Research and sources
Writing · 4 min read
Attach your own links, let Zsper go and find the rest, and read why a source was refused.
Some pieces need facts you don't already hold. Zsper handles those two ways — you hand it sources, or it goes and finds them.
Attaching your own
Paste a link on the New screen or in the editor conversation and Zsper reads the page.
What comes back is verbatim. There's no summarising step and no model call in that path — Zsper quotes the passage as written. It also doesn't cost you credits, because nothing was generated.
Anything you attach outranks the brain. Hand over a report and Zsper works from the report; your own stored knowledge steps back to make room, because handing over source material is the strongest possible signal about what the piece is for.
If a link can't be read — the page is gone, it's behind a login, it isn't fetchable — you'll be told it went unread. It's never quietly dropped from the list.
Letting Zsper look
When a piece needs something you haven't given it, Zsper can search. The order is the important part:
- It searches.
- It ranks what comes back and disqualifies the sources that don't clear the bar.
- It reads only what survived.
So the sources panel shows two kinds of row: the ones it read, and the ones it refused, with the reason. A refusal is usually "no primary source" — a page republishing a number from somewhere else, three hops from wherever it was actually measured.
Read the refusals. They tell you what the ranking thought was going on, and you can disagree with it: if it threw out something you know is good, attach it yourself and it will be read.
Zsper can only open a URL that the ranking admitted. That's what stops a made-up link ever being fetched or cited.
What it won't do
- It won't decide between sources that disagree. A second source agreeing adds support; a second source disagreeing never causes the first to be dropped. Disagreement between sources is the interesting part, and it belongs in front of you.
- It won't research forever. Every run has a budget and a stopping rule. "Enough to write this" has to be earned.
- It won't invent a specific. If a figure isn't in your knowledge and isn't in a source that was actually read, it doesn't go in the draft — Zsper asks you instead.
A note on credits
Research costs credits, because it's real work: searching, ranking, reading, deciding. Reading a link you attached does not. If you already know the source, attaching it is both cheaper and better.
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