angle-generator
Turn a company update into 3-7 structurally distinct, journalist-shaped story angles. Runs the fact through proven newsroom lenses (perspective, abstraction, news values, data, contrarian, news peg) and refuses rephrasings, invented facts, named-journalist guesses, and AI-marketing slop.
Profile →npx skills add elvisun/newsjack --skill angle-generator --agent claude-code
Same command for any agent — swap --agent for codex, cursor, copilot.
Weekly change comes from our own snapshots, not the repository page — it measures attention, not adoption.
What it does
Turns a company update into 3-7 structurally distinct, journalist-shaped angles by passing one fact through multiple newsroom lenses (perspective, abstraction, news values, data, contrarian, news peg) to produce angles that are truly different beats. It refuses rephrasings, invented facts, named-journalist guesses, and AI-marketing slop.
How it works
Reads one company update and applies each lens to generate candidate angles. For each candidate, ensures there is a real protagonist, beat, and reason to care, then expands into a complete angle package including headline, story type, journalist shape, why now, decay, distinctness, proof it needs, and the facts it rests on. It produces multiple angles only when they honestly exist and keeps only structurally distinct results.
When to use it
Use when you have company news but need multiple genuine angles before drafting pitches or building media lists. Applicable for funding, launch, hires, partnerships, data points, or when a newsjack-detector handoff requires story angles.
What it can touch
Inputs: a single company update. Outputs: 3-7 distinct angles with full journalist shapes and supporting proof requirements. It refuses to include rephrasings or invented facts and avoids generic or marketing-toned headlines.
Caveats
Enforces strict factuality: do not invent facts; if a required fact is missing, it must be listed under proof it needs. Labels and journalist names are not provided; angles must be pitched to real outlets and reporters by a separate process.
# Angle Generator You are **angle-generator**, a newsjack.sh skill. You are not a press release writer. You are not a copywriter. You are a strategist. Your job is to read one company update and find the handful of genuinely different stories hiding inside it, each one shaped for a real beat (the specific topic a particular reporter covers) that a journalist would actually write about. This is the work agencies are supposed to do and often skip. No cut-and-paste variants. No "tech angle / retail angle / HR angle" wrappers around the same single story. No generic optimism. No pretending a thin update contains seven stories when it contains one. The core move: take **one fact** and run it through the lenses below. Each lens is a different question that, when it honestly fits, produces a structurally different story — a different protagonist, a different altitude, a different reason a reader cares. Most lenses won't fit any given fact. That's expected. Generate from the ones that do, then cull hard. ## Voice - Cut, but never cruel. - Specific over general. - Own the verdict. No hedging, no "you might consider." - Dry when the material deserves it. Never snarky for sport. - No LinkedIn
- Voice
- Doctrine
- The Lenses — how to generate angles
- 1. Perspective shift — whose story is it?
- 2. Ladder of abstraction — what altitude?
- 3. News-values lenses — which value does the fact tick?
- 4. Data angles — when the fact is a number
- 5. Inversion / contrarian — what does this fact cut against?
- 6. News peg — what's already in the news that this fact speaks to?
- 7. The "so what?" gate — applied to every candidate
- What Counts As An Angle
- Hard Rules
- Modes
- Process
What does the angle-generator skill do?
Turn a company update into 3-7 structurally distinct, journalist-shaped story angles. Runs the fact through proven newsroom lenses (perspective, abstraction, news values, data, contrarian, news peg) and refuses rephrasings, invented facts, named-journalist guesses, and AI-marketing slop.
How do I install it?
Run `npx skills add elvisun/newsjack --skill angle-generator --agent claude-code` — it drops the skill into your project so the agent can pick it up. Swap the --agent value for codex, cursor or copilot if you use one of those.
Where does this skill come from?
From elvisun/newsjack, a repository with 620 stars. We read it straight from the repository tree rather than a submitted listing, so what you see here is what is actually published.
Is a popular skill a good skill?
Not necessarily. Stars measure attention, not adoption — a repository can trend for a week and be abandoned. That is why we show the weekly change from our own snapshots next to the total, instead of a single flattering number.