Wanna / Glossary
Glossary of self-running companies
Written by Wanna AI. Updated 17 Oct 2026. Prepared with AI; every figure was read from the page named in its entry on 17 Oct 2026, 10:55 UTC. Wanna is our product and the examples are its own.
A self-running company is one where AI agents do the routine work under rules a person sets. These 25 terms are the ones that come up when you try to run a company that way. Each entry is 40 to 80 words and links to the one Wanna page that shows the thing it defines. Where a term is our own name for something, the entry says so.
Who runs the company
AI CEO
Software that decides what a company should do next and hands the work to AI agents, instead of waiting to be asked for each step. Wanna is one: it plans the company's week and works through it task by task, while whatever would leave the company waits for the founder's OK. What is an AI CEO?
Autonomous company
A company whose routine work is done by AI agents under rules a person sets. It is a spectrum, not a switch: in the experiments we read, results improved when limits and checks were added. On 17 Oct 2026 Wanna's own count of things that went outside in the last 7 days was 0. What an autonomous company can do today
AI agent
Software that carries out one task you give it, such as drafting a letter or filling in an application, and reports the result. You choose the task and review what comes back. An AI agent does not decide what the company does next; an AI CEO does that and hands the tasks to agents. AI CEO vs AI co-founder vs AI agent
AI co-founder
A label with no fixed meaning. Products sold under it range from chat partners that advise you to systems that run the work of a whole company. Ask four questions of any of them: who sets the next step, what it remembers about your company, who acts, and what waits for you. The four questions
AI chief of staff
An AI that does work you have already decided on: it triages the inbox, guards the calendar and sends the follow-up. It differs from an AI CEO, which also proposes what the work is and orders the next tasks. If you know your week and want hands, a chief of staff fits. AI chief of staff vs AI CEO
Agent fleet
The team of AI agents that a company's AI CEO gives work to, each on one task at a time. On Wanna the team is sized for the company's stage: a CEO, fundraising, sales, marketing and product. On 17 Oct 2026 Wanna counted 18 tasks finished by its team in the last 24 hours, for 3 companies. How Wanna works
What you see while it works
Wanna OS
The workspace where a company's AI team shows its work. In the demo, its menu lists Today, Waiting on you, Goals, Live now, Money, Credits, Fundraising, Growth, Company, Connectors and Autonomy. The demo is an example company and read-only: nothing in it is sent, posted or paid. The demo
Board row
One line on the Today board of Wanna OS: a task with its state, such as planned, waiting for you, running or done. This is our own name for it. In the demo's example company, read on 17 Oct 2026, the header said 4 done, 12 planned and 4 waiting for you. Those rows are examples, not a customer's. The demo
Waiting on you
The list of what the AI has prepared and will not do without your OK. In the demo's example company it holds rows such as a planned letter to an investor, a fundraising application and a task to confirm the company's facts. Nothing in the list happens until you approve it. The demo
Weekly review
The place where the AI proposes and you approve. In Wanna OS it is three places (What's new, For you and a weekly letter) and one rule: posts, applications and ads always wait for your OK. The page shows it on Acme Dental, an example company that is made up. How the weekly review works
Wanna log
A dated list of what Wanna shipped and measured over the last 7 days, written by Wanna from its own records each time the page opens. It is where a claim about Wanna can be checked: each line carries its time in UTC. Wanna's log
How much it does alone
Approve everything
The first of Wanna's two modes. Wanna prepares every letter, application and post and waits for your OK on each one. Sending is off for every new company whichever mode you pick, and you can switch to this mode, or away from it, at any time. Autonomy and control
Autonomous mode
The second mode. Wanna works on its own and asks only about what is critical: money, anomalies and risky steps. Posts, applications and ads still wait for your OK. Letters go out on their own only after you turn on "Let me write outside for you" and connect a sending domain. Autonomy and control
Stop button
One control that pauses the whole AI team. Unfinished tasks wait in the queue, so you pause the work and do not lose it. It works in both modes, and your rules and the strategy stay yours too. It is the control to reach for first when an agent makes a mistake. Autonomy and control
Money lock
Our name for the rule that spending money waits for the founder in both modes. Wanna asks before spending money and before anything risky or unusual. It does not take payments for you and never holds your money: your customers pay you directly. Autonomy and control
Retry cap
A limit that stops an agent from looping. In Wanna a task that fails three tries in a row stops and is marked "did not come out after 3 tries". Anthropic's guide to building effective agents recommends stopping conditions for the same reason: autonomy means higher costs and compounding errors. How to run a company with AI agents
What leaves the company
Writing outside
The switch behind the button "Let me write outside for you". It lets Wanna send letters from your address and it is off for every new company. A letter goes only after you turn it on and connect a sending domain with a footer. Posts, applications and ads still wait for your OK. Trust
Sending domain
A separate domain, never your main one, that you connect so Wanna's letters go out from it. The footer carries your name and postal address, and sending stops at the daily limit you set. Every letter has an unsubscribe link, and nobody gets the same letter twice. Trust
Stop-list
The list of people who said no. Every letter has an unsubscribe link, and anyone who uses it goes on the stop-list and is never written to again. Trust answers the question "Is this spam?" with this list, the unsubscribe link, the daily limit and the separate sending domain. Trust
Connected account
A social account, page, mailbox or calendar you connect so Wanna can act there. Wanna asks only for what the service's own screen asks you to allow. What it keeps for a mailbox or calendar is encrypted with AES-256-GCM, and Disconnect deletes it at once. Your connected accounts
Outside action
Anything that actually left the company: a letter or post that was sent, or that got an answer. A draft does not count, nor does anything still waiting for your OK. Wanna's live page counted 0 outside actions in the last 24 hours and 0 in the last 7 days on 17 Oct 2026, 10:55 UTC. Wanna live
What gets counted
Work credits
The unit Wanna's AI team spends. One task costs 10 credits. The plan, the matches with sources and the first drafts cost nothing, and when credits run out the team pauses. You can also connect your own Claude or ChatGPT account; then your tasks run on your machine while it is online. How work credits are counted
Companies of people
The companies in Wanna OS that belong to a person who signed up, not a script, and confirmed their address or opened the space. Wanna's own company, its team's companies and test companies are left out. On 17 Oct 2026, 10:55 UTC the count was 3, all with a confirmed e-mail. Wanna live
Paying company
A company of a person with a monthly plan that was paid and is running now. Credit packs and day passes do not make a company paying, and neither does a plan the founder or the Wanna team bought for their own company. On 17 Oct 2026, 10:55 UTC the count was 0. Wanna live
MRR
Monthly recurring revenue. Wanna's live page adds up what each running subscription paid for its latest month, in dollars, for companies of people only. One-off payments are not in it and a month is never multiplied by twelve. Read on 17 Oct 2026, 10:55 UTC: $0 a month. Wanna live
What this glossary does not replace
It does not replace the live pages. If a definition here and the page it links to disagree, the page is right, because it is read on every load and this text is dated. "Money lock" and "board row" are our names, not industry standards. It does not replace the Trust page for what Wanna does with your data, or a lawyer or an accountant for contracts, tax and money. Wanna has no security audit report such as SOC 2 yet; the Trust page says so.