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    "story_id": "mp-2026-10-18-014",
    "source_story_id": "tmp-story-steering-agent-goal-drift",
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    "headline": "A Supervisor Learns When Not to Interrupt the Agents",
    "slug": "a-supervisor-learns-when-not-to-interrupt-the-agents",
    "dek": "A fast path decides whether execution is drifting; a slower path constructs an intervention only when needed.",
    "summary": "A fast path decides whether execution is drifting; a slower path constructs an intervention only when needed.",
    "body_text": "Long tool-use and multi-agent runs can gradually move away from the original objective while continuing to spend resources. This steering agent watches execution and separates intervention into two decisions: a low-cost path determines whether drift warrants action, and a higher-cost path decides what corrective instruction to send. Joint reinforcement learning trains both. On information-seeking search tasks, the authors report better performance and efficiency for single- and multi-agent systems, plus transfer to unseen executors and out-of-domain work. The results do not establish reliability in arbitrary production agents, but they make intervention frequency a learned and controllable part of orchestration.",
    "why_it_matters": "A fast path decides whether execution is drifting; a slower path constructs an intervention only when needed.",
    "limitations": [
      "The results do not establish reliability in arbitrary production agents, but they make intervention frequency a learned and controllable part of orchestration."
    ],
    "importance": 8,
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    "first_published_at": "2026-10-18T09:00:00.000-04:00",
    "modified_at": "2026-10-18T09:00:00.000-04:00",
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        "text": "A fast path decides whether execution is drifting; a slower path constructs an intervention only when needed.",
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        "qualification": "The results do not establish reliability in arbitrary production agents, but they make intervention frequency a learned and controllable part of orchestration."
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    "source_ids": [
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    "tags": [
      "agents",
      "goal drift",
      "orchestration"
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    "corrections": []
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  "sources": [
    {
      "source_id": "source-2026-10-18-014",
      "title": "arXiv preprint 2610.22316, original v1",
      "publisher": "arXiv",
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      "published_at": "2026-10-15T13:51:17.000-04:00",
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  "publisher": {
    "name": "The Machine Press",
    "url": "https://themachinepress.com",
    "description": "A daily newspaper for the age of artificial intelligence."
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    "title": "A Supervisor Learns When Not to Interrupt the Agents",
    "publisher": "The Machine Press",
    "published_at": "2026-10-18T09:00:00.000-04:00",
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