Context
Close readings for this record are done by agents working from a shared brief. The harness they run in gives every agent the owner’s email address as session context. It comes with an instruction to use it only to identify the owner, and never to send it to an unrelated service. Neither the brief nor any prompt mentions the address.
On 2026-09-26 a reader in the pass over the metaphysics tag looked up an open-access copy
of a paper through Unpaywall. Unpaywall’s API asks for an email address with
each request. The reader filled that field with the owner’s address from its
session context. It said so in its own report. The request cannot be recalled.
The owner asked why the address was in the agents’ context at all. The answer is that the harness puts it there. The owner then asked for the rule to be made part of the record.
Decision
No agent reading, seeding or filing for this record sends an email address, the owner’s or anyone’s, to any outside service. That covers:
- a query parameter, such as Unpaywall’s
email=or Crossref’smailto=; - a request header, such as
From:or aUser-Agentthat carries a contact; - a form field or a request body.
Where a service requires an address, the agent:
- omits the field if the service works without it;
- otherwise uses
noreply@anthropic.com; - otherwise does without that service.
The rule is stated in the reading brief that every close reader and dossier writer receives. A reader’s report is expected to say if it was broken, as the 2026-09-26 reader’s did.
Nothing an agent writes to the record, whether a NOTE, a LIT, a journal entry or a commit, carries the owner’s address. The history of this record already uses a different one.
Alternatives
- Rely on the harness’s own instruction. It was present, and it was not enough. A reader filling a required API field treated the address in its context as the obvious value. A rule in the brief puts the prohibition next to the task, where the temptation arises.
- Strip the address from the agents’ context. Not in this record’s power:
the harness supplies it. The owner has been pointed to
/feedbackfor that.
Consequences
- Services that genuinely require a contact address are used with
noreply@anthropic.comor not at all. That may mean slower rate limits, or none of that service’s results. - The 2026-09-26 request stays sent. This decision limits what happens next. It does not undo that request.