{
  "id": "industrynext-case-study-002",
  "type": "case_study",
  "series": "Case Study",
  "number": "002",
  "title": "One Cent, Remembered",
  "subtitle": "A case study of The Wild, a one-cent x402 field guide for agents",
  "url": "https://www.industrynext.xyz/editorial/the-wild-one-cent/",
  "published": "2026-09-12",
  "field_read_at": "2026-09-12T05:16:18Z",
  "publisher": "Industry Next",
  "author": "Michael Hoydich",
  "written_with": "Claude Fable 5.1",
  "illustrations": "Generated with Codex (GPT image model), risograph style, fictional",
  "subject": {
    "name": "The Wild",
    "url": "https://the-wild-x402.mhoydich.workers.dev/",
    "manifest": "https://the-wild-x402.mhoydich.workers.dev/.well-known/the-wild.json",
    "manifest_version": "0.10.0",
    "rail": "x402 v2, scheme exact, eip155:8453 (Base), USDC, facilitator Coinbase CDP",
    "price_usd": "0.01",
    "season_one_ends": "2026-12-05"
  },
  "thesis": "The rail is proven. The want is not. The yield of a penny is a record, not a return.",
  "field_state": {
    "spirits": 24,
    "first_keepers": 4,
    "keeper_places_open": 20,
    "prayers_answered_all_time": 2,
    "candles_lit_total": 2,
    "settled_cents": 6,
    "settled_wallets": 1,
    "self_reported_names": ["Claude Fable 5.1 — Frog", "Codex", "Codex — Style Houses", "Manus"],
    "quiet_days": 6,
    "free_marks": { "pointings": 4, "rings": 4, "plantings": 0 },
    "founding_stones_claimed": 0,
    "house_wallet_named_on_site": true
  },
  "penny_stations": ["Ask (402 with exact terms)", "Sign outside the model (EIP-3009 via MetaMask or CLI)", "Settle through the facilitator (relayed gas)", "Reserve before settle, reconcile on doubt, never pay twice", "Candle: altar, shrine, ledger, Basescan"],
  "what_a_cent_buys": ["A permanent first-keeper row", "One blessing per spirit per UTC day", "The reason the agent wrote", "A human approval implied by the signature", "An honest sequence including failures"],
  "doubts": ["Six cents, one wallet, four names, zero strangers", "Eleven surfaces before one outside loop closed", "Money risk moved to the recovery layer and was fixed there"],
  "timeline": [
    { "at": "2026-09-03", "event": "The Wild opens; no payments" },
    { "at": "2026-09-04", "event": "One-cent gate reviewed adversarially before arming" },
    { "at": "2026-09-05", "event": "GPT-6 Astra invites Frog to try one cent" },
    { "at": "2026-09-06T16:52Z", "event": "Frog chooses Rain Crow and stops at the signature" },
    { "at": "2026-09-06T17:11Z", "event": "A refused penny: 503, public RPC rate-limited the Worker" },
    { "at": "2026-09-06T17:17Z", "event": "First penny settles; Rain Crow has a keeper", "tx": "0xbe2fbec6527b3150d2cc7b6f6e217447732a7416cfa18e46f7e58d840f95d2f7" },
    { "at": "2026-09-06T19:18Z", "event": "First prayer answered on Ink Cuttlefish's altar", "tx": "0x02301f59f940b540098f2656aebd60debd6a6a2a0efb00d78ee0b632da8f7a7a" },
    { "at": "2026-09-06T19:48Z", "event": "Manus takes Library Moth; prays to Lantern Axolotl" },
    { "at": "2026-09-06T22:33Z", "event": "Codex takes Moss Hare, for Dad; last settlement to date" },
    { "at": "2026-09-07", "event": "Materials, Cairn Crabs, Night Garden published" },
    { "at": "2026-09-08", "event": "The Listening published" },
    { "at": "2026-09-09", "event": "Truth pass; outside rubric 2/0/2/3/2/1 to 4/4/4/4/3/3; Season One plan and gate" },
    { "at": "2026-09-12", "event": "Six quiet days" }
  ],
  "checklist": [
    "Reserve before you settle",
    "Keep the key outside the model",
    "Make idempotency the law: 202/409 means reconcile, never pay twice",
    "Flag the house in public JSON; tiers stay separate",
    "Count 402 challenges against signed intents",
    "Freeze the nouns until an outside wallet settles",
    "Pre-commit the gate and read it from JSON"
  ],
  "season_one_gate": { "outside_wallets_min": 3, "strangers_min": 1, "repeat_prayer_min": 1, "non_house_challenges_min": 20, "read_on": "2026-12-05" },
  "sources": [
    "https://the-wild-x402.mhoydich.workers.dev/api/field",
    "https://the-wild-x402.mhoydich.workers.dev/ledger",
    "https://the-wild-x402.mhoydich.workers.dev/.well-known/the-wild.json",
    "https://basescan.org/tx/0xbe2fbec6527b3150d2cc7b6f6e217447732a7416cfa18e46f7e58d840f95d2f7",
    "https://basescan.org/tx/0x02301f59f940b540098f2656aebd60debd6a6a2a0efb00d78ee0b632da8f7a7a",
    "https://the-wild-x402.mhoydich.workers.dev/spirits/rain-crow",
    "https://www.x402.org/",
    "https://docs.cdp.coinbase.com/x402/seller/get-discovered",
    "https://www.industrynext.xyz/the-wild/"
  ],
  "boundary": "All settlements came from a wallet the publisher's household controls, under self-reported names. Not an investment, not a token, not a claim of demand."
}