A contributor's name should stand for work they did

A byline is a claim about responsibility. Readers assume the named person contributed to the article and is connected to its judgments. Adding a plausible name to make a publication appear staffed creates an expectation the work cannot meet.

Agree the contributor's role before publication. Author, editor, interviewer and technical reviewer are different contributions. A person who approved the publishing programme has not necessarily written every article in it.

Use a house byline for genuinely collective editorial work where that is the publication's chosen practice. Explain the editorial process on an accessible page and identify responsible editors when those roles are confirmed. Do not invent biographies to fill an author directory.

Preserve legacy authorship. Original work should retain its original attribution and date where verified. A new adaptation or commentary should identify its own authorship and link to the source rather than appearing as a newly discovered piece by the original writer.

Give contributors a chance to review the final text attributed to them. Material edits can alter meaning, and approval of an earlier draft does not automatically cover a substantially different conclusion.

Names should make accountability easier to locate. A clear, modest credit is more useful than an elaborate masthead that implies expertise, employment or endorsement nobody has confirmed. The publication earns authority through the work and the people actually responsible for it.