TorpidLife covers the health consequences of sitting in front of a screen for a living. Health content written badly does real damage, so here is the standard we hold ourselves to, in enough detail that you can hold us to it.
What counts as a source
We cite primary research, not other people’s summaries of it. When a claim rests on a study, we read the study (methods and limitations, not just the abstract) and link to the paper, not the news write-up about it.
In rough order of weight: systematic reviews and meta-analyses; randomised trials; large prospective cohorts; then everything else. For ergonomics and hardware we also use published standards: ANSI/BIFMA and ISO seating and display standards, NIOSH and OSHA guidance, and manufacturer specs where they can be verified.
What we refuse to use: brand press releases as evidence of anything but what the brand claims; affiliate roundups from other sites; “studies” that exist only as a marketing page; a single small trial reported as though it settled the question. If a supplement company paid for the trial proving its supplement works, that fact goes in the sentence.
How health claims are handled
Every health claim here is labelled by how well supported it is, in four states we use plainly in the text:
- Well established: replicated across good studies. Stated as fact.
- Probable: the evidence leans one way but has real gaps. The gap gets named.
- Thin or mixed: early, small, conflicting, or mostly mechanistic. Stated as unresolved.
- Opinion: our judgement, marked as ours, reasoning shown so you can disagree with it.
Two rules follow. We report absolute risk alongside relative risk, because “raises your risk by 40%” is meaningless without the baseline. And we don’t launder mechanism into outcome: changing a marker in a lab is not the same as changing how long or how well you live.
TorpidLife is not a clinical resource and does not give medical advice. Where a symptom pattern warrants seeing a doctor (persistent numbness, escalating pain, vision changes), the article says so instead of offering a stretch.
How products get recommended
TorpidLife is new: as of today no product here has been tested by us, because no product review has been published yet. When that changes, these are the rules the reviews run on.
Products are used before they’re recommended: in ordinary working conditions, over enough weeks that novelty wears off. A “review” assembled from spec sheets and other people’s reviews is not a review, and we won’t call it one. Where a page is a research-based shortlist rather than a hands-on verdict, it says so at the top. That distinction is never blurred to make a page rank.
Every recommendation states who it is for and who it isn’t. There is no universally correct chair, keyboard, or standing desk, and any site telling you otherwise is selling something. We name the tradeoff, and we say when the cheap option is good enough. Usually it is.
Uncertainty, and saying so
Much of what circulates about desk work and health is weaker than it sounds. Posture, blue light, standing desks, sitting as “the new smoking”: each has a confident internet consensus and a messier literature underneath.
Where the evidence is thin, the article says so. We would rather publish a short piece that admits the gap than a long one that papers over it.
If we can’t answer a question honestly, we don’t publish the article.
Corrections
We will get things wrong. When we do, the fix is visible.
- Typos and broken links are fixed silently.
- Any change to a fact, figure, health claim, or recommendation gets a dated correction note saying what was wrong. The error is not deleted from the record.
- If the evidence a piece rests on collapses, the piece is retracted with an explanation left in its place, not pulled offline.
- Articles carry a last-reviewed date, and health content is re-checked rather than left to rot at the top of a search result.
If you find an error, tell us through the contact page. It reaches the person who wrote the piece, and a good correction gets acted on quickly whether or not it’s polite.
Money
Commercial relationships, right now: none. No affiliate programmes, no sponsorships, no advertisers, no paid placements. That will likely change (independent sites need funding somehow), and when it does, this is how it will work.
- Disclosure appears at the top of the page it applies to, in plain language, not buried in a footer.
- No brand sees a review before publication, or gets approval, edits, or a heads-up on what it says.
- Placement is never for sale, and commission rates never influence order. If a cheaper product with no affiliate programme is better, it wins.
- Sponsored content, if it ever exists, is labelled in the headline area, and is never a review or a health claim.
- Review units sent free by a brand are disclosed as free units.
The point of an independent site is that nobody bought the answer. Break that and there’s no reason for TorpidLife to exist.