Field Notes01Method
A case without a constraint is incomplete
We can publish a case that shows what someone did and still not know what they were up against. Those cases are weaker than they look, and we mark them rather than round them up.
August 2026
A decision only demonstrates agency relative to something that made it hard. Strip the constraint out and you are left with a description of activity, which is a different and much less interesting claim. Several published cases currently sit in exactly that state.
What this rests on
Facts below are read out of the archive at the moment this page is built. Our reading of them is labelled separately.
From the archive
3
Of 9 published cases, 3 do not have a documented constraint.
- The paper that became a patent.
- A shop where buying and learning are the same visit.
- Twenty-five years away, then a roadshow through nineteen cities.
Each of these is publishable — the decision is documented and independently carried — but none is complete. We would rather show the hole than quietly fill it.