Week 3: Recurring Contracts: Interaction Frequency and Reliability

Why a relationship is better modelled as a recurring contract than a single transaction, and what reliability adds that attraction can't

8 March 2027

A single good date is a spot transaction. A relationship is a recurring contract, and recurring contracts are priced on a variable spot transactions don’t have: reliability. Does this party show up when they say they will, respond inside a range you can predict, hold a plan once it’s made? None of that is romantic. All of it is the thing that turns intermittent attraction into a system you can actually plan around.

The mistake this week targets is treating reliability as a personality trait (“they’re just flaky”) instead of a measurable rate. A rate can go up. A personality trait, in most people’s folk model, can’t — which is why “they’re flaky” ends a conversation that “they’ve missed three of the last five plans” should actually start.

Outline#

• spot transaction versus recurring contract: what changes once you expect another round
• reliability as an observed rate, not an inferred trait
• why reliability compounds: each kept commitment lowers the cost of believing the next one
• reading for next week: what a pattern of reliable interaction actually builds, beyond trust