Protocol worksheet

A fillable version of the sociotechnical protocol, same seventeen questions, nothing added. Nothing you type here is saved or sent anywhere; the answers live in this browser tab and disappear when you close it, so copy the result when you are done and paste it into your notes, a Problem Inventory entry, or a draft.

Your name

The technology

Harm or success case

Side A, questions for any technology

A1. Who designed this, and who was in the room when the problem was defined?

A2. Whose problem does it solve, and whose problem does it claim to solve?

These are often different, and most of the trouble starts in the gap between them.

A3. Whose data and whose labor make it run?

A4. What does it assume about its users, and who breaks those assumptions?

A benefits portal that assumes a smartphone, a fixed address, and fluent English has already chosen its users.

A5. Who bears the risk when it fails, and who does the work of appealing?

In MiDAS, the state made the error and the claimant did the paperwork.

A6. What social arrangement does it create or reinforce, and how hard would that be to undo?

A7. What did it replace, and what was lost in the replacement?

Side B, conditions of success

Run Side B on everything, including the failures, because a failure's Side B shows what was missing.

B1. What made this work: the tool, the institution, or the people it amplified?

B2. Whose participation shaped the design, and at what stage?

Advising at the end is not the same as deciding at the start.

B3. Which guardrails were built in before deployment, and which were added after failure?

B4. Who verified the claims of success, and what would falsify them?

Vendor metrics are marketing until someone independent checks them.

B5. Would this replicate without its champions, its funding model, or its political moment?

B6. Who maintains this in year five?

Side M, mandated deployments

Fill this set in only when a funder or a law requires the deployment. The mandate usually sets a floor, and these four questions locate the terms that are still decided locally.

M1. Which terms of this deployment are negotiable, and who is present when they are set?

The software, the configuration, and any data collected beyond the required minimum are often decided locally.

M2. What is monitored after launch, and who sees the numbers?

M3. Who can override the system's output, and does the override stand?

M4. What would trigger rollback or exit, and is that written down where the agency can point to it?

Result

Every field above is optional, and the button assembles whatever you have completed into plain text and puts it on the clipboard. If the browser blocks clipboard access, the text appears in a box below instead, ready to select and copy by hand. Because nothing is stored, the browser asks you to confirm before you leave or reload this page with answers still in it.

The copy button needs JavaScript, so it is not shown here. The fields above still work for typing, and the answers can be selected and copied one field at a time. The seventeen questions in plain form are on the sociotechnical protocol page.