I read a lot online. News, essays, blog posts, analysis, the occasional unhinged social media thread. We are constantly inundated with information.
The internet is not short on opinions. What it is short on is clarity.
The problem is speed.
We read more now than any generation in history, but we read fast. We skim, we scan, we scroll, and we make judgments in seconds. In this high-velocity environment, it’s easy to get swept up in language without realizing it.
That’s not a moral failing. It’s just the reality of how information moves and our brains work.
Rhetoric is ancient and unavoidable. It’s how humans persuade each other, and it’s woven into everything from political speeches to product descriptions to your friend’s text about where to get dinner. The question isn’t whether rhetoric exists. It’s whether you see it.
So I built Rheta.
Rheta is a Chrome extension that highlights rhetorical techniques directly on the page as you read.
It is deliberately quiet. It’s not a fact-checker. It doesn’t rate, rank, or score. It doesn’t try to assign motives. It’s not a content filter. It’s not a political tool. It does not tell you what is true.
It does something simpler: it helps you see what is happening within the language itself. It helps you see how arguments are constructed so you can slow down, think, and decide for yourself. It highlights language inline and offers annotations on hover, doing what good editors and good teachers have always done: pointing things out and stepping back.
The goal is a small pause between your initial reaction and your deeper understanding. A chance to see the skeleton beneath the prose. A chance to read between the lines.
What Rheta Does
When you turn Rheta on, it annotates the article you’re already reading. Highlights appear inline. You can hover for a quick explanation and keep reading without leaving the page.
Rheta flags common patterns like:
- Evaluative or Loaded Language
- Unattributed Claims
- Causal Assertions and Predictions
It also includes optional, more interpretive detections (clearly labeled), like:
- Logical Fallacies
- Hedging
- Passive Voice
- Cherry-Picked Data
- False Balance
- Missing Context
You can toggle categories on and off depending on what you want to focus on.
Privacy and How It Runs
Rheta is built to be simple to use.
- No accounts required. Your app key is your identity.
- We only store hashed keys and usage totals.
- Text is processed to produce results, but it is not used to train models.
- Analysis runs on secure, server-configured providers, so you don’t need to set up anything locally.
How to Get It
You can install Rheta at Rheta.app or through the Chrome Web Store (search “Rheta”). Install it, generate your app key, top up credits, and start using it.
Version 1.0.0
I’m thrilled to share Rheta and hear your feedback. This is version one, and it will get better. I’ll continue to experiment with backend models and keep refining it in public. If you try it and have thoughts about techniques it should catch, pages where it struggles, UI tweaks, or features that fit the philosophy, I want to hear them.
In Close
Rheta does not promise better opinions or cleaner conclusions. It does not improve arguments or settle debates. It simply improves the conditions under which arguments are read.
Not every argument needs to be rejected. Not every claim needs to be trusted. Sometimes, seeing is enough.
Rheta exists for that moment.
The internet isn’t going to slow down. But we can.