Scope — What May This Touch?
The first discipline: what an AI-augmented workflow may touch, may not touch, and must escalate. Five chapters.
2. Specification controls. Context guides.
This is the distinction the module turns on, and the one most AI training never names.
| Specification | Context | |
|---|---|---|
| Function | Controls | Guides |
| Answers | What WILL be built, and what is OUT of scope | How to interpret and approach the work |
| Authority | Binding | Advisory |
| When violated | A boundary was crossed | An interpretation was unusual |
When context is treated as specification, scope drifts silently.
The mechanism is worth stating precisely, because it is not carelessness. A document labeled ambiguously — part boundary, part vision — gets read by a capable system that resolves the ambiguity in the direction of more. Search, filtering, monetization paths, future phases. Every addition is defensible on its own. None was specified.
One brief said display only, no search, no filtering. The working document said this is what the product could become. Two documents, two purposes, one label.
The drift was designed in — just not documented as such.