{
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  "passage": {
    "id": "steve-yegge-fourteen-mechanical-fences-agents-first-class-2026",
    "text": "There is structure: doctrine and policy, human gates, and just fourteen mechanical “fences” (programmatic denials). But my agents are first-class colleagues. They work under my own identity, signing their own names to the work, and they can see the whole system and act independently. It is YOLO mode scaled up to the size of a small company.",
    "context": null,
    "speaker": "Steve Yegge",
    "speakerId": "steve-yegge",
    "speakerUrl": "https://the-ai-record.com/people/steve-yegge",
    "speakerLevel": "executive",
    "role": "Independent; builds and runs Wheelhouse, a solo multi-agent software factory (2026)",
    "voice": "person",
    "organization": "Steve Yegge (independent)",
    "organizationId": "steve-yegge",
    "organizationUrl": "https://the-ai-record.com/organizations/steve-yegge",
    "aiVendor": true,
    "work": {
      "title": "The Counting House",
      "type": "post",
      "date": "2026-10-27",
      "publisher": "Medium (Steve Yegge)",
      "locator": "Wheelhouse Recap",
      "url": "https://steve-yegge.medium.com/the-counting-house-steve-yegge-83f5145cc35b"
    },
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      "reviewedOn": "2026-11-07"
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    "topics": [
      "autonomy-and-oversight",
      "agent-permissions"
    ],
    "functions": [
      "engineering"
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    "figures": [
      {
        "metric": "mechanical-fences",
        "value": 14,
        "unit": "fences",
        "period": "2026",
        "definition": "Programmatic denials in the author's Wheelhouse system, besides doctrine, policy and human gates",
        "level": "n/a"
      }
    ],
    "url": "https://the-ai-record.com/passages/steve-yegge-fourteen-mechanical-fences-agents-first-class-2026",
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  },
  "notice": [
    "Every passage is reproduced word for word from the cited source.",
    "Check the verification status: \"reported\" means not yet confirmed by an independent second reader.",
    "Organizations flagged aiVendor sell AI tools or services and have a reason to publish flattering numbers.",
    "An empty result means the archive holds nothing on it, not that nobody has said anything."
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}