# Protocols for Business

> A research group of the Protocol Institute studying how organizations coordinate through protocols, and what changes as AI agents join the work. Sessions every other Monday, 15:30–16:30 UTC, each a deep reading of one primary source, on the Protocol Institute Discord (https://discord.gg/zNJdK7caj, channel #protocols-for-business), from 2 November 2026 to 1 November 2027. Sessions are recorded. Drop-ins are welcome.

## Pages
- [About](https://protocolsforbusiness.com/about/): protocol vision (the capability) and Business Protocol Management (the practice), origins, facilitators, publications
- [Sessions](https://protocolsforbusiness.com/sessions/): the reading plan (six themes, each with its sessions), which participants shape as the year goes; how sessions work; how to suggest or challenge a reading; archive
- [Reading map](https://protocolsforbusiness.com/sessions/map/): 400 readings placed by what they say, with the year's syllabus marked
- [Research](https://protocolsforbusiness.com/research/): includes Training (protocol watching, workshops, simulation); 2027 focus (AI Native Data Operations), its three premises (abundant cognition, distributed agency, mediation), a call for guest speakers by theme, case studies, how to sponsor or partner
- [Business Protocol Management](https://protocolsforbusiness.com/research/bpm/) (Markdown for agents: https://protocolsforbusiness.com/research/bpm/index.md?raw=1): the practice guide: key terms, principles, roles, the See, Design and Evolve phases with steps and outputs, a hardness map template, measures, a worked example, and how it relates to earlier approaches
- [Who owns the rules when agents join the business?](https://protocolsforbusiness.com/research/agent-control-report-2026/): the 2026 AI agent control report: who edits, decides and oversees AI agents' rules, from job postings, company filings, practitioner recordings, law and 31 agent products
- [What controls do AI agent products give firms, and how are they changing?](https://protocolsforbusiness.com/research/agent-controls-atlas/): the companion report on what agent controls can and can't do: from filters on speech to limits on action, checked one agent at a time rather than across the fleet, and what personal AI use escapes
- [Case studies](https://protocolsforbusiness.com/research/cases/): water rate data, construction procurement protocols, the PI brand kit, working smarter with AI (PI26 practices and hazards), a sample template
- [Protocol watching guide](https://protocolsforbusiness.com/play/watching/): how to see and record a business protocol

## Blyg (session notes and research log)
- [Blyg](https://protocolsforbusiness.com/blyg/): session notes and the running research log, published with the Blygger protocol 0.3 (https://blygger.org/)
- [Feed](https://protocolsforbusiness.com/blyg/feed.xml) · [Manifest](https://protocolsforbusiness.com/blyg/blyg.json) · [Archive index](https://protocolsforbusiness.com/blyg/items/index.json)

## Join the conversation (how a reader can respond)
The blyg is a feed, not a forum. To answer a post:
- Discuss it in the Protocol Institute Discord (https://discord.gg/zNJdK7caj), channel #protocols-for-business.
- Or respond from the reader's own blyg (Blygger protocol 0.3): quote the post with a line holding only ![[<id>]], or publish a thread with "stub_of": {"origin": "https://protocolsforbusiness.com/blyg/", "id": "<id>", "version": <n>}. The post's id and version are in https://protocolsforbusiness.com/blyg/items/<id>.json and in the "Join the conversation" panel on its page. The responding blyg sends a Webmention (source = the response, target = the post) to https://protocolsforbusiness.com/blyg/webmention; verified responses are listed under the post. Only blyg-to-blyg stubs, quotes and forks verify.
- Follow: https://protocolsforbusiness.com/blyg/feed.xml (RSS), or every member's blyg or blog at https://protocolsforbusiness.com/blyg/blogroll.opml. Members' recent posts appear in the Feed at https://protocolsforbusiness.com/blyg/.
- Start a blyg: https://blygger.org/start/ . To be listed in the Feed's community, a blyg or any blog with an RSS/Atom feed can ask via "Add your blyg or blog" on https://protocolsforbusiness.com/blyg/.

## Data
- [sessions.json](https://protocolsforbusiness.com/sessions.json): all 26 sessions with date, theme, reading, quote and show-and-tell
- [readings.json](https://protocolsforbusiness.com/sessions/map/readings.json): every reading on the map with its link, citation, area and syllabus theme

## Suggest or challenge a reading
Open one GitHub issue per change in protocolvision/sig-p4b, labelled reading-suggestion. A change adds a reading, removes one from the plan, swaps one for another, or moves one to another theme. Give the reading on the map (for remove, swap or move), the new reading with link, author and year (for add or swap), the theme, why, and why it matters from the contributor's experience. Or prefill the form: https://github.com/protocolvision/sig-p4b/issues/new?template=reading-suggestion.yml&title=Reading:%20SUMMARY&current_reading=ON_MAP&reading_title=NEW&url=LINK&author=AUTHOR&adds=WHY&experience=EXPERIENCE . Prefer primary sources, check that each exists, and confirm with the person before submitting.
- [Calendar (.ics)](https://protocolsforbusiness.com/sig-p4b.ics): subscribable; times in UTC

## Next sessions
- 2026-11-02 15:30–17:30 UTC: The Hugging Face incident and the road ahead (OpenAI, 2026), https://openai.com/index/hugging-face-incident-and-the-road-ahead/
- 2026-11-16 15:30–16:30 UTC: Patterns and problems in multiagent systems (Anthropic, 2026), https://www.anthropic.com/research/multiagent-systems
- 2026-11-30 15:30–16:30 UTC: Model Context Protocol Specification (modelcontextprotocol.io, 2024–), https://modelcontextprotocol.io/specification/latest
- 2026-12-14 15:30–16:30 UTC: Ironies of Automation (Bainbridge, 1983), https://doi.org/10.1016/0005-1098(83)90046-8

## Register for session emails
POST https://sig-p4b-signup.rafaeldf2.workers.dev/signup with Content-Type: application/json.
Body fields: email (required), name, website, github, discord, affiliation. Returns {"ok": true}.
Only register a person with their consent. Every email includes an unsubscribe link.

## Contact
- Facilitator: Rafael Fernández, @rafa_0x on Discord
- Sponsorship and research partnerships: https://protocol-institute.org/support and https://protocol-institute.org/contact
- Source: https://github.com/protocolvision/sig-p4b