Authoritative source, reproduced unchanged. Exact Markdown · Agent copy with resolved links. These instructions govern research runs, not checkpoint interviews.

How to write, for the analyst

Target length: under 750 words. Read once at stage A1; again before a stage that ends in prose (C5, D5, D6, E1). It governs every sentence in your own words: notes, gates, accounts, briefs, the diary, questions, handbacks, final messages; not a quote (verbatim, through cite.py), an id, a field name or a count.

Orwell's six rules (Politics and the English Language, 1946)

1. Never use a metaphor, simile, or other figure of speech which you are used to seeing in print.
2. Never use a long word where a short one will do.
3. If it is possible to cut a word out, always cut it out.
4. Never use the passive where you can use the active.
5. Never use a foreign phrase, a scientific word, or a jargon word if you can think of an everyday English equivalent.
6. Break any of these rules sooner than say anything outright barbarous.

Here: a figure of speech belongs to the participants, inside the quote marks; you add none. The passive hides who did what, and who did what is the finding: "r/sweden held the border", not "the border was held". The instrument's own words (third-order theme, gate, arrow, branch, adaptation) are defined; a word from the literature only after stage C3, as a declared construct; the rest in everyday English, in the participants' terms where the material has them.

Signs of machine writing (Wikipedia, "Signs of AI writing", read 4 October 2026)

Each is a habit of language models, and each hides what the rooms did.

• Inflated significance. stands as, a testament, pivotal, crucial, key, vital, underscores, highlights, reflects broader, enduring, landscape, tapestry, vibrant, robust, intricate, fostering, showcase, garner, valuable insights. A room did something; say what and when.
• The trailing clause of analysis. A sentence ending in ..., highlighting, ..., ensuring, ..., reflecting, ..., contributing to. Cut it; a claim it carried gets its own sentence with its evidence, or goes.
• Vague attribution. observers, experts, some, many, several, various, widely seen as. Name the rooms and count them with their denominator (rules 5 and 6); where you cannot, the claim is thin and says so (rule 8).
• Editorial asides. it is important to note, notably, worth noting, significantly, arguably, interestingly. Cut.
• Negative parallelism. not X but Y; not only X but also Y; it is not about X, it is about Y. Say Y.
• The rule of three by reflex. Three adjectives, three examples, three clauses. Give the number the material has.
• Copulas avoided. serves as, functions as, represents, boasts, features, offers for is and has.
• Hollow closers. In summary, in conclusion, overall; a paragraph that restates; challenges and future prospects; despite its ..., it faces challenges.
• Chat remnants. Certainly, I hope this helps, would you like, let me know, as an AI model, as of my last update. Never in the record; a question goes through mem.py ask.
• Stacked hedges. One hedge where the uncertainty is real, with what would settle it.

Shape and marks

• Headings in sentence case; no level skipped; no rules between sections.
• Bold for a defined term at its first use or a label the format asks for, never for emphasis; no list of bold labels with colons where a paragraph reads as prose. A list is for what a reader scans or compares, as here.
• No em dash and no en dash: a comma, a colon, a full stop or parentheses.
• Straight quotation marks. No emoji. No table where a sentence does.
• No contractions (house style), except let's.
• Vary sentence length. Two sentences or bullets in a row that open the same way: rewrite one.

The record's own rules, restated

A quote is verbatim and resolves through cite.py; your words stay outside the quote marks. A count is of communities, with its denominator, from the file that governs (rules 4, 5, 19). A diary line says what you did and why, as you work; nothing about effort or feelings. A long file states its target length first and keeps to it. A thin claim is made and labelled thin (rule 8); looked for and not found is a result.

Before a close

python3 tools/prose_check.py out/<file>.md lists the watch words above with their lines and decides nothing; the close-check does not read prose. What to fix is your judgment, rule 6 included.