# Findings — RuntimeWire same-story & content-quality population study (Aug 1–15, 2026)

**Read this first — denominators.** Analysis A (RW vs 11 named competitors on same-story clusters):
1,531 story clusters built from the full in-window corpus; 199 multi-outlet clusters; 109 clusters where
RW and at least one named competitor covered the same story; 276 RW×competitor pairs formed; 208 valid
(≥2,500-char competitor text); **205 graded same-story pairs** covering **110 unique RW articles** in
**97 clusters**. Analysis B (RW vs the sources it cites, stratified by type): 3,252 outbound citations;
655 pairs formed; **512 graded**, of which **382 were judged same-story**. A and B are separate studies
and are never combined. Every rate below names its denominator.

## Headline result (Analysis A) — two numbers, on purpose

- **All graded pairs (n=205): RW 182 W / 1 T / 22 L = 89.2%** wins (Wilson 95% 84.2–92.8; cluster
  bootstrap 0.893 [0.843, 0.938], B=10,000, seed 20260817).
- **Clean-text pairs only (n=120): RW 98 W / 1 T / 21 L = 81.7%** (Wilson 73.8–87.6). "Clean" = the
  competitor's judged text contains ≥1,500 chars of actual prose after stripping nav/paywall/player
  boilerplate (`diag_prose_density.csv`).

The gap between the two is a text-availability artifact, not a quality signal: 85 of 205 graded pairs
(41%) pit RW against stub-class competitor text, and RW went 84-0-1 in those. 64 of the 85 stubs are
Bloomberg. **We treat 81.7% on clean text as the defensible headline.** Sensitivity band under other
text-quality restrictions: 78.7% (capped-bodies-only) to 91.2% (no-judge-truncation); ≥5,000-char
competitor text gives 82.7%. Other denominators, all graded pairs: unique-RW-article level 96 W / 6 T /
8 L (n=110); cluster-outlet cells 125/2/15 (n=142); cluster level 86 W / 3 T / 8 L (n=97).

## Per-outlet results (graded pairs; Wilson 95% in outlet_summary.csv)

| Outlet | W-T-L | Mean gap | Read |
|---|---|---|---|
| TechCrunch | 71-0-1 | +3.9 | Real sweep: holds 52-0-0 on clean-text pairs alone. The one loss (Apple spyware exclusive) is genuine. |
| Bloomberg Technology | 66-0-0 | +5.40 | **Artifact — do not cite as a quality result.** 64/66 pairs are paywall/video stubs (median 499 prose chars); several "articles" are video pages with 1–3 sentences of prose. This measures RW vs Bloomberg's feed, not Bloomberg's journalism. |
| The Verge | 17-0-0 | +3.4 | Clean text, legitimate sweep (n=17). |
| WIRED | 15-0-4 | +1.9 | Legit both ways: RW wins most; the 4 losses are exclusive founder interviews and an original GPS-jamming investigation RW itself credited. |
| VentureBeat | 4-1-17 | −0.98 | **The only losing matchup — and the only big feed with perfectly clean text (zero stubs).** See below. |
| Axios | 6-0-0 | — | Directional (n<10); house-style tell disclosed in methodology. |
| 404 Media | 3-0-0 | — | Directional (n<10). |
| Ars Technica / The Information / SiliconANGLE / Crunchbase News | 0 pairs | — | Feeds excerpt-only / citation-stubs / no overlap. Not ranked. |

## The VentureBeat anomaly is real — and instructive

VB's 17 wins are spread across 17 RW articles in 12 clusters (not one bad story). The pattern in the
judged text: VB's enterprise long-form carries more granular technical detail — benchmark and pricing
tables, architecture sections, executive interview quotes — than RW's tighter same-story pieces, chiefly
on model/product-release stories. VB's text was capped at 8,000 chars (it would be longer uncapped), so
the losses are conservative. Where RW beats VB (4 wins, e.g. the AgentRadio story), it does so with
corrective framing, cost economics, and leaderboard context on top of the source paper — the win
mechanism RW's format is built for. Human audit of all 22 losses found **zero verdicts to overturn**.

**Observation → implication (not a generalization):** in this window, depth-of-technical-detail on
enterprise release stories is the one dimension where a competitor systematically out-scores RW.

## Where RW loses (all 22 A losses, human-audited)

17 VB (long-form depth), 4 WIRED (genuine exclusives/original investigations), 1 TechCrunch (Apple
spyware exclusive, −0.333, adjudicated, plausible either way). Text pollution (Cloudflare interstitials,
nav cruft) taxed competitor texts in many pairs — competitors won these 22 anyway, which strengthens
loss validity; the same pollution biases *wins* toward RW, which is why the clean-text headline is quoted.

## Coverage & speed (199 multi-outlet clusters)

RW covered **109 of 199** multi-outlet stories (54.8%). Among those 109, RW was first-or-tied in **34**
(31.2%); lag vs the earliest named competitor: q25 −0.9 h (RW earlier), median +0.6 h, q75 +4.6 h.
RW is effectively a fast follower: typically within the hour, occasionally first, with a tail of
several-hour lags. (Prior 59-pair run reported median lag 4.7 h on a different clustering definition —
see continuity note.)

## Analysis B — RW vs its cited sources (512 graded; 382 same-story)

Same-story rate is 74.6% — citations are often background rather than the same development (expected).
Among 382 same-story source pairs: **RW 321 W / 9 T / 52 L (84.0%)**. By source type (W-L):

- social 99-18 · company_announcement 61-16 · named_competitor 58-10 · other_news 55-7 ·
  primary_document 19-0 · wire_pr 28-0 · research 1-1 (2 T)

**The loss pattern is the honest one for a synthesis wire:** 42 of 52 losses are to the *scooping
primary document itself* — rich vendor announcements (e.g. Cloudflare's Radar Researcher post with
architecture and outage metrics), first-person researcher disclosures (tl;dv Firestore exposure), and
genuine competitor exclusives (Axios's on-the-record Astra story). RW never lost to wire/PR copy or to a
primary document it was summarizing badly — it loses when the source is itself an excellent article.
Judges consistently credited RW for sourcing, restraint, and added context even in losses. Role tags
across B: adds_context 362, verifies_extends 313, synthesizes_sources 302, advances_new_facts 53,
summarizes_other 22 — i.e., graders overwhelmingly see RW as synthesizing and extending, rarely as
merely summarizing. Caveat: the gradeable pool is 512 of 3,252 citations (DB-matched, ≥800 chars); B
describes that pool, not all citations.

## The spec's ten questions, answered

1. **Does RW cover the stories that matter?** 109/199 multi-outlet clusters (54.8%). Misses skew toward
   enterprise-vendor and consumer-gadget stories outside RW's thesis (see coverage_overlap.csv).
2. **Is RW fast?** Median +0.6 h behind the first competitor; first-or-tied 31.2% of covered clusters.
3. **Does RW win on quality?** Yes on this window's evidence: 81.7% of clean-text same-story pairs
   (89.2% unrestricted), and it holds at the article (96/6/8) and cluster (86/3/8) levels.
4. **Against whom does it win/lose?** Wins vs TC/Verge/WIRED-majority/Axios/404; loses systematically
   only to VentureBeat's enterprise long-form; Bloomberg result is an artifact.
5. **What explains losses?** Technical depth on release stories (VB), genuine exclusives (WIRED/TC/Axios).
6. **Does RW beat its own sources?** 84.0% of same-story source pairs; losses concentrate where the
   source is the scoop itself.
7. **By source type?** Sweeps wire_pr and primary_document; strong vs other_news and named competitors;
   thinnest margins vs social (researcher threads/disclosures) and company announcements.
8. **What role does RW play?** Synthesizer-extender (adds_context/verifies_extends/synthesizes_sources
   dominate); advances_new_facts in 53 gradings — original-reporting share is real but minority.
9. **Is the grading trustworthy?** Blind, de-identified, position-randomized, two passes + adjudication;
   human audit of all losses, ties, top gaps, and a seeded win sample overturned zero verdicts; known
   biases (stub texts, pollution, judge-model family, Axios style tell) quantified and disclosed.
10. **How does this compare to the prior run?** Prior (Aug 16, 59 pairs): 53-0-6 = 89.8% — statistically
    indistinguishable from this run's 89.2% unrestricted; the population run adds the clean-text
    correction (81.7%), the VB weakness (invisible at n=59), and the Bloomberg artifact diagnosis.

## Observation vs generalization

Everything above is an **observation about Aug 1–15, 2026** under the stated feeds, caps, and judges.
Generalizations we consider supported: RW's synthesis format reliably beats same-story coverage where
full competitor text is available, except against depth-first enterprise long-form; RW's edge is
context, sourcing discipline, and corrective framing, not scoops. Generalizations NOT supported: any
claim about Bloomberg/The Information/SiliconANGLE quality; season-over-season trends (two windows, one
overlapping method); reader preference (judges proxy a professional reader, not audiences).
