# Human on the Loop

> An interaction model in which automation acts within set bounds while a person monitors it and can intervene.

- HTML version: https://robbiepalmer.me/ideas/human-on-the-loop

Human on the loop leaves routine decisions with the system while a person supervises its operation.
They do not approve every action. They need enough visibility and control to detect when behaviour
departs from expectations, pause or override an action, and change the system's operating bounds.

The phrase describes how a person supervises the system. The same person may stay on the loop while
automation handles high-confidence cases, then move into the loop when an exception needs an
explicit decision.

The difficult part is making oversight actionable. A dashboard with stale data and no useful
controls does not keep anybody meaningfully on the loop. The system must surface exceptions in time
to act, make the available intervention clear, and record both automated actions and human
interventions as events.

## Questions it prompts

* Which actions may proceed without prior approval?
* What should trigger an alert or require intervention?
* Can a person stop or reverse an action quickly enough?
* Do policy changes and overrides become part of the audit history?

## Related ideas

- [Human in the Loop](https://robbiepalmer.me/ideas/human-in-the-loop.md): An interaction model in which a person contributes to a decision before the system can continue.

## Where it appears

- Project: [Real-Time Multi-Camera Video Analytics](https://robbiepalmer.me/projects/real-time-multi-camera-video-analytics.md)

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