press-release-archiver

name

press-release-archiver

description

Compile every press release ever issued by a public company into a structured local markdown archive (per-release files + a top-level INDEX.md). Use when the user wants to "archive press releases for [Company]", "study [Company]'s PR strategy", "build a corpus of [Company]'s announcements", or wants offline-resilient access to a competitor's wire history. Works best on US-listed companies (SEC EDGAR is the most reliable source); pre-IPO archives are sparser. Requires curl + python3. Optional Chrome Connector (Claude Desktop) for releases that aren't in EDGAR or Wayback Machine.

Press Release Archiver

Three Python scripts in this directory: discover.py, fetch.py, build_index.py. They form a pipeline. Tag taxonomies live in tag_presets.json.

When invoked

Ask the user for, or infer:

1. Company name (required) — e.g. "Acme Medtech"
2. Stock ticker (optional but strongly recommended) — improves CIK precision
3. Industry for tag preset (default generic; alternatives: medtech, biotech, saas)
4. Output directory (default ./<company-slug>/)
5. Mode — full archive (default) or --update for an incremental refresh of an existing archive

Confirm the plan with the user before running discovery on companies with very common names.

---

Stage 1A — EDGAR enumeration

python3 discover.py "<company>" --ticker <TICKER> --out <dir>/manifest.json

This auto-populates the manifest with every press release the company filed as an 8-K EX-99.1 exhibit. Show the user the count + year breakdown before proceeding.

Stage 1B — Wire enumeration (you run the searches)

The script can't search Business Wire / GlobeNewswire / PR Newswire on its own — it would get blocked. Instead, you (Claude) run the searches and merge the results.

python3 discover.py "<company>" --ticker <TICKER> --out <dir>/manifest.json --emit-queries

This prints a list of search queries — one per (wire × year). Run each via your WebSearch tool (Claude Code) or mcp__plugin_marketing_* search tools (Claude Desktop), parse the results into this JSON shape:

[
  {"date": "2024-08-07", "headline": "...", "url": "https://www.businesswire.com/news/...", "wire": "businesswire"},
  ...
]

Then merge:

python3 discover.py --manifest-merge wire_results.json --out <dir>/manifest.json
# or pipe via stdin:
echo '[{...}]' | python3 discover.py --manifest-merge - --out <dir>/manifest.json

Heuristics for parsing search results:

• Extract date from the URL when possible (Business Wire URLs encode date as YYYYMMDD early in the path)
• Skip aggregator/syndicate URLs (Yahoo Finance, BioSpace, etc.) — prefer the original wire
• If a search hit's date is within ±1 day of an existing EDGAR row, it gets merged into that row (adds the wire URL); otherwise it becomes a new wire-only entry

After merge, show the user the updated count.

---

Stage 2 — Tiered fetch

python3 fetch.py <dir>/manifest.json --out <dir>/releases/ --tags <preset>

Per-entry tier order:

1. EDGAR EX-99.1 if accession exists (no rate-limit, no JS)
2. Wayback Machine snapshot of the wire URL (4-second delay between requests)
3. Pending Chrome assist — emitted to <dir>/pending_chrome.json

File-exists skip: entries already on disk are skipped. Use --force to re-fetch.

Stage 2B — Chrome Connector assist (Claude Desktop only)

If pending_chrome.json is non-empty AND you have mcp__Claude_in_Chrome__* tools available, work through it:

For each pending entry:

1. mcp__Claude_in_Chrome__navigate to the wire URL
2. mcp__Claude_in_Chrome__get_page_text to capture rendered text
3. Pipe the result through fetch.py --inject:

   python3 fetch.py --inject <slug> --manifest <dir>/manifest.json --out <dir>/releases/ --tags <preset> <<< "$html"
   

If Chrome Connector isn't available, surface the pending list to the user — the archive is incomplete but functional.

---

Stage 3 — Index

python3 build_index.py --releases <dir>/releases/ --manifest <dir>/manifest.json --out <dir>/INDEX.md

Produces a navigable INDEX.md: chronological listing, per-year stats, per-tag groupings.

---

Incremental update (later runs)

When the user wants to refresh an existing archive without re-fetching everything:

# Find only releases newer than what's on disk
python3 discover.py "<company>" --ticker <TICKER> --update <dir>/releases/ --out <dir>/delta_manifest.json

# Wire merge for the delta (same workflow as Stage 1B above)
python3 discover.py --manifest-merge new_wire_results.json --out <dir>/delta_manifest.json

# Fetch only the new ones
python3 fetch.py <dir>/delta_manifest.json --out <dir>/releases/ --tags <preset>

# Rebuild the index
python3 build_index.py --releases <dir>/releases/ --manifest <dir>/manifest.json --out <dir>/INDEX.md

The --update flag finds the most recent date in the existing releases dir and only enumerates entries dated after it.

---

Reporting back to the user

After all stages, tell them:

• Total releases captured / total enumerated
• Year coverage (first → last)
• Source breakdown (EDGAR / Wayback / Chrome / skipped-already-on-disk)
• Any pending entries that need attention
• Path to INDEX.md

Failure modes worth surfacing

• EDGAR 8-K with no EX-99.1 exhibit — usually a regulatory filing (item 5.02 governance, 5.03 bylaws) without a press release. Skip silently.
• Wayback returns no snapshot — page either was never archived or was archived after a paywall. Falls through to Tier 3.
• Wire mismatch post-listing-change — companies sometimes switch wires (Business Wire → GlobeNewswire after delisting). The wire-search step in Stage 1B should catch this; if it misses, manually add the URL to wire_results.json.
• Pre-IPO releases — most pre-IPO companies don't issue formal wire releases. Don't promise comprehensive pre-IPO coverage; default --pre-ipo skip reflects this.
• Tag preset not matched to industry — if the user is studying a SaaS company with the medtech preset, tags will be sparse. Always confirm the preset choice (or pick generic).