Apptainer - hold Bjorn to zero engineering hours and let things fall on the floor so the maintenance cost becomes visible

Situation

Peter has an agreement with Bjorn that Apptainer costs zero engineering hours. In the 10/22 Wolford 1:1, after hearing the PIC team still spends some time on it, Peter told Wolford to be aggressive about spending zero time, said he expects Apptainer to fall apart a bit and that is okay, because Bjorn needs to hear that these things do not stay functional and maintained without engineering focus. He said the same to Nathan the same day and created a todo for Bjorn noting that Apptainer is taking engineering time.

Reasoning

Zero engineering hours is a product claim that is false in practice; quietly absorbing the cost keeps it false while it looks true and trains Product to expect free maintenance. Letting reality contradict the belief is the cheapest correction, but only if engineering actually stops subsidizing. A bounded cost (Apptainer degrading for a while) buys a durable fix - Product prices maintenance into its decisions - and protects PIC capacity during the Stratum sprint. Whether to invest in Apptainer stays Bjorn call.

Additional Context

Peter confirmed the hypothesis as presented.

Observed Evidence

Two 1:1s on 10/22 plus Peter-created todo 646abe25 (Apptainer IS taking eng time, delegate Bjorn).

Matching Patterns

Confidence Breakdown

Reasoning Depth Analysis