Commitment · Structural

A value a plan fixes is a governed parameter

adopted a build gate proves it

Every value a plan has to fix before a reading, a rule, an instrument or a move can be computed is a declared parameter: a governed slot that says what it is a parameter of or what it constrains, the unit it is measured in and the basis its default rests on. The value in the slot is a record, set over a window, in a geography, for a segment, on a stated basis: a standard, a benchmark, an experiment or a decision. An evidence design that can establish a parameter's value calibrates it, and the calibration loop closes where the design a reading is read by calibrates a parameter of that reading.

What goes wrong without it

A plan that runs on numbers nobody declared runs on numbers nobody can trace: a lookback window set in one platform's defaults, a frequency cap in another's, a visit timeout in a third's and a lapse rule in a spreadsheet, each changing a reading without changing its name. The standards bodies fix some of these values outright, the experimentation literature says the design parameters are set before a test and never after, and the regulation requires a retention period without naming one. Declaring the slot as vocabulary and the value as a record with its basis is what lets a business supply its own context without touching the model, and what lets an export carry the value a computation actually needs. The private platform this model learned from wrote the same rule, that a value store never defines meaning, and it rotted where the slots were named for the engine rather than the marketing and the citations were never made.

What proves it — 4

Each is a gate the build runs: a check inside a ring, a whole ring, or an eval beside them. A build stops at the first that refuses.

registry integrityspine integrity
Every row of a kind the model leans on states the relationships that kind exists to carry, so a relationship declared across the registry and asserted nowhere is a failure rather than a thin line on a map.
registry integritythe loops close
Every pattern the kernel names as a loop is a shape whose edges form one cycle over all of its roles, and the model instantiates it: at least one set of rows stands to one another all the way round. A loop is how the model says its gears connect; a loop that does not close is a picture, and one nothing stands in is a promise.
registry integrityroads are walked
Every relationship the registry declares, other than the grounding every kind makes, is walked by at least one pattern of its grain: a vocabulary road by a question or a shape, a record road by a record shape. A road no pattern walks answers no competency question, and a grammar that grows ahead of what is asked of it is the drift this refuses.
registry integrityrecord shapes hold
Every pattern declares its grain. A record shape is a shape, walks at least one record road, and is the registry's declaration of a join a record must make, a person-level record in every case but the campaign roll-up, so the registry instantiates it by nothing and the standards export writes it as a shape without a target. A vocabulary pattern walks no record road, because a record road holds no rows to answer from.

Derived from — 8

Media Rating Council, 2014, updated 2015Viewable Ad Impression Measurement Guidelines, Version 2.0
Media Rating CouncilOutcomes and Data Quality Standards
Media Rating Council, 2017Digital Audience-Based Measurement Standards
Kohavi, Tang and Xu, Cambridge University Press, 2020Trustworthy Online Controlled Experiments: A Practical Guide to A/B Testing
Lewis and Rao, Quarterly Journal of Economics, 2015The Unfavorable Economics of Measuring the Returns to Advertising
Gordon, Zettelmeyer, Bhargava and Chapsky, Marketing Science 38(2), 2019A Comparison of Approaches to Advertising Measurement: Evidence from Big Field Experiments at Facebook
European UnionRegulation (EU) 2016/679, Article 5: Principles relating to processing of personal data
International Organization for StandardizationISO 80000-1:2022 Quantities and units, Part 1: General

Kinds it licenses

Parameters Setting Bases

Relationships it licenses

parameter of · constrains · measured in · defaults on · calibrates · set over · set in · set for · set on

Where this model stands

Parameters is a vocabulary kind of eleven in Measurement and evidence: the attribution lookback window, the viewable pixel share and viewable time, the minimum detectable effect, statistical power, significance level and holdout share, the incrementality factor, the frequency cap, the session timeout and the retention period. Each is a parameter of a metric, an attribution model, an evidence design, an instrument or a processing purpose, or constrains a tactic, held by the Parameters spine; each is measured in a unit and defaults on a basis. Duration enters Units for the windows and the timeouts.

Setting Bases is a vocabulary kind of four: standard, benchmark, experiment, decision. The Setting record shape declares the join a set value makes, to its window, geography, segment, basis and unit, and the registry instantiates it by nothing.

Evidence Designs calibrates Parameters: the holdout experiment calibrates the incrementality factor and the attribution lookback window, the geo experiment the incrementality factor. Reactivation Rate is read by the holdout experiment, and the calibration loop closes on it, the design a reading is read by calibrating a parameter of that reading; the kernel names it as its third loop.

The Settings tab of the Evidence Plan reads every parameter with its unit, its default basis, what it sets or constrains and the design that calibrates it; nine questions walk the roads.

The set operation holds a value against a parameter in the reader’s browser under the key the law declares, in the parameter’s unit and on a chosen basis, shows it on the Settings tab, on the parameter’s own page and on the Evidence Plan, and shares it as an address that enters the store where it is opened; the kernel’s settings names the parameters kind, the unit road, the bases kind and road and the Setting record shape, held by the kernel law. Nothing computes with a held value yet.

A parameter pinned on the board shows the value held against it, in its unit, so the business’s context is read where the shape is built.

What it does not claim

A held value is scoped to nothing yet: the window, geography and segment the Setting shape declares are not offered on the form.

The windows a journey times out after remain Time Windows, and their lengths are the record system’s, as a reading’s value is; a floor or a ceiling on a parameter is a literal the model does not yet carry.

An export that computes a measure needs the values and reads them from the Setting records; until then a measure names its parameters and carries no number.

RUL-053