset acquisitions must be held for a minimum of 30 days by employees.


Trading is also prohibited during business hours. Employees are not allowed to trade futures contracts or short digital assets. Journalists must report cryptocurrency holdings of $1,000 or more on their profile pages, and they must update them quickly if their holdings change.


Company stocks: For a variety of reasons, we have a stricter stance on stock ownership than we do on cryptocurrencies.


First, although setting up and utilizing a brokerage account is not generally included while reporting on publicly listed firms, using bitcoin and similar services is frequently a crucial component of studying and understanding the subject.


Second, firms have top-down management teams who have direct control over the project’s path and may attempt to sway reporters for positive coverage. While crypto projects have development teams and other stakeholders, there is no one who is formally “in control” of the project’s operations. Because there is no direct control, there isn’t as much conflict as there is with stocks – not enough to offset the educational benefit of reporting using bitcoin, and not enough to be mitigated by our above-mentioned transparency guidelines.


Third, a reporter breaking a story on a publicly listed firm, whether favorable or bad, may have access to substantial nonpublic information that, if released, might influence the stock price; reporters covering cryptocurrencies are typically working with publicly available information (on the blockchain, in code repositories or in developer forums). While there are cases where non-public information gathered from a corporation active in the crypto sector might affect the price of a token, the disclosure rules would eliminate any possible conflict.


Shares in pure-play crypto enterprises are prohibited for all MetaNewsr™ editors and reporters (e.g. Coinbase). Furthermore, beat writers and their editors who cover diverse crypto businesses on a regular basis (e.g. Square, Tesla, MicroStrategy) are prohibited from owning stock in such companies. A MetaNewsr™ employee must also hold any stocks acquired for a minimum of 30 days.


Employees of MetaNewsr™ who are found to be in violation of these standards may face disciplinary action, including termination.
MetaNewsr™ purpose is to drive the debate around the future of money, and one of the strongest instruments for doing so is social media. MetaNewsr™ official brand accounts are the authorized editorial voice. We utilize social media to disseminate our content as well as to advertise upcoming events and new goods.


Journalists are encouraged to use their personal handles to connect with viewers of our material. They are thereby reflecting the MetaNewsr™ brand and ideals. They are required to handle themselves professionally, even if they utilize their own unique voice or convey personal beliefs. They are not allowed to launch personal attacks or circulate unsubstantiated material that might harm the reputation of an individual or a corporation.


Advertising: Online advertising is one of MetaNewsr™ sources of income. Aside from upholding fundamental quality and content criteria, MetaNewsr™ will reject any adverts that explicitly promote a cryptocurrency (ads from companies with tokens but are promoting some other aspect of their business may be permitted).


If a company has announced a fundraising event (such as an ICO or an IPO), MetaNewsr™ will reject any advertisements from that company that aren’t specifically allowed under SEC advertising guidelines.


Events and partnerships: MetaNewsr™ may post sponsored material on our platforms from time to time. This material will be clearly identified as sponsored, authored by MetaNewsr™ journalists or editorial employees, and distinguished from our news, analysis, research, and opinion items. Sponsored content connections will have no impact on the journalism that MetaNewsr™ editorial staff produces independently.


Sponsored sessions may also be part of MetaNewsr™ events. Sponsor partnerships will have no influence on speaker invites or event programming since these sessions will be explicitly labeled as sponsored and will be completely distinct from most sessions that are chosen by the content team.
Giveaways/competitions: MetaNewsr™ journalists are prohibited from accepting tokens, coins, or any other items or merchandise from giveaways, contests, airdrops, or other activities that may impair their ability to cover digital assets or the businesses behind them objectively.


Appendix A: Content Independence Policy


MetaNewsr™ context Satoshi Nakamoto’s idea sparked a campaign to change the way money is exchanged. Developers, cryptographers, engineers, entrepreneurs, and anybody else might contribute to Bitcoin’s development thanks to its open-source economic model. A similar approach was then adapted to additional protocols, with some of them being able to “pay for themselves” as open-source technology.


This decentralized economic model faces a common challenge: asymmetries among many stakeholders, some private, some public, some for-profit, some non-profit, compete to create open-source technology.


MetaNewsr™ has set a goal for itself.


MetaNewsr™ opportunity and responsibility as a media platform is to provide a forum for stakeholders of all kinds, from all over the world, to contribute to the conversation about money transformation, regardless of any asymmetry among stakeholders, and solely based on the quality of their work or ideas.
If the foregoing asymmetries continue unchecked, they may lead to private, limited interests controlling open-source initiatives, thereby duplicating the centralized system of money that these projects are attempting to replace (or transcend).


Principles to Be Defined


MetaNewsr™ is a completely owned subsidiary of Birchwood Group, one of the industry’s leading private investors and a supplier of trading and other investment services. As a result, both parties must avoid exerting excessive influence or the appearance of exerting control over MetaNewsr™ content generating processes. Both MetaNewsr™ and BWG promise to respect the following values in their mutual relationship for MetaNewsr™ to continue to provide a trustworthy venue for multi-stakeholder industry growth.


• All MetaNewsr™ content providers will operate independently of any BWG directives.


• MetaNewsr™ content providers, whether journalists, multimedia producers, academics, or event programmers, are allowed and empowered to follow their job goals without fear of BWG officials interfering or retaliating. Promotions, firing, and salary increases are all examples of this. The CEO of MetaNewsr™ has control over all of these metrics and rights.


• MetaNewsr™ journalists are allowed and empowered to pursue their news gathering goals without fear of intervention from officials of either BWG or MetaNewsr™ commercial activities. Beyond news gathering, MetaNewsr™ journalists are also enabled and encouraged to talk publicly on technology without interference from BWG, except for social media and public statement standards, which are governed by editorial management.


• In terms of coverage in MetaNewsr™ articles, multimedia material, social media outlets, social media outlets, and events, BWG and its portfolio firms have no distinct advantage over other organizations.


MetaNewsr™ Processes


Both parties will agree to various rules of engagement in the performance of MetaNewsr™ activities based on those principles:


• BWG and its non-MetaNewsr™ subsidiary employees have no control over MetaNewsr™ content authors. If a MetaNewsr™ content creator refuses to do duties or conduct his or her work according to the employee’s preferences, a complaint will be filed with the BWG chief operating officer, who will punish the employee. As a result of the occurrence, the MetaNewsr™ content creator’s performance record will be updated to reflect his or her adherence to the company’s ethical guidelines.


• MetaNewsr™ content authors have no power over members of MetaNewsr™ sales or other business divisions (excluding MetaNewsr™ Human Resources). If any such employee makes demands of a MetaNewsr™ content producer in order to build a quid pro quo relationship in order to achieve commercial goals, a complaint will be filed with the MetaNewsr™ CEO, who will penalize the employee. As a result of the occurrence, the content creator’s performance record will be updated to reflect his or her adherence to the company’s ethical guidelines.


• If a BWG, its subsidiaries, MetaNewsr™ sales, or other business unit employee instructs MetaNewsr™ content creators on how to cover a story, conduct research, produce a multimedia product, or program an event, a complaint will be filed with the BWG chief operating officer, who will reprimand the employee. As a result of the occurrence, the MetaNewsr™ content creator’s performance record will be updated to reflect his or her adherence to the company’s ethical guidelines.


• If a representative of a BWG portfolio firm attempts to influence a MetaNewsr™ content creator’s coverage by using his or her BWG connection, the MetaNewsr™ employee must immediately contact their manager, who will alert BWG management. As a result of the occurrence, the MetaNewsr™ content creator’s performance record will be updated to reflect his or her adherence to the company’s ethical guidelines.


• MetaNewsr™ will cover BWG subsidiaries agnostically and thoroughly, just as it does other firms in the industry, with appropriate disclosures about MetaNewsr™ connection with BWG.


• MetaNewsr™ employees are not obligated to attend BWG-sponsored events.


• BWG personnel and management should make appointments to visit MetaNewsr™ offices, since they are not permitted to enter without permission.


• In terms of speaking at offsite events, etc., BWG workers and management are subject to the same rules as any other prospective source.