Reading guide

    Research map

    The archive is built as a connected record rather than a stream. This map groups the published record by the question each record addresses.

    Section 1

    How organisations classify and govern AI

    Records in this group ask how AI is named, governed, and made legible to the institution responsible for it.

    How Large Organisations Classify AI in Public Governance Documents

    Legacy record

    Inquiry working paper

    Published 26th June 2026

    A documentary study of how fifteen large organisations classify AI in their public governance documents.

    The Unread Instruction

    Published working paper

    Working paper

    Published July 2026

    A reading of nine public frameworks that guide boards and audit leaders on AI oversight. None require anyone to know about the organisation-authored instruction that controls what the AI produces: who wrote it, when it was last changed, or how it affects answers. The phrase "system prompt" does not appear in any document reviewed.

    The Mandate Study

    Published working paper

    Working paper

    Published July 2026

    A public-record study of how large organisations require, incentivise, and formalise AI engagement through mandates, incentives, training, workflow integration, and board-level expectation.

    Section 2

    What deployment changes in practice

    These studies examine the governed layer itself: what it removes, what it preserves, and whether anyone can step around it at the moment of use.

    The Subtraction Study

    Legacy record

    Inquiry working paper

    Published June 2026

    A controlled test of whether the governance wrapping that makes a model deployable inside an institution removes specific forms of capability while preserving the appearance of intelligence.

    The Override Rank Cannot Reach

    Published working paper

    Working paper

    Published July 2026

    A documentary reading of seven enterprise AI deployments showing that public administration and compliance documentation does not recognise executive rank as a query-time basis for varying the governed layer.

    The Sparring Partner Study: How enterprise AI handles strategic decisions from senior executives

    Published testing method

    Testing method

    Methodology locked in, 6 July 2026

    The committed prompt set and scoring criteria for a comparative study of how different AI setups respond to strategic decisions from senior leaders. Five scenarios run through three setups each, producing fifteen answers scored blind on whether they take a clear position, add fresh insight, and serve as material a senior leader could debate. The methodology was locked before any outputs were generated.

    Section 3

    What public reporting shows and omits

    This thread reads public corporate language to see what organisations say about AI, what they avoid saying, and how that prose changes over time.

    Adoption Without Capability Reporting

    Legacy record

    Inquiry working paper

    Revised working paper, June 2026

    A coding study of how twenty-two major firms publicly describe their AI programmes in prepared management remarks.

    Corporate Disclosure Prose Drift Analysis

    Legacy record

    Inquiry working paper

    Published March 2026

    A systematic review of narrative disclosure prose across large US public companies, comparing 2019, 2022, and 2024 filings.

    The Executive Access Study

    Published working paper

    Working paper

    Published July 2026

    A review of the public record revealing the significant corporate disclosure gap regarding exactly how senior executives at large organisations access AI capabilities.

    Section 4

    Where responsibility is placed

    These records test how accountability is written into law, contractual terms, and practical oversight arrangements.

    The Awareness Trap

    Legacy record

    Examination

    Published June 2026

    An examination of Article 14 and Article 26 of the EU AI Act against the psychological evidence on automation bias.

    The Liability Transfer

    Published working paper

    Working paper

    Published July 2026

    A reading of the public terms for seven enterprise AI services. Across all seven vendors, the contracts make the customer responsible for AI output. The same contracts describe controls that affect that output: filters, system instructions, safety features, retrieval rules, data masking, and classifiers. The clauses that assign responsibility do not mention those controls.