autonomous-investigation

# Autonomous Investigation Protocol ## Purpose Provide the canonical contract for **investigation skills** — research the AI performs in the world (web search, published data, public filings) while you review the evidence instead of feeding it context. Where `workshop-facilitation` governs skills that ask you questions one at a time, this protocol governs skills that *proceed without you*: they budget their questions, show their plan, label every claim, and produce output stable enough to diff against last quarter's run. That last property is the payoff — an investigation honoring this contract can run as an agent task, in a loop, or on a schedule. ## Input **Nothing required** — this skill defines the protocol other investigation skills follow. **Also useful when invoked standalone:** the target of the investigation and, above all, **the decision the research should support**. Research without a decision is a hobby; every investigation skill asks for the decision because it determines what "just enough" means. Anything supplied with the invocation itself — text after the skill name, a pasted context dump, or an appended `ARGUMENTS:` line — counts as answers already given. Use it, credit it against the question budget, and don't re-ask. **Arriving empty-handed? That works too.** The protocol's whole design is to proceed on best-available evidence with labeled assumptions when nobody answers questions. When another skill references this protocol, that skill's Input secti...