Memory is a source with a label
Many famous missed deals survive through interviews, memoirs and speeches. Those accounts can be valuable, especially when participants agree. They can also simplify informal conversations into a clean offer and rejection.
We label participant recollections, look for contemporaneous records, and say when another participant disputes the framing.
The clean headline problem
The internet rewards the shortest version. Editorial work often means making the headline slightly less satisfying so the underlying claim becomes much more honest.