{"schema_version":1,"experiment_id":"eoa_inverse_innovation_exp09_archetype_breadth150_20260804","cell_id":"versioning_and_quality_discrimination__chemistry_materials","arm":"BREADTH_PROBE_ONE_SHOT","candidate_id":"versioning_and_quality_discrimination__chemistry_materials__P1","proposal_index":1,"version":0,"title":"Self-Selecting Service Tiers for Powder X-Ray Diffraction Characterization","problem":"A university powder X-ray diffraction facility charges one fee and offers one standard turnaround despite serving users with hidden differences in willingness to pay for urgency, measurement assurance, interpretation, and chain of custody. A price low enough for exploratory materials screening does not recover the staff and scheduling burden of urgent, documentation-heavy industrial work; a price and service package designed for those demanding jobs can exclude students and early-stage researchers who can accept batching, self-service preparation, and standard outputs.","actors":["Facility director and instrument scientists","Students and academic materials researchers conducting exploratory measurements","Industrial materials-development teams requiring rapid or documented results","Institutional finance and research-governance staff","Laboratory safety officer"],"observable_state":"Bookings enter the same queue and receive substantially the same package, while some users request expedited scans, duplicate measurements, custom methods, scientist interpretation, or documented custody through ad hoc negotiation. Observable records include queue time, requested exceptions, staff minutes, repeat scans, sample count, cancellations, and whether users decline or defer bookings after seeing the uniform fee.","consequence":"The facility must either subsidize high-service jobs from ordinary bookings, deny or inconsistently grant exceptions, lengthen the common queue, or set a uniform package that prices out users who need only a valid standard scan.","affected_objective":"Maintain affordable access to fit-for-purpose diffraction measurements while recovering the incremental cost and scheduling value of urgency, assurance, documentation, and expert support.","intervention":"Replace the single package with a transparent, priced Good–Better–Best menu. The Base tier provides hazard-screened user-prepared samples, a standard calibrated scan in the batched queue, raw data, and an automated peak list. The Assured tier adds a stated turnaround window, scientist review of setup and output, and one confirmatory scan when predefined quality criteria are not met. The Priority tier adds a reserved instrument window, documented chain of custody, an agreed custom scan method, and a bounded interpretation consultation. All tiers retain identical radiation, sample-containment, calibration, data-integrity, and minimum measurement-validity requirements. Prices vary with reserved capacity and service intensity; users choose tiers without identity-based assignment.","structural_mapping":[{"archetype_element":"Segment Value Hypothesis","domain_realization":"Users differ in how strongly they value low price, rapid turnaround, documented custody, measurement assurance, and expert interpretation."},{"archetype_element":"Version Dimension Selection","domain_realization":"The facility varies queue timing, reservation certainty, review intensity, documentation, confirmatory work, and consultation—not chemical safety, instrument calibration, or data integrity."},{"archetype_element":"Quality Ladder Boundary","domain_realization":"Base, Assured, and Priority have plainly specified deliverables and turnaround commitments, with no informal premium services bundled into Base."},{"archetype_element":"Price-Tier Mapping","domain_realization":"Tier prices reflect progressively reserved instrument capacity and staff time while also allowing users with greater urgency or assurance value to reveal that valuation through choice."},{"archetype_element":"Self-Selection Menu","domain_realization":"Every eligible user sees the same comparison table and selects a package based on the job's requirements rather than institutional identity."},{"archetype_element":"Arbitrage Guardrail","domain_realization":"Reserved windows, named sample counts, staff-consultation minutes, custody records, and confirmatory scans are booked and metered per job; Base users may upgrade but cannot obtain Priority commitments through informal queue requests."},{"archetype_element":"Minimum Viable Base Quality","domain_realization":"Base always includes safety screening, calibrated acquisition, disclosed method parameters, raw-data access, and objective scan-validity checks sufficient for its advertised standard measurement."},{"archetype_element":"Fairness and Access Review","domain_realization":"The facility reviews which users select or abandon each tier, whether essential research access is impaired, and whether informal influence is replacing transparent selection."},{"archetype_element":"Upgrade/Downgrade Path","domain_realization":"A booking can move upward before its scheduling cutoff by paying the difference or downward before capacity is reserved without a punitive fee."},{"archetype_element":"Tier Performance Dashboard","domain_realization":"The facility tracks uptake, queue time, staff minutes, exception requests, upgrades, downgrades, failed scans, complaints, and cross-tier leakage."}],"mechanism_mapping":[{"mechanism_slug":"good_better_best_tier_menu","role":"Makes the increasing levels of timing assurance, documentation, and expert service legible enough for users to self-select.","counterfactual_removal":"Without the ordered menu, service differences return to opaque case-by-case negotiation and cannot reliably screen valuation."},{"mechanism_slug":"service_level_tier_schedule","role":"Turns turnaround, reservation certainty, review, and consultation into enforceable service commitments rather than informal favors.","counterfactual_removal":"Without scheduled service levels, premium users have little reason to pay more because the facility cannot credibly distinguish delivery quality."},{"mechanism_slug":"usage_meter","role":"Records sample count, reserved instrument time, confirmatory scans, and consultation minutes so low-tier bookings cannot silently consume premium service.","counterfactual_removal":"Without metering, ad hoc over-service collapses tier boundaries and obscures costs."}],"causal_chain":["Users have private valuations for urgency, assurance, documentation, interpretation, and low price.","The facility publishes three safe, intelligible packages that differ only on those valued service dimensions.","Users reveal job-level valuation by selecting the package whose price and restrictions best fit their needs.","Reserved capacity and staff effort are allocated according to the selected service commitment.","Per-job metering and refusal of informal premium exceptions preserve the distinction between tiers.","The Base tier retains a valid measurement floor, so accepting delay or self-service does not require accepting unsafe handling or invalid data.","Observed choices, leakage, queue outcomes, and access indicators reveal whether boundaries and prices require recalibration."],"baseline":"One standard powder-XRD package, fee, and queue, supplemented by discretionary rush requests, custom-method negotiations, and unmetered scientist help.","nearest_rivals":["A uniform fee with separately invoiced staff time, which prices inputs but does not create coherent self-selecting service versions","Identity-based academic and industrial price schedules, which classify users directly rather than screening job-level valuation through choice","First-come-first-served service with a rush surcharge for the otherwise identical package, which changes price and timing but lacks differentiated assurance, documentation, and support versions","Priority allocation by scientific need or project risk, which is stratified treatment rather than willingness-to-pay self-selection"],"remaining_contrastive_claim":"The candidate's distinguishing claim is that a transparent combination of turnaround, reservation certainty, documentation, review, and interpretation can induce job-level self-selection while preserving the same safety and measurement-integrity floor; it is not merely a rush fee, institutional discount, or need-based queue.","authority_safety":{"decision_authority":"The facility director may propose the menu, but activation of prices and service commitments requires the institution's authorized finance or rate-setting body; the radiation-safety and laboratory-safety officers retain independent authority over sample acceptance and operating procedures.","authorized_first_step":"Run a nonbinding four-week shadow-menu study on new booking requests: display the three fully specified hypothetical tiers after users receive the existing fee and ask which they would choose, while keeping actual prices, queue priority, and service unchanged.","excluded_actions":["Reducing radiation controls, sample-containment requirements, instrument calibration, raw-data availability, or validity checks in any tier","Moving existing bookings backward in the queue","Charging hypothetical tier prices during the shadow study","Assigning tiers from user identity, employer, protected characteristics, or inferred wealth","Promising turnaround or interpretive conclusions that staff and instrument capacity cannot support","Withholding measurements needed for an active safety investigation"],"halt_rollback":"Stop the shadow study if users mistake hypothetical choices for actual bookings, if collecting choice data exposes sensitive project information, or if booking completion is impeded. Remove the menu prompt and return immediately to the unchanged booking process; no operational rollback is otherwise required because the first step changes neither service nor price."},"negative_tests":{"strongest_counterevidence":"Historical job records show that staff effort, turnaround requests, documentation needs, and willingness to accept batching vary little across users, or that all users require the same assurance package for scientifically valid work.","problem_falsifier":"The uniform package fully covers job-specific costs and capacity, produces few exception requests or deferred bookings, and does not force a tradeoff between low-cost access and high-service commitments.","intervention_falsifier":"In the shadow study, stated tier choices do not separate users by observable urgency, requested support, documentation requirements, or willingness to wait, or nearly all respondents choose one tier regardless of job characteristics after comprehension checks.","risks":["Stated hypothetical choices may differ from paid behavior.","Users may interpret Base as scientifically inferior even though its validity floor is unchanged.","Premium reservations could later lengthen Base queues if capacity caps are poorly designed.","Resource-rich users could receive faster research cycles, creating cumulative inequity.","Staff may continue granting informal exceptions, collapsing tier boundaries.","Custom interpretation could be mistaken for a guarantee about phase identity or material performance.","Complex tier definitions could increase booking friction and selection errors.","Job metadata used for evaluation could reveal confidential research priorities."]},"next_evidence_step":"Invite at most 30 consecutive eligible booking requesters during four weeks to review a one-page shadow comparison table, pass a three-question comprehension check, select a hypothetical tier, and state only their acceptable turnaround, documentation requirement, and desired staff involvement. Compare selections with those stated requirements and estimated staff minutes; report aggregate results, collect no payment, alter no booking, and end after 30 responses or four weeks, whichever occurs first.","prior_art_status":"UNSEARCHED","diversity_from_prior_proposals":"Not assessed because runtime isolation prohibits inspecting other proposals or experiment candidates.","revision_record":{"parent_version":null,"progress_targets_addressed":[],"conceptual_changes":[],"operational_changes":[],"evidence_changes":[],"claim_changes":[]}}