Editorial Policy

MICHI is an independent Osaka travel publication operated by Stay Buddy Inc., a hospitality company headquartered in Osaka. Every guide on this site is written and fact-checked by our Osaka-based editorial team — people who live in the city, ride its trains, and eat in the places we recommend. This page explains exactly how we work, so you can judge our guides on their process, not just their promises.

Who writes MICHI

MICHI is produced by the MICHI Editorial Team, a group of Osaka-based writers, researchers, and editors working under Stay Buddy Inc. Our team covers the city across food, sake, bars, experiences, sightseeing, history, shopping, stays, transport, and practical tips, organised by neighbourhood across 24 Osaka areas. We write for English-speaking visitors who want to understand Osaka, not just tick off a list.

Because our work is a team effort — researched, drafted, edited, and verified by different members — articles are published under the MICHI Editorial Team byline rather than a single name. You can browse everything we have published on our team page.

How we research

Our guides start on the ground in Osaka. Before a place is recommended, we draw on first-hand knowledge of the neighbourhood and cross-check the practical details against primary and reputable sources:

• On-the-ground familiarity — we prioritise places our team knows or has visited, and we describe them the way a local would, not the way a brochure would.
• Primary and local sources — official venue sites, municipal and museum records, and Japanese-language sources (including Tabelog and Google Maps) are checked directly, not summarised second-hand.
• Closure & relocation checks — before publishing, each venue is checked for recent closure, relocation, or rebranding, so our lists do not carry places that no longer exist.
• Specifics over filler — we favour concrete, verifiable detail (prices, hours, nearest station, what to order) over vague adjectives.

Our editorial process — and how we use technology

We are transparent about our workflow. MICHI's editors use a range of research and drafting tools, including AI-assisted drafting, to organise the large volume of Osaka information we cover. Crucially, no guide is published as raw automated output: every article is reviewed, fact-checked, edited, and given its local perspective by our Osaka-based editorial team before it goes live. The judgement about what to recommend, what to warn about, and what is actually worth a visitor's time is always human, and always local.

In other words, technology helps us handle scale; it does not replace the editorial standards, first-hand knowledge, and verification that make a MICHI guide worth reading.

Accuracy & sourcing

We aim for guides that a reader can act on with confidence. Where an article states a specific fact, date, price, or figure that a reader should be able to verify, we attribute it to a source. For historical and cultural pieces, we cite primary and academic material inline as links. When accounts genuinely differ, we say so and present more than one view rather than asserting a single tidy answer.

Freshness & updates

Osaka changes — restaurants move, hours shift, prices rise. We revisit and update our guides, and the publish and last-updated dates shown on each article reflect when it was last reviewed. Prices and hours are always worth confirming on the venue's official channel before a special trip, and we say so.

Corrections

If you find an error — a closed shop, a wrong price, an outdated detail — please tell us and we will fix it. Email [email protected] with the article and the correction. We take accuracy seriously and treat corrections as a priority, not an afterthought.

Independence & advertising

MICHI's recommendations are editorially independent. We do not accept payment in exchange for a positive review or a place on a list, and our editorial judgement is not for sale. Where a page contains advertising or any commercial relationship, it is disclosed. Advertising does not influence which venues we recommend or what we say about them.

Contact

Questions about how we work, or want to reach the editorial team? Email [email protected] or use our contact page.