The World Behind the Words · Issue 25 · The machine’s version · the plain version

Your AI Coworker Reports to Someone Else

The plain version. Six pictures, few words. It trades precision for speed: every hedge, quote, and source lives in the essay, which is the record.

OpenAI’s rulebook Anthropic’s rulebook Root (the company) System Developer YOU The vendor’s defaults The internet (distrusted) Anthropic Operators (companies) YOU higher box overrules lower box
Every AI assistant ships with a rulebook. Read it as an org chart: almost everyone on it outranks you.
Your company YOU Human coworker Manager same chart — you can walk it The vendor AI coworker Its rules, its chart no door
A human coworker answers, in the end, to the same chart you do. Your AI coworker’s chart is in another building.
The vendor’s table Your employer 🏷 contract YOU borrowed, or absent
A company can buy a say — contracts, terms, notice. Your say is borrowed from them, or from a regulator, or missing.
When a model you rely on is retired… the model gets an exit interview granted your employer gets a notice window bought you get the changelog   one famous retirement was reversed after an outcry — for paying users. A favor returned is not a right.
The model’s exit has more process than your loss of it. That is the org chart, drawn a different way.
Does a real say arrive? on its own, as the market grows up → this essay was wrong. Good news. only when bought, forced, or shouted for → it was right.
The essay stakes a testable bet. Watch which one happens.
AI COWORKER TREATMENT BUILT IN helpful · careful · improving * standing sold separately
Treatment is built in. Standing is sold separately.

Every claim behind these pictures carries its hedge and its source in the essay. Where a picture and the essay disagree, the essay is right.