Standards
Terms and conditions
These terms apply when you use The Coastal — the independent digital newsroom based in KuGompo City, Eastern Cape, published at thecoastal.co.za or any other address we use. By reading the site you agree to them. If you do not agree, please do not use the site.
They sit alongside our editorial policy and privacy notice. There is no paid subscription, print edition or reader login on this site today. If that changes, we will update these terms.
Who we are
The Coastal is the responsible publisher. Questions about these terms: newsroom@thecoastal.co.za. Postal description: The Coastal, KuGompo City, Eastern Cape, South Africa.
How you may use the site
You may read, share links to, and print stories for your own lawful, personal, non-commercial use. Short quotations are allowed if they are fair, attributed to The Coastal, and linked back to the original article.
You may not copy the site wholesale, scrape it, republish our reporting as your own, sell our content, frame our pages inside another site, or strip our branding. You may not attack, overload or interfere with the site, or try to reach the newsroom systems that sit behind it.
For any other reuse — syndication, commercial reprint, or teaching packs beyond a short quotation — write to us first and wait for written permission.
Our journalism
News, opinion, headlines and photographs on this site are journalistic work. News is reported to the standards in our editorial policy. Opinion is labelled and is the writer’s view, not a newsroom finding. AI may help inside the newsroom; it does not publish. An editor approves every story.
We work carefully, but journalism is not a warranty. Stories can be updated. If we get a fact wrong we correct it. Do not treat anything on this site as legal, financial, medical or investment advice. If a decision matters, get independent professional advice.
Advertising and other sites
Advertisement spaces on the site are placeholders until we sell advertising. When ads run they will be labelled. A link or an advert is not an endorsement. Other websites have their own terms; once you leave The Coastal, those rules apply.
Your conduct
Do not use the site to send malware, bulk unsolicited email, or material that is unlawful, defamatory or hate speech. Do not impersonate The Coastal or our journalists. If we later open comments or letters for publication, you remain responsible for what you submit, and we may refuse or remove it.
Intellectual property
Unless we say otherwise, the words, photographs, marks and design of The Coastal belong to us or to people who have licensed them to us. Using the site does not give you ownership. Photographers and other creators keep the rights we have not licensed. Credit lines on images must stay with the picture.
Availability
We try to keep the site up. We do not promise uninterrupted access, error-free pages, or that files will always be free of harmful code. We may change, pause or withdraw stories, sections or the whole site without notice.
Liability
To the extent South African law allows, The Coastal and the people who work on it are not liable for loss that arises merely from your use of the site, from relying on a story without further checks, from downtime, or from another site we link to. Nothing in these terms takes away rights you have that cannot be limited by contract, including rights under the Consumer Protection Act or the Electronic Communications and Transactions Act where they apply.
Staff access
The newsroom at /admin is for authorised staff only. Staff accounts are personal. Uploaded documents and drafts are internal. If you are not a member of the newsroom, you have no right to that system.
Privacy
How we handle personal information — including the weather-town cookie and messages you send us — is explained in our privacy notice.
Changes
We may update these terms when the site or the law changes. The current version will always be on this page. Continued use after a change means you accept the new terms.
South African law
These terms are governed by the law of the Republic of South Africa. If a dispute cannot be resolved with us directly, the courts of South Africa have jurisdiction, with a preference for those serving the Eastern Cape.
Contact
Terms, reuse requests and complaints: newsroom@thecoastal.co.za, or our contact page.