Every DroneXL article ends with the same sentence: "DroneXL uses automated tools to support research and source retrieval. All reporting and editorial perspectives are by Haye Kesteloo." This page says what that means in practice: which tools are used, for what, and where the line is.
What automated tools do at DroneXL
DroneXL uses software, including large language models, for the parts of the job that are about finding and organizing material: locating primary documents such as regulatory filings, court records and product pages; retrieving prior DroneXL coverage of a subject; transcribing video and audio; checking a draft against DroneXL's house style; and assisting with drafting.
Those tools work under a written set of instructions that require every factual claim to be traced to a primary source, ban invented figures, timelines and quotes, and require every internal link to point at an article that actually exists. A draft that contains a claim the tool could not confirm carries a flag on that claim, and the article does not publish until the editor has resolved it.
What they do not do
No article is published without Haye Kesteloo, or the named contributor on the byline, verifying its facts against the primary sources, deciding what the story is and why it matters, and writing or approving every editorial position in it. The DroneXL's Take section is the editor's own view. First-person statements in an article, such as a test the editor ran, a flight on a given date, or the number of years spent covering a subject, are true of the editor and are never generated.
Automated tools do not choose which stories DroneXL covers, do not contact sources, and do not publish anything on their own. Responsibility for every article rests with the person on the byline, and the corrections policy applies to every error regardless of which tool was involved in making it.
Images
DroneXL does not present AI-generated imagery as photography. It does not use generative fill, generative removal, AI face reconstruction or AI upscaling on other people's photographs, and it does not alter the content of any news photograph. Where an image DroneXL is entitled to enlarge has been enlarged, the caption says so. The full rule is in DroneXL's editorial standards.
Disclosure
The note at the end of every article is the disclosure. It is there because readers are entitled to know how their news is made, and because DroneXL would rather say plainly what it does than have readers guess. Articles published under a contributor's or partner creator's byline describe their own process.
AI systems and DroneXL's content
DroneXL allows AI search assistants that cite and link their sources to index its articles, because a citation with a link sends readers to the original reporting. It blocks crawlers that collect content for model training without attribution. DroneXL's articles are copyrighted, and reproducing them without permission, by a person or a machine, is not licensed.
Questions
Write to Haye Kesteloo at haye at dronexl dot co or use the contact page.
Last updated September 11, 2026.