A to Ö

One alphabetical register of everything built, run, measured and refused across the other nine issues. 47 entries, no categories, and no sorting by importance, because deciding what matters is the reader’s job and I have already done enough deciding on this site.

Press any letter key to jump to it · A G S · every entry says which issue it comes from

A

A to Ö

This register. Called A to Ö because I am Swedish, not because there is an entry under Ö.

Agent

A program given a job rather than a command. The useful question is never what it can do, but what it is allowed to do without asking. № 02

Agent-driven retail

Built for agents from the first day rather than retrofitted onto something older. A different exercise, and a better one. № 02

B

Blind spot

A question about your own company you cannot answer from memory. Naming one is worth more than scoring well. № 05

Build rather than buy

Building is now fast enough that most software is not worth buying. Your own stack becomes the thing nobody can copy. № 03

C

Chosen by the agent

The state a page is in before I have read it. It is printed so you know whether a human has been past. № 04

Cookie

There are none. The one in the corner is a biscuit, and it is the only thing on this site that asks you for nothing.

Could find out

The middle position on the dial. Honest, and more common than either neighbour. № 05

Counter-case

The condition under which a principle stops being true. Five of the seven have one. Two do not, which is stated rather than hidden. № 03

D

Day rate

Two thousand euros. A day is a day, not a diary entry. № 10

Discard

The eight observations the agent throws away each morning. The judgement is in the discard, not the generation. № 04

E

ERP

What you buy when a business needs a spine. We built ours instead. № 01

Escalation

How often an agent hands a decision back to a person. The most telling number in the operation, and the least known. № 05

F

Field guide

The long-form half of Binary & Thread: the story behind a garment, written properly. № 07

Fluency

Being able to answer a question about your own company from memory. It is a consequence of how the company is run, not a trait of the leader. № 05

From memory

Without a dashboard and without asking the person who would know. The whole test is that one condition. № 05

G

Guardrail

What an agent may not do, written down, with a named person who decided it. Without the name it is a habit. № 02

I

ICAx

The innovation hub, 2017 to the end of 2023. Projects across retail, banking and pharmacy. № 01

In development

A state label. It means the page exists and the thing behind it does not yet. It is printed so you never wonder.

Instrument

A page you operate rather than read. Number 05 is one. The dial moves before the argument does. № 05

K

Kept

The two observations that survive the morning. Kept by the agent until I have read them, then kept by me. № 04

L

Limit

Where a principle breaks. A principle with no stated limit is a slogan. № 03

M

Minimap

The strip at the top of the cover. The red tick is where you are. It is the only navigation this site has.

N

Named owner

Every shared agent has one. Every quarter that person says whether it still earns its place, and if not it is switched off. № 02

New Business

2024. A remit to start businesses rather than projects, which produced unmanned stores, a parcel business and Gaston. № 01

No idea

The third position on the dial. The lamp goes out. It is the most useful answer on the page. № 05

O

Observation

One checkable sentence about one news item. Ten are written each morning and eight are struck through by breakfast. № 04

Operating model

How the work actually moves, as opposed to the chart of who reports to whom. It is the thing I am hired to change. № 02

Organic traffic

The only kind either shop gets. No advertising budget, which makes the numbers small and the evidence real. № 07

P

Plateau

Month four, when everybody is busy and cheerful and the curve has quietly stopped climbing. It does not clear itself. № 02

Principle

Seven of them, each with the condition under which it stops being true. Reading them without the limits is reading half. № 03

Product information layer

Built rather than bought. The part of the stack where the specification was ours alone. № 01

R

Refusal

Work turned down, kept in the open with the reason. Three kinds are refused outright and the reasons are printed. № 09

Retainer

A monthly fee with no build in it. One of the three things I will not quote for. № 10

Ro Sweden

An AI-native shop for cleaning products, operated by an agent rather than by me. More than a hundred and eighty products. № 01

S

Selection pressure

The force that decides which of the morning's ten survive. Free to produce, expensive to apply, and the reason a person stays on the call. № 04

Squircle

A square and a circle brought together. Order and creativity, and most people are handed one of the two. It is also the favicon. № 01

State label

Every issue carries one: live, free, in development. You always know whether you are reading something finished.

T

Translation

What I am actually paid for. Holding the technical, commercial and design arguments in one conversation and saying which two only pretend to agree. № 01

Tuesday

The test of an agentic company. Anyone can make an agent do something impressive once. It has to work on a Tuesday.

U

Unit economics

What one automated thing costs, in currency rather than tokens. Without it you know the machine is faster, not that it is cheaper. № 05

Unverified

The mark on anything the machine produced that I have not checked. It is printed rather than quietly assumed. № 04

W

Weekly letter

One story a week behind a Binary & Thread design, written properly, sent to four people. № 07

Workaround

What your people use instead of the tool you bought them. It is a running cost with no invoice, paid in minutes. № 05

X

X-ray

Press and hold a panel to see what is underneath the official version. Number 02 has one. № 02

Y

Young Digital

The company. One person, a great many agents, and a rule that nothing on this site asks you for anything.

Ö

Ö

Nothing yet. The register is named for the Swedish alphabet, and the last letter is still empty. It will stay listed until something earns it.