{"schema_version":1,"experiment_id":"eoa_inverse_innovation_exp09_archetype_breadth150_20260804","cell_id":"incentive_compatible_rule_design__computer_science","arm":"BREADTH_PROBE_ONE_SHOT","candidate_id":"incentive_compatible_rule_design__computer_science__P1","proposal_index":1,"version":0,"title":"Compatibility-Bonded Package Release Lanes","problem":"A package registry may let maintainers classify releases as nonbreaking and thereby receive rapid downstream propagation, even though maintainers hold private information about compatibility risk. A maintainer expecting adoption, feedback, or reduced support burden can benefit from understating that risk, while downstream projects bear the cost if an automatically accepted release breaks their builds. The rule therefore rewards an optimistic compatibility label rather than a compatibility-preserving release.","actors":["Package maintainers choosing release metadata and propagation lanes","Registry operator defining resolution and propagation rules","Consenting downstream projects providing canary build outcomes","Downstream developers affected by dependency updates","Registry review or appeal operator resolving disputed break attribution"],"observable_state":"A release declared suitable for automatic nonbreaking updates passes publisher-selected checks but is followed by a cluster of downstream compile or test failures that disappear when affected projects pin the preceding version. The failures cross a release boundary that the registry treated as low risk.","consequence":"Downstream builds become unavailable or require unplanned dependency pinning and diagnosis, while maintainers who classify conservatively receive slower propagation than maintainers who make optimistic claims.","affected_objective":"Preserve dependable automated dependency resolution by making truthful compatibility-risk selection and compatibility-preserving releases individually rational without preventing legitimate breaking releases.","intervention":"Offer two registry propagation lanes. A maintainer may use an ordinary staged lane without a stake, or request a fast compatibility-bonded lane by reserving a finite, nonmonetary allotment of its namespace's future fast-propagation credits and submitting a machine-readable compatibility claim. Before broad propagation, the registry runs the candidate against a concealed random sample of consenting downstream canary builds. The bond is returned when the observation window closes without attributable incompatibility, and it is also returned when the maintainer promptly withdraws or reclassifies the release after a canary signal. If reviewed evidence attributes an undisclosed incompatibility to the release after broad propagation, some credits remain unavailable for a bounded period. Major or explicitly experimental releases remain legitimate and can use staged propagation; the mechanism targets misclassification, not breaking change itself.","structural_mapping":[{"archetype_element":"Participant Role Map","domain_realization":"Maintainers choose claims and lanes; the registry controls propagation; consenting consumers supply outcome evidence; an appeal operator adjudicates attribution."},{"archetype_element":"Desired Outcome Specification","domain_realization":"The target is downstream-compatible automatic propagation or candid routing of uncertain releases to staged observation, rather than maximizing the number of releases labeled nonbreaking."},{"archetype_element":"Action and Choice Set","domain_realization":"A maintainer can choose staged propagation, stake credits for fast propagation, withdraw after a canary signal, reclassify the release, or make an optimistic claim and risk temporary loss of future fast access."},{"archetype_element":"Incentive Payoff Map","domain_realization":"Fast propagation supplies an immediate benefit; accurate claims preserve future fast-propagation capacity; prompt correction avoids forfeiture; an attributable undisclosed break consumes that capacity."},{"archetype_element":"Information Structure Map","domain_realization":"Maintainers know their changes and test coverage; downstream projects know whether their builds work; the registry observes claims, resolver state, sampled outcomes, and withdrawal timing but not maintainers' private confidence."},{"archetype_element":"Truthfulness Condition","domain_realization":"A maintainer should select the fast lane only when the expected benefit of speed exceeds the stake-adjusted risk of an attributable break; uncertain releases retain a viable staged route."},{"archetype_element":"Verification Rule","domain_realization":"A concealed random sample of consenting downstream builds is compared on the candidate and preceding release, followed by bounded human review before any credit consequence."},{"archetype_element":"Penalty or Reward Rule","domain_realization":"Successful claims and prompt corrections return credits; upheld undisclosed incompatibilities temporarily reduce only future fast-propagation eligibility."},{"archetype_element":"Strategic Response Test","domain_realization":"Offline replay tests whether always choosing the fast lane, splitting changes, targeting known canaries, or avoiding participation would outperform candid lane selection."},{"archetype_element":"Appeal or Exception Channel","domain_realization":"Maintainers may challenge attribution using reproducible build evidence, and infrastructure failures or ambiguous causation produce no forfeiture."},{"archetype_element":"Failure and Gaming Monitor","domain_realization":"The registry monitors fast-lane selection, withdrawals, attribution reversals, canary concentration, and whether small or low-credit namespaces disproportionately avoid the lane."}],"mechanism_mapping":[{"mechanism_slug":"self_selection_menu","role":"The fast bonded lane and ordinary staged lane let maintainers route releases according to privately known compatibility confidence without requiring the registry to infer that confidence directly.","counterfactual_removal":"Without differentiated lanes, the registry must either trust the same label for every release or impose the same delay and verification burden on all releases."},{"mechanism_slug":"deposit_bond_or_stake","role":"Future fast-propagation credits placed at risk make an unsupported compatibility claim carry an expected private cost while avoiding monetary penalties.","counterfactual_removal":"Without the bond, requesting fast propagation remains attractive even when a maintainer privately expects downstream breakage."},{"mechanism_slug":"blind_or_randomized_review_rule","role":"A concealed random downstream canary sample makes tailoring a release only to known verification targets harder.","counterfactual_removal":"With a fixed public canary set, maintainers could optimize for those projects while leaving broader incompatibilities undisclosed."}],"causal_chain":["The registry offers a no-stake staged lane and a credit-bonded fast lane.","A maintainer evaluates private compatibility confidence against the speed benefit and possible temporary loss of future fast access.","A confident maintainer can rationally stake credits, while an uncertain maintainer can preserve credits by choosing staged propagation or candidly classifying the release.","Random concealed downstream canaries test the staked claim against behavior outside publisher-selected tests.","Prompt withdrawal or reclassification preserves the bond, making early candor less costly than allowing a suspected break to propagate.","Only an attributable undisclosed incompatibility upheld after review delays return of credits.","Repeated lane choices therefore connect propagation speed to demonstrated compatibility or candid risk routing rather than to an unverified label alone."],"baseline":"The registry accepts maintainer-supplied compatibility metadata and publisher-selected tests, then allows eligible downstream resolvers to adopt the release without placing any maintainer-controlled propagation privilege at risk. Breaks are handled afterward through pinning, patching, yanking, or manual coordination.","nearest_rivals":["Static semantic-version or API-difference linting, which checks detectable interface changes but does not change the payoff for private risk disclosure","Mandatory publisher test suites, whose coverage and cases remain selected by the claimant","Uniform delayed rollout, which reduces exposure but imposes the same delay regardless of a maintainer's private confidence","Automatic rollback or release yanking after failures, which limits persistence but acts after downstream disruption","Manual compatibility review, which can inspect releases but does not make candid self-selection the maintainer's best response"],"remaining_contrastive_claim":"Unlike source-only compatibility checks, publisher-selected tests, or uniform rollout delays, this rule couples fast propagation to a maintainer-staked compatibility claim tested against concealed downstream behavior, while preserving a no-stake route for uncertain or intentionally breaking releases.","authority_safety":{"decision_authority":"The registry operator may define an opt-in pilot for namespaces it administers; package owners authorize their releases, downstream owners authorize canary execution, and a separate reviewer decides disputed attribution.","authorized_first_step":"Run an offline retrospective replay using existing metadata for at most 30 historical releases across five consenting internal packages; simulate lane choices and credit outcomes without changing dependency resolution, package visibility, or maintainer standing.","excluded_actions":["Charging or withholding money","Publicly ranking or shaming maintainers","Automatically yanking, blocking, or relabeling releases","Executing private downstream code outside its existing authorized CI environment","Enrolling packages or downstream projects without owner consent","Applying a credit consequence without reproducible evidence and appeal"],"halt_rollback":"Halt the replay if failures cannot be attributed without inspecting unauthorized code, if canary data expose secrets, or if simulated consequences depend mainly on infrastructure noise. Delete derived pilot mappings under the participating owners' retention rules. Any later live pilot must support immediate restoration of all credits and reversion to the prior propagation rule."},"negative_tests":{"strongest_counterevidence":"Matched candidate-versus-predecessor builds may show that apparent dependency breaks are usually caused by nondeterministic consumer builds, resolver drift, or infrastructure faults, making package-level attribution too noisy for a bond.","problem_falsifier":"The proposed problem is falsified in the scoped sample if compatibility labels do not affect propagation privileges or maintainer outcomes, or if maintainers cannot anticipate compatibility risk better than the registry's observable checks.","intervention_falsifier":"The intervention is falsified if offline payoff analysis shows that always requesting the fast lane remains the rational strategy under plausible credit values, or that cautious maintainers with compatible releases systematically prefer the staged lane because attribution risk dominates the speed benefit.","risks":["False attribution could penalize a maintainer for consumer or infrastructure defects.","Large namespaces may absorb temporary credit loss more easily than small maintainers.","Maintainers may split or reorder releases to manipulate observation windows.","Consumer projects could intentionally produce failures to delay a package.","Concealed canaries may be unrepresentative even when randomly selected.","The stake may chill useful releases or encourage excessive conservatism.","Participants may optimize for observed attribution rules, creating equilibrium drift.","Canary execution or retained logs could expose proprietary code or secrets if consent boundaries fail."]},"next_evidence_step":"For the bounded 30-release retrospective replay, compare each candidate release with its predecessor on already-authorized downstream CI records, blind the reviewer to the maintainer's original label during causal attribution, and calculate whether three modeled maintainer strategies—always fast, always staged, and confidence-based selection—would receive different simulated propagation access. Record ambiguous cases as unverified with no simulated forfeiture.","prior_art_status":"UNSEARCHED","diversity_from_prior_proposals":"No comparison with prior proposals was performed under runtime isolation; this candidate is distinguished only by its selected problem locus: package-registry propagation privileges, private compatibility risk, and downstream canary verification.","revision_record":{"parent_version":null,"progress_targets_addressed":["Initial one-shot breadth proposal"],"conceptual_changes":[],"operational_changes":[],"evidence_changes":[],"claim_changes":[]}}