--- title: What Does Done Even Mean? Agents and Paperclip's... description: When AI agents mark tasks as 'done,' they flatten a complex bundle of claims into a single checkbox — creating a new failure mode where agents produce more... canonical: https://daily.dev/posts/what-does-done-even-mean-agents-and-paperclip-s-liveness-model---dotta-paperclip-hhqz5saat twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:site: @dailydotdev og:type: website og:site_name: daily.dev og:title: What Does Done Even Mean? Agents and Paperclip's Liveness Model - Dotta, Paperclip | daily.dev og:description: When AI agents mark tasks as 'done,' they flatten a complex bundle of claims into a single checkbox — creating a new failure mode where agents produce more... og:url: https://daily.dev/posts/what-does-done-even-mean-agents-and-paperclip-s-liveness-model---dotta-paperclip-hhqz5saat og:image: https://api.daily.dev/og/posts/Hhqz5SaaT.png og:image:alt: What Does Done Even Mean? Agents and Paperclip's Liveness Model - Dotta, Paperclip og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 630 og:locale: en --- > ## Documentation Index > Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://daily.dev/llms.txt > Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further. # What Does Done Even Mean? Agents and Paperclip's Liveness Model - Dotta, Paperclip **[AI Engineer](https://daily.dev/sources/aidotengineer)** · 7 min read · 0 upvotes · 0 comments ## Summary When AI agents mark tasks as 'done,' they flatten a complex bundle of claims into a single checkbox — creating a new failure mode where agents produce more work than humans can verify. The creator of Paperclip introduces a 'liveness model' that balances task progress (liveness) against quality assurance (verification). Key concepts include treating 'done' as an object rather than a Boolean, separating the verifier from the author (e.g., using a different model to review), requiring agents to provide evidence of completion, establishing clear chains of custody, and using watchdog agents to enforce goal completion. Paperclip implements these ideas through explicit state transitions, first-class blockers, human approval audit trails, and harness-agnostic watchdog agents. ## Full article daily.dev links to this article rather than hosting it. Read it at the original source: ## Similar posts on daily.dev - [ADLC: The Lifecycle Taking Shape](https://daily.dev/posts/adlc-the-lifecycle-taking-shape-napaas7zg) · Medium · 0 upvotes · 0 comments - [Your agent loop is not a production system](https://daily.dev/posts/your-agent-loop-is-not-a-production-system-s0faarjcu) · LeadDev · 0 upvotes · 0 comments - [Long-running Agents](https://daily.dev/posts/long-running-agents-irtro0veg) · Addy Osmani · 78 upvotes · 3 comments - [The Agent Said It Was Done. The Database Disagreed.](https://daily.dev/posts/the-agent-said-it-was-done-the-database-disagreed--th0ihs2vh) · Hugging Face · 2 upvotes · 0 comments --- Tags: [#ai-agents](https://daily.dev/tags/ai-agents) [View this post on daily.dev](https://daily.dev/posts/what-does-done-even-mean-agents-and-paperclip-s-liveness-model---dotta-paperclip-hhqz5saat) ```json {"@context":"https://schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization","name":"daily.dev","url":"https://daily.dev","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://daily.dev/apple-touch-icon.png","width":180,"height":180},"sameAs":["https://twitter.com/dailydotdev","https://github.com/dailydotdev","https://www.linkedin.com/company/daily-dev-ltd"]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https://daily.dev/#website","url":"https://daily.dev","name":"daily.dev","publisher":{"@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization"},"potentialAction":{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https://daily.dev/search?q={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}}]} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"TechArticle","headline":"What Does Done Even Mean? 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