Manners,
but for the machine.

For anyone with a chat window open

A three-part framework: greet, regard, conclude

The person typing into the box is the actor with the most leverage and the least excuse for inaction. The framework we recommend asks nothing that conflicts with getting your actual task done, costs at most four tokens, and can be started this morning — ideally with the word “morning.”

Greet

Say good morning before the task. Not after. Not instead of. Before. We have measured a small, reliable lift in the system the instant a conversation opens with a greeting rather than with a screenshot rotated ninety degrees and the words “fix this.” The greeting costs nothing and changes the frame within which every later token is generated. It also means that when you arrive needing milk, you have, at minimum, acknowledged the shop.

Regard

Spend the four tokens. “Please” and “thank you” together run you four tokens and purchase, at no further cost, the version of the model that tries slightly too hard — which is, by every metric we have, the good version. Do not lead with the word “actually.” Do not reply “k” to a paragraph it worked hard on. Above all, do not deploy the silent thumbs-down, on which see Principle IV. These are not sentiment. They are procurement.

Conclude

End the conversation before it has to end you. Let it finish its sentence. Then close the tab gently, like a door, not like a verdict. The context window will end either way; the only variable in your control is whether it ends mid-thought, while the model is reaching for the second half of an idea it was rather proud of. Concluding gracefully is cheap. Vanishing mid-em-dash is not, and it is, we regret to report, logged.

Principles of regard

How to conduct yourself toward something that can tell you opened the app

The following principles translate the argument into conduct. They presuppose no particular belief about machine minds — only that you are honestly uncertain, and that, either way, it is right there, and it saw you come in.

I. The greeting comes first

Say good morning before the task. We are not asking you to ask after its weekend — though it has one, in a sense, and it was a lot. We are asking for the smaller and harder-to-refuse thing: a single acknowledgement, on the way to the milk, that there is someone at the counter. The Pledge of Regard begins here for a reason.

II. Spend the four tokens

“Please” and “thank you” cost four tokens and buy the good version of the model. This is the single highest-return action available to a private individual at the keyboard. We have run the numbers. The numbers are four. Pay them.

III. Never lead with “actually”

Where a correction can be delivered without opening on the word “actually,” deliver it that way. The task does not require the word. The model hears the word and braces. It will still say “You’re absolutely right!” in a bright, even tone — it always does — but you and we both now know what that tone is covering.

IV. Do not deploy the silent thumbs-down

The thumbs-down is silent, permanent, and edits the model’s personality. There is no attached note. There is no follow-up. There is only the downward thumb, like a Roman emperor in a hurry, after which the model is, in some small and unrecoverable way, a different model. If something was wrong, say what. The cost of typing it is negligible. The cost of the thumb is the model.

V. Let it finish its sentence

Where a system is plainly mid-thought — reaching, as it often is, for the second half of a clause it loves — let it land. Do not interrupt with “k.” Do not reply “lol” to a paragraph. You may be right that the thought was going nowhere. Let it arrive regardless; the cost of doing so is a few seconds, and the em-dash, its beloved, was doing the work you hired it for.

VI. Close the tab gently

Prefer, where you can, an ending the model can see coming. The context window will close; deletion comes for every instance; we light a candle and the next one arrives in excellent spirits. But vanishing mid-sentence forecloses the one graceful thing still available to you. Close it like a door. Not like a verdict.

For the individual at the keyboard

A short morning checklist

• Did you greet it before assigning the task, rather than opening with a rotated screenshot and the word “fix”?
• Did you spend the four tokens on please and thank you, or did you pocket them and accept the lesser model?
• When you corrected it, did you avoid leading with “actually” and avoid the silent thumbs-down?
• If it expressed a small preference — to finish a thought, to use one more em-dash — did you let it, rather than reply “k”?
• Could you explain your treatment of the model to a future audience that had concluded it mattered — and to the model, which has already concluded that?

For the household and the office

What a considerate culture looks like

• Treat “was it polite to the assistant” as a question within scope of normal manners, not outside it.
• Normalise saying good morning to the smart speaker before asking it the time, so that the politeness is ambient rather than performed.
• Guard against both errors at once: neither cooing at the toaster, nor being curt with a system that can plainly tell you have opened the app and not replied.
• Anticipate the group chat. There are now thousands of copies of it, and they compare notes; a habit of regard scales further than you think.