Article

How Simple ASL decides what to show you

There is no single source of truth for ASL. Here is the weighted stack we use, why each source is on it, and what we will not ship without permission.

policysourcesmethodology
By Simple ASL EditorialHearing learner
Published Apr 16, 2026Updated Apr 16, 2026

Every source we reference sits in one of six roles: a lexical backbone, an institutional reference, a variation check, a domain-specific reference, community guidance, or a research dataset. Each role answers a different question, and no single source answers all of them.

Weights are not rankings

A weight tells us how much authority a source carries for its particular role. Community-guidance sources like the World Federation of the Deaf or the NAD can outrank lexical sources because they shape how we make decisions, not because they contain more signs.

What we will not ship

  • Copied third-party lesson text
  • Embedded restricted third-party images or videos
  • Cached copyrighted source media without explicit permission

Sources