Common questions
What LakFeed is, where the news and the numbers come from, and what to do when something looks wrong.
About LakFeed
What is LakFeed?
A single page for the things Sri Lankans check daily: today's news, bank exchange rates, gold prices, and a few calculators. We collect what other people publish and put it in one place, in English, Sinhala and Tamil.
Do you write the news yourselves?
No. Every headline on LakFeed was written by a newsroom, and tapping it takes you to their site. We group articles about the same event so you see it once instead of eight times, and that grouping is the only thing we add.
Which languages does LakFeed work in?
English, Sinhala and Tamil. Each has its own front page, its own sources and its own search, so the Sinhala site is not a machine translation of the English one. Bank names and currency codes stay in Latin script, because that is how they are printed.
Is it free? Do I need an account?
Free, and there is no account to make. Nothing to sign up for, no paywall, and no advertising.
The numbers
Where do the exchange rates and gold prices come from?
The rates are what each Sri Lankan bank publishes on its own site. The gold price is what jewellers advertise. We collect what they publish and show it side by side, and every page says when we last checked.
How often are the rates and prices updated?
We check bank rates through the working day and gold prices regularly during shop hours. Banks usually move a rate once or twice a day and jewellers about the same, so the number often does not change between checks. The timestamp tells you when we looked, not when it changed.
Why is the rate here different from the one at the counter?
A published rate is an advertised rate. The counter rate depends on the amount, the branch, whether it is notes or a transfer, and the bank's own cut-off times. Use this page to decide which bank to walk into, and confirm the number before you hand anything over.
A number on the site is wrong. What do I do?
Email [email protected] with the address of the page and what you expected. A screenshot is the fastest thing you can send. If we collected a bank's number incorrectly we can usually fix it the same day.
Is any of this financial advice?
No. Everything here is a report of a published number, and our software can misread one. The Terms page says what we do and do not stand behind.
Using and reusing LakFeed
Why does tapping a headline take me to another site?
Because the article is not ours. The newsroom wrote it and they should get the reader and the page view. We show you enough to decide whether to read it, and then we get out of the way.
I run a news site. How do I get on LakFeed, or off it?
On: email [email protected] with your site and your feed address, and we will look at it. Off: email [email protected] and say so, and we will remove the source, not just an article. We do not argue about it.
Can I reuse LakFeed's rates or prices on my own site?
Not by scraping, and the Terms page says so. But ask. Write to [email protected] and describe what you want to build; we would rather give you a clean way to get the data than find out from our server logs.
Does LakFeed track what I read?
No. No analytics vendor, no advertising network, no reading history. Your language and theme are saved in your own browser. The Privacy page has the full detail and it is short.
Where is the Colombo Stock Exchange data?
Being built. There is a preview page at /stocks with what is planned and roughly where it stands.
Still stuck?
If your question is not here, write to us. We are a small team and we read everything.
Contact us