Diamond Stone Platform: Where Content Comes From
Date: 2026-11-11. Revision 2. Status: draft for owner review, with five points for a
lawyer (section 9). Companion to docs/SOCIAL.md (posting), docs/WEBSITE.md
(pages) and docs/FLOWS.md. Diagrams: docs/content-map.html. Screens: "Where content
comes from" in docs/ui-shell-mockup.html.
1. The idea
Nobody at Diamond Stone has time to "make content". But every day people already photograph slabs, load trucks, answer questions and receive ratings. The content is a by-product of the work. The platform's job is to notice it, check it, and offer it as a finished draft, so that the one marketing person chooses and approves instead of chasing and creating.
Three rules follow:
- Document, don't create. Capture happens inside a step the person already does. The most it ever costs them is one tap.
- Nothing is shown by default. A photograph is private until someone marks it "may be shown", the checks pass, and the people and customer concerned have agreed.
- Two people decide; the rest is automatic. Marketing edits; the owner (or a named approver) approves. Tagging, masking, checking rights, drafting, sizing, scheduling, posting, measuring and taking down are done by the system.
2. Where content arises
The full map is in docs/content-map.html: an order's life across the top, each person
down the side. In summary:
| Moment | Who is there | What it yields |
|---|---|---|
| Enquiry, chat, search | Visitors, customers, sales | The questions people really ask; which stones they look at; searches that found nothing |
| Quote | Sales, customer | Which stones are quoted most; objections; why a quote was won or lost |
| Inspection at the factory | Purchasing | Dated photographs of every slab; matching side by side; a short video; measured sizes |
| Loading | Warehouse, driver | The crates, the strapping, the loaded truck |
| On the way | Driver, the system | Transit time; the route, shown as cities |
| Delivery | Driver, customer | A rating and a comment; with agreement, the arrival on site |
| Installed | Customer, architect, sales | The finished space; the architect's and designer's names |
| Months after | Customer | A testimonial; a public review; a repeat order |
| Always | The system | Figures: deliveries this year, on-time rate, countries served, most-specified stone |
What the evidence says is worth most. Proof from peers and real projects is trusted more than a supplier's own claims: the direction is well supported across surveys, but the precise multipliers quoted online are mostly vendor marketing and none is specific to building materials. Specifiers say they want clear technical data, samples and project examples from a supplier (UK and US surveys, unverified, not stone-specific). So the order of value here is: finished projects with the client's words; real slab photographs; answers with data; how the work is done; figures.
3. The pipeline
Drawn in docs/content-map.html and, for posting, docs/system-flows.html.
| # | Step | Done by | What happens |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Capture | The person working | A photograph taken as part of the job, with a guide on screen |
| 2 | Quality check | The phone | Sharp, bright enough, level, large enough. A warning lets them retake at once |
| 3 | "May be shown" | The person | One tap, or left off |
| 4 | Tag | The system | Stone, finish, lot, order, stage, date, who took it, wet or dry |
| 5 | Strip and mask | The system | Location data removed from every copy that leaves the company. Faces, number plates, crate labels, signs and logos found and blurred |
| 6 | Rights and consent | The system | Whose photograph is it? Is anyone in it? Has the customer agreed? Is the project private? Until when? |
| 7 | Block | The system | Anything showing a supplier or quarry, another customer's order, or a person without a consent stays private and says why |
| 8 | Pool | — | Ready; waiting for someone's agreement; private |
| 9 | Draft | The system | Chooses the strongest pieces, suggests the words, makes a version for each channel and for the website |
| 10 | Edit | Marketing | Changes words or pictures |
| 11 | Approve | Owner or named approver | Sees it exactly as it will appear |
| 12 | Publish | Channel service; website build | At its time |
| 13 | Measure | The system | Enquiries and orders by piece |
| 14 | Expire | The system | Taken down everywhere when a consent is withdrawn or a right ends; a "new slabs" post retired when the lot is sold |
Screens drawn: capture with a guide; "pick the best three"; the content pool; one photograph checked and masked; a customer sharing a project; a rating becoming a testimonial; a question becoming an answer page.
4. Making capture effortless
The camera guide. Wherever the app opens a camera for a slab it shows a frame, a level line and three live ticks: sharp, level, no glare. For stone specifically:
- Wipe the slab first. Light from the side, not head-on.
- Polished: stand 10 to 20 degrees off square to avoid a hot spot. Honed: low, raking light. Mid-morning daylight where possible.
- Whole slab in the frame; then one close detail; then one with something for scale.
- Marked wet or dry. A neutral grey card in the inspection shot keeps colour honest. (My recommendation; no published source was found for stone.)
- Held landscape for stills, upright for video; clips of 15 to 60 seconds.
- Taken once at full size. The system makes each channel's shape from that one original.
(Lighting guidance from one trade source; the rest is general practice.)
The asks. Small cards at the moment the person is already looking at the thing; at
most one a day per person; always skippable. The full list is in docs/content-map.html
section 4. Examples: after an inspection, "pick the best three"; after answering a
question in chat, "worth answering publicly?"; when a quote is won or lost, "what decided
it?".
Recognition. A person sees "your photograph was used" with the post. A photograph of the month, chosen by the owner. First name credited only if they want it. No quotas and no targets for posts or reviews.
5. Customers as a source
| Ask | When | How | What they get |
|---|---|---|---|
| A rating and a comment | At delivery | On the portal's "Delivered" screen | — |
| "May we quote you?" | With the comment | With my name; without my name; no | — |
| A public review | After every delivery, whatever the rating | A link to Google, in their own words | Nothing. Rewarding a review, or asking only happy customers, breaks Google's rules |
| A photograph once installed | About a week after the date they said it would be laid (section 14) | A reply in WhatsApp with the picture, or the portal | Their project shown and credited; optionally a credit toward a next order (see below) |
| Permission to show the project | About 90 days after | "Share your project" in the portal: name the company or not, city only, private home, architect and photographer to credit | A professional shoot offered for the strongest projects |
Two things kept strictly apart: reviews and photographs. A reward may never be tied to a review. A sample credit or discount in return for project photographs and a signed permission appears to be allowed, provided it does not depend on leaving a review, the two requests are on separate screens, and any benefit is stated when a testimonial is published. That is a reading of Google's policy and the US rule on reviews, not a stated allowance: for the lawyer.
The customer can withdraw permission at any time from the same screen. The pictures come down everywhere within two days and the withdrawal is recorded.
6. What must never get out
Specific to a trader whose suppliers are confidential.
| Risk | How it leaks | Guard |
|---|---|---|
| The supplier or quarry | A crate stencil or label, a sign in the background, a truck's livery, the photograph's hidden location | Text and logo detection blocks the photograph, not just blurs it, when it finds markings. Location data stripped from every published copy. Close shots of the slab preferred. A supplier's own photographs are never published unreviewed. File names and descriptions carry no supplier codes |
| Another customer's order | A shipping mark, a name on a bundle, paperwork in the frame | Same detection; blocked |
| A person who did not agree | A worker in a loading photograph; a face on site | Faces blurred unless a consent is on record for that person |
| A customer's private site | A home, a palace, a government project | The project is private until the customer agrees; a separate flag for homes and restricted projects blocks publication whatever else was ticked |
| Where the stone was collected | The route, the truck's position | Cities only, as in docs/MODULES.md section 12 |
| What is in stock, to competitors | "New slabs in" posted the day they arrive, with quantities | Posted at least two weeks later; never with quantities, lot numbers or a port |
| A defect, or an unhappy client | A flaw visible in an installation photograph | A person approves every post; the client signs off any project that names them |
| Ports and official sites | A photograph taken inside a port or customs area | Never published without the operator's written permission |
Delivery-proof photographs are evidence, not marketing. They are kept unaltered with their time and place, and are never offered to the pool. A separate photograph, taken or sent with the customer's agreement, is what may be shown.
7. Rights and consent
What the research found. Items marked lawyer need confirming before launch.
| Question | Finding | In the app |
|---|---|---|
| Who owns a photograph a staff member takes at work? | Oman's copyright law has no general rule that an employer owns it. A transfer of rights must be in writing, naming the right, purpose, time and place. The author's right to be credited cannot be given away. Lawyer | A clause in each employment contract, and acceptance of the app's terms, granting the company the right to use photographs taken for work |
| A photograph from a customer, an outside driver or a supplier | Theirs. A written licence is needed | A tick at upload stating what the company may do with it; who took it is always asked |
| A photograph by a client's or architect's photographer | The photographer's | A written licence and a credit by name, recorded on the picture |
| A person in a photograph | Oman's data protection law (in full force since 5 February 2026) requires explicit consent the company can prove in writing, and a right to withdraw. Children only with a guardian's approval | A consent record per person per picture: who, what for, which channels, the date, an end date (default 24 months). No record, the face is blurred |
| Photographing people at all | Oman's new cybercrime law (Royal Decree 61/2026, June 2026) is reported to penalise taking or publishing photographs of others, with prison and fines. The text itself was not read. Lawyer, especially for workers in loading photographs | Staff told not to photograph people who have not agreed; faces blurred by default |
| Posting to Instagram, Google or LinkedIn | This sends personal data abroad, which the data protection law restricts and fines heavily. Lawyer | Nothing with an identifiable person is posted without that person's consent naming the channels |
| Customers in the UAE and Saudi Arabia | Both restrict photographing or marketing with people's images without consent (unverified) | The same consent rule applies everywhere |
| Marketing messages | WhatsApp's own policy and Oman's data protection law both require opt-in first | Already the rule (docs/MODULES.md section 9) |
8. Platform rules that shape the automation
| Rule | Effect |
|---|---|
| Google: no reward for reviews; no asking only satisfied customers; no review targets for staff; staff may not review their own company | The review request goes to every customer or to none. No staff targets |
| Google Business Profile: photographs must represent reality; no heavy editing | Blurring a face or plate, and cropping, are acceptable. Nothing is added or removed by generative editing |
| Instagram's interface for businesses: JPEG only; the picture must be reachable at a public address when published; about 100 posts a day | The system converts and hosts each picture; the limit is far above need |
| Meta and YouTube: realistic video or audio made or altered by AI must be labelled | No AI-made or AI-altered video or audio is used. Colour correction, blur and AI-suggested captions do not need a label |
| Music in Reels: business accounts may use only Meta's commercial sound library (unverified) | Original sound or that library only |
| Reposting someone else's post | Only with the owner's permission, recorded |
9. For the lawyer, in order
- The text and reach of Royal Decree 61/2026 on photographing and publishing images of people.
- Whether the company owns photographs staff take at work, and the wording of the written clause.
- The consent wording, the data protection officer, and sending images to social platforms abroad.
- Offering a credit for project photographs without breaking review rules.
- Exposure in the UAE and Saudi Arabia for photographs taken on customers' sites there.
10. Settings
Under Settings → Messages and channels → Content. Each has a default.
| Setting | Default | Choices |
|---|---|---|
| "May be shown" is | Off until tapped | Off; on for slab-only photographs at inspection |
| Photographs with a face and no consent | Blurred | Blurred; kept private |
| Markings found (labels, plates, signs) | Photograph blocked | Blocked; blurred and sent for review |
| "New slabs" posts wait | 14 days | 0 to 60 days |
| Quantities and lot numbers in posts | Never | Not changeable |
| Asks per person per day | 1 | 0 to 3 |
| Ask customers for a photograph | 30 days after delivery | Off; 14, 30, 60, 90 days |
| Ask customers for a public review | Off | On for every customer; off |
| Credit for project photographs | Off, until the lawyer confirms | An amount; off |
| A consent lasts | 24 months | 6, 12, 24 months; until withdrawn |
| Take down after a withdrawal within | 2 days | 1, 2, 7 days |
| Posts that may skip approval | None | Named kinds, for example slab-only photographs |
11. Measures
| Measure | Why |
|---|---|
| Pieces entering the pool each week, by source | Is the supply steady without anyone chasing? |
| Share that pass the checks | Is the camera guide working? |
| Time from capture to post | Is approval a bottleneck? Target: two working days |
| Customers who share a project; who allow a quote | The strongest content |
| Enquiries and orders by piece and by source | What is worth more of |
| Withdrawals, and time to take down | The promise kept |
12. Build stages
| Stage | Content |
|---|---|
| With inspection and delivery (stages 3 to 5) | Camera guide; "may be shown"; tagging; location stripped; the pool; manual choice by marketing |
| With social posting | Automatic drafts; the asks; rating to testimonial; question to answer page |
| Next | Face, plate and label detection; consent records with end dates; "Share your project" in the portal; expiry and take-down |
| Later | Short video; suggested best pieces; credit for project photographs, if allowed |
Until detection is built, every photograph is checked by a person before it can be shown.
13. Sources
Read directly on 11 November 2026: Oman Personal Data Protection Law, Royal Decree 6/2022 (decree.om/2022/rd20220006), and CMS on its enforcement; the listing of Royal Decree 61/2026 (decree.om/2026/rd20260061) and a Times of Oman report on it; WIPO's summary of Oman's copyright law; Google's contribution policy and Business Profile photo and post policies (support.google.com); Meta's Instagram content publishing documentation; YouTube's altered-content disclosure rules; LinkedIn on content credentials; WhatsApp Business policy; the US Federal Trade Commission's 2024 rule on reviews; Nielsen's Trust in Advertising 2021; one trade guide on photographing stone.
From search summaries only (unverified): the B2B peer-trust and specifier surveys; employee-advocacy figures (old, and not relied on); Meta's AI-label and music rules; UAE and Saudi provisions; picture sizes for each platform other than Google's.
14. Asking customers for installation photographs (revision 2)
Added 11 November 2026. Screens: "Asking customers for installation photos" in the sketch.
The sequence
| Step | When | What is sent | Why |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | At delivery, with the thank-you | "Roughly when will it be laid?" with three one-tap answers | A small, easy question. It also gives the real date: the gap between delivery and a finished floor runs from weeks to many months, so no fixed number of days is right |
| 2 | About a week after the date they gave | "Is it down? If you have a photo, reply with it here." | Asked when there is something to show, not before |
| 3 | One to two weeks later, if no reply | One reminder, worded differently | A second contact raises replies; beyond two or three the gain is negligible and people start opting out |
| 4 | Then | Nothing. The request closes | |
| On a photograph | At once | Thanks, and "May we show it?": with our name; city only; no | Permission is asked separately from the photograph and is never assumed |
| After it is used | When published | "Your project is on our site", with the link | Closes the loop; the strongest reason to send the next one |
Rules
- At most two messages after the date question (a setting; the evidence supports no more than three contacts in all).
- Reply with a photo. The customer answers in WhatsApp by sending the picture. No sign-in, no form. The system receives it and attaches it to the order. The portal's "Share your project" is the alternative, not the requirement.
- From a named person, the customer's own contact, with their name.
- Every message offers "not now", "ask me later" and "please don't ask". The last is honoured for good.
- Never sent while a case or claim is open, while a payment is overdue, to a customer who rated the delivery poorly, for a private or restricted project, or to a trader.
- Paused by any reply until a person has read it.
- Who is asked: the architect or designer first where there is one, because their name is credited and they are the most likely to have good photographs; then the contractor's site contact; the owner or developer for permission. Sales sets this on the order.
- Plain wording. No guilt, no false deadline, no "last chance", and the "no" is as easy to tap as the "yes".
- Something given first: the care guide for their stone goes with the delivery message. The offer for a strong project is a professional shoot and a credited project page.
What WhatsApp allows
- A request for photographs to use in marketing counts as a marketing message, not a service one. It needs the customer's opt-in, uses an approved template, and is charged.
- WhatsApp limits how many marketing messages any one person receives from all businesses together, and does not say how many. When a message is refused for that reason the system waits a day, tries once more, then sends an email instead.
- Once the customer replies, a 24-hour window opens in which ordinary messages are free-form. The thanks and the permission question are sent inside it.
- If customers block or report a template, WhatsApp pauses it and can restrict the number. The system watches each template's quality and stops the automation by itself if it falls.
Customers who are traders
Some customers buy to sell on. They are a different kind of customer, set on the customer record, and several rules change.
| An end client, contractor, architect or developer | A trader | |
|---|---|---|
| Where the stone ends up | Their own project | With their customer, whom we do not know |
| Asked for installation photographs | Yes, by the sequence above | Never |
| Asked who their customer is, or where it went | — | Never. Their customers are theirs; a supplier who asks looks like one about to go round them |
| Papers | Diamond Stone's documents | Kept plain: nothing beyond the invoice need carry our name, so they can pass papers on |
| Named publicly as our customer | With permission | Not unless they ask to be |
| Their orders used as content | With permission | Slab photographs only, never anything showing who bought |
| What we give them | Tracking, approval, documents | A reseller pack: photographs without our logo, datasheets they can put their own header on, free to use with their customers |
| What we may ask | A rating; a photo; a review | A rating of our service; optionally one tap on what the stone is being used for (floors, walls, counters); a photograph of it in their showroom, if they wish |
| A public review | Every customer is asked | Asked as well; it is about our service to them |
Limits to be honest about
- We will rarely see where a trader's stone ends up. That content is simply not ours to get, and the plan does not try.
- A trader may also be a competitor for the same end clients. Nothing in the app shows a trader what other customers buy, and nothing we post shows what a trader bought.
- If a trader's own customer later contacts Diamond Stone directly, sales sees a note that the stone was supplied through that trader, so the relationship is handled with care. This needs a rule from the owner (section 15).
- The reseller pack helps them sell our stone. There is no measured proof that it makes traders share more in return; it is offered because it is useful to them.
Why it is built this way
| Principle | What the evidence says | Used as |
|---|---|---|
| Make it easy | Removing effort is the best-supported way to get a voluntary action | Reply with a photo; one-tap answers; no sign-in |
| Ask when the moment is right | A large field study found reminders sent before people were naturally ready backfired; later ones did not | Timed from the customer's own date, never from delivery |
| A plan helps follow-through | Asking "when?" has a real but modest effect, and gives the trigger | The first question |
| A small first ask | A small effect | The date question comes before the photo request |
| Reminders work, then stop working | One reminder lifts replies noticeably; gains fade after two or three; unsubscribes rise | Two messages at most |
| Giving first | Reciprocity has held up when re-tested | Care guide first; the project page and credit |
| A person, not a company | A small effect from personal address | Sent by their named contact |
| Pressure backfires | Regulators treat false urgency and shaming as deceptive | Plain wording; an equal "no" |
Honest note: recognition (an architect valuing a credit) and "ask at a high point" are sensible practice, but no field evidence was found for them in this setting. Most of the effects above are small. The design relies on being easy and well timed, not on persuasion.
Settings
Under Settings → Messages and channels → Content → Photo requests.
| Setting | Default | Choices |
|---|---|---|
| Ask customers for installation photographs | On | On; off |
| First ask | 7 days after the date they gave | 0 to 30 days |
| If they gave no date | 45 days after delivery, once | 30, 45, 60, 90 days; do not ask |
| Reminders | 1, after 14 days | 0, 1 or 2; 7 to 21 days apart |
| Who is asked first | Architect or designer | Architect; contractor; the main contact |
| Never ask when | A case is open; payment overdue; rating of three or less; private project; trader | Each can be switched, except trader |
| "Please don't ask" | Honoured for good | Not changeable |
| Fallback when WhatsApp refuses | Email after one retry | Email; none |
| Stop the automation when template quality falls | On | Not changeable |
| Reseller pack for traders | Offered | Offered; on request; off |
Measures
Share who give a date; share who send a photograph; messages sent per photograph received; share who allow it to be shown; "please don't ask" count; template quality.
15. Decisions
- Whether a credit toward a next order is offered for project photographs (after the lawyer's view, section 9).
- Whether traders are named publicly as customers by default: this plan says no.
- What sales should do when a trader's own customer comes to Diamond Stone directly.
- Whether the reseller pack removes the Diamond Stone name entirely or keeps "Omani marble, supplied by Diamond Stone" in small type.
Sources for section 14, read directly on 11 November 2026: Meta's WhatsApp Business documentation on template categories, opt-in, per-user marketing limits, pricing, template pausing and inbound images; the American Marketing Association's summary of Jung, Ryu, Han and Cho (2023) on review-request timing; Göritz and Crutzen (2012) on reminders in web surveys. From search summaries only (unverified): the meta-analyses on defaults, implementation intentions and foot-in-the-door; the reciprocity replication; the distributor and channel literature; project photography timing.
The website's library (added 11 November 2026)
Articles, answers, facts and history are planned in docs/EDITORIAL.md. Photographs
and facts captured in normal work feed it through the same pool; a claim is published
only when tied to a Fact record with its source.