The most common question about our interview series is how much editing happens between the actual conversation and what readers see published, since interviews can range from lightly cleaned-up transcripts to heavily reshaped narrative pieces built around a conversation.
Why this question matters for how readers should weigh what they read
A near-verbatim transcript and a heavily edited narrative piece represent very different levels of editorial intervention between what a source actually said and what a reader encounters, and readers reasonably want to know which they're getting.
Our actual practice
We edit for length and clarity - removing filler, tightening rambling answers, occasionally reordering for narrative flow - but we don't add words a source didn't say, and we don't change the substance of an answer even when a more polished version would read better. Quotes are edited transcript, not paraphrase.
Why we draw the line where we do
Editing for readability without altering substance strikes a balance we think respects both the source's actual view and the reader's time; editing further, into paraphrase or reconstructed narrative, would blur the line between quoting someone and characterizing them.
Why we think this distinction is worth stating explicitly
Readers relying on an interview as a source's own words, rather than our characterization of their views, deserve to know exactly how much editorial hand shaped what they're reading, and we'd rather be explicit about it than leave that ambiguous.