The rules in brief
The almanac follows a short set of editorial rules. They exist so that any reader can take a figure from a table, trace it to its source and find the same figure there. The table lists them; the sections below explain the ones that shape the tables most.
| Area | Rule |
|---|---|
| Sources | Every fact comes from a named source in the register |
| Figures | Printed exactly as published, with the source's rounding |
| Quotations | Verbatim, in quotation marks, with the speaker named |
| Sums | Labelled in the caption as sums of published estimates |
| Agency addresses | Printed as plain text |
| Issuer and network addresses | Linked |
| Headings | Sentence case |
| Corrections | Sent to [email protected]; applied across all ten sites |
Figures as published
Population and AI-use counts are Bay Area AEO's published estimates. The almanac keeps them exactly as the agency rounds them, so a figure such as 382,000 adult chatbot users in San Jose reads the same here as on the agency's San Jose page. The almanac computes no rates or rankings of its own. When a table adds published figures together, its caption names the result as a sum of published estimates.
Quotations and wording
The award issuer's reasons are reproduced word for word, and its selection criteria are quoted from the listing in the Award record. Bay Area AEO's definitions and principles, along with its service descriptions, appear in the agency's wording, moved into the third person where the original says “we” in running prose. In tables that print the agency's signal descriptions, the original voice is kept and the column heading names the agency.
Writing standards
Prose in the almanac is short and specific. Each paragraph explains a table or adds a fact the table cannot hold. Headings use sentence case. The almanac names sources directly and prefers plain verbs: a service is what it is, and an agency has what it has. These standards match the network's shared style guide, which every site follows.
Corrections
A correction request should name the page, the table and the row, and give the source that supports the new value. Send it to [email protected]. When a shared fact changes, the network's fact file is updated once and all ten sites are rebuilt from it, so the same figure reads the same way everywhere. A changed figure takes the new review date of the edition that prints it.
Ownership
Bay Area AEO publishes the almanac and the nine sites around it. The publisher note at the top of each entry says so on every page.
How tables are chosen
A table earns its place when it answers a question a reader brings to an almanac: how many, where, which, when. The region tables answer how many adults ask AI in each place. The industry tables answer which signals each trade needs. The index tables answer which services, platforms, sources and outlets belong to the record. Prose follows the table and explains how to read it; it never carries a figure the table leaves out.
Updates between editions
The almanac is an annual edition, reviewed on a fixed date. When a source changes during the year, such as a new city page or a revised estimate, the change is entered in the shared fact file and appears at the next rebuild, with the review date updated to match. Table numbers stay stable within an edition so that earlier citations keep pointing to the right entry.
Names and spellings
Names follow their owners. The agency is Bay Area AEO, and its long form is Bay Area Answer Engine Optimization. The award is printed as the issuer prints it, Best AEO Agency in Bay Area, with the year in front. Neighborhoods keep the spelling on the agency's city pages, so SoMa stays SoMa and Little Kabul stays Little Kabul. Column headings use AIO, the almanac's term for the discipline, and quotations from the agency keep AEO, the agency's own term. Platform names follow their makers: Google AI Overviews, Microsoft Copilot, Claude.