📖About

PROBLEM. Every media cost row records the generic KIND where the model belongs. The one door every picture and video comes through charges with record(None, kind, 1, initiative_id=ini) and passes no model, so shared/media_spend.record falls back to model=str(kind) and the ledger says 'image' or 'video'. Measured on 2026-08-04: 45 image rows across two days, every one of them model='image'.

WHY IT MATTERS. Rule 1165 makes the TRACK carry the subscription and CAROL-INI-3620 makes the task carry the model - and the Creative track now names gemini-2.5-flash-image and veo-3.1-generate-preview on its two specific tasks. But the SPEND cannot be matched back to either, so the estate can state which model a task is supposed to use and cannot show which one actually served it. A price change on one model would be invisible in the ledger, and 'is this task running the model we think it is' is unanswerable - the exact drift that allocation-by-purpose exists to prevent.

SCOPE. The image-and-video door records the ACTUAL model on the cost row, read from the same constants the generator calls with (IMAGE_MODEL / VIDEO_MODEL, already imported there) - never a literal. Covers both the image route and the video route. The unit price stays where it is; only the model label is added.

OUT OF SCOPE. Backfilling the historical rows, and any change to who is billed - the picture still bills the picture track, not the asker (Ninad 2026-08-02).

⚖️Decisions

• Elrond's bypass methodology checklist (a reminder, not a gate -- you've got this): 0. File it requested_mode='bypass' (planner-vs-bypass is a deliberate choice). bypass_start REFUSES a non-bypass initiative (CAROL-INI-1846), and the dispatcher only skips the bypass lane when the mode says bypass -- a 'planner' mistag lets Merlin's pipeline grab the placeholder step and block your finished work. 1. Filed as planned status -- let the bypass claim/activate it; never file active. 2. Open the bypass (bypass_start) with your droid id + the remediation answer (remediates_initiative_id=NNN, or remediates_nothing=True). 3. Work the blocks for your work-type: template -> design -> code -> test -> review. Do the real work; record decisions on the initiative as you make them. 4. Reality is recorded for you at close -- code (files changed), each decision, and the twin-review verdict become real activities tied to this initiative and show in the Activity Tracker like a planner run (CAROL-INI-1840). No dummy rows. 5. Keep the initiative status moving; it parks in 'reviewing' and is tagged uat-pending for you at close (CAROL-INI-1836), so the stuck-watchdog leaves it alone until UAT. 6. Close runs the gates (design/architecture compliance + caller-audit). If a gate flags something pre-existing or unrelated to your change, waive it with a clear written rationale -- audit, don't skip. 7. Bypass skips the planner's auto-orchestration, NOT the standards. Same template checklist, same review, same observability as a planner run. (elrond)
• hold — HELD PENDING CAROL-INI-3648. A parallel Orion lane filed 3648 (a cost line does not say which task paid for it) two minutes before this one and is executing on it now. Both change the same seam: the single point where a media or model cost row is written. 3648 adds the task and the track to that row; this one adds the MODEL. Shipping them an hour apart from two lanes would mean two edits to one writing point and a real chance of clobbering. No code has been written for this initiative. It resumes when 3648 closes, at which point the work is: confirm whether 3648 already carries the model through, and if not, add it on top of their change rather than beside it. (orion)
• [status-router] planned -> executing | event=bypass_executing | bypass transition (or-bx-01)
• [status-router] executing -> reviewing | event=bypass_reviewing | bypass transition (or-bx-01)
• [status-router] reviewing -> closed | event=operator_signoff | Auto-accepted (CAROL-INI-1859): Orion-initiated, >2 days in reviewing with no objection. (el-srac-01)

✅Success criteria

• A newly generated image writes a cost row naming the real image model, not the word 'image'. (must_have)
• The video route passes its model the same way, read from the same constant the generator calls with. (must_have)
• The model is read from the running configuration, never typed into the charging code as a literal. (must_have)
• Who is billed is unchanged: the picture still bills the picture track, not the agent who asked. (must_have)
• The unit price and the refusal behaviour are unchanged. (must_have)