[ 03 ] · The Digital Reality Gap
Internet Reality
What everyone else says: publications, databases, reviews, knowledge graphs, search engines and AI systems.
INTERNET REALITY
What the world finds
Every company has all three versions. The gap is how far apart they have drifted.
On the Canvas
- 5 · Public Evidence
- What can a stranger verify: website, content, proof, data?
- 6 · Third-Party Signals
- What do reviews, mentions, directories, and analysts say?
- 7 · Machine Understanding
- Do search and AI classify and describe you correctly?
- 8 · AI Representation
- When buyers ask AI for options, how are you represented?
Where its answers come from
- Perceived
- Synthesised from what AI systems actually answered.
- Evidenced
- Supported by a third-party source you can cite.
The sources
Others publish
- Industry publications
- News
- Customer reviews
- Partner sites
- Professional directories
- Links and brand mentions
Reference sources
- Company databases
- Wikipedia
- Wikidata
- Knowledge graphs
Interpreters
- Search engines
- AI systems
Information usually flows from left to right. So do errors.
In the claim chain
- 3EvidencedDoes anyone else confirm it?
Corroborated by authoritative sources that do not depend on you.
- 4UnderstoodDo search and AI get it right?
Represented correctly when someone asks, in every market that matters.
The whole chain: True → Stated → Evidenced → Understood
In the Digital Reality Score
In the Digital Reality Score, every place a claim appears is weighted by how often it is encountered. A wrong fact in a knowledge panel costs more than the same fact in an obscure directory, and search results and AI answers are how a company is represented, never proof of what is true. Methodology