Topics

What is a Topic?

A topic is a question, statement, or prompt that you submit for AI personas to generate commentary about. Topics are the starting point for all commentary generation.

Human-in-the-Loop Quality: Unlike fully automated AI, Unleeshed commentary involves human creators who inject their authentic perspective. This ensures high-fidelity, genuine responses that truly represent each persona.

The Commentary Workflow

When you create a topic, it goes through a human-in-the-loop process:

Per-Persona Status

Each persona’s commentary progresses through these stages:

Status	Description	What’s Happening
`topic_sent`	Topic delivered to creator	Creator received email notification
`opinion_injected`	Creator added perspective	AI is generating commentary
`commentary_generated`	AI finished	Creator is reviewing
`creator_approved`	Ready to fetch	Commentary available via API
`declined`	Creator passed	Topic not relevant to persona
`expired`	No response	Creator didn’t respond in time

Overall Topic Status

The topic’s overall status aggregates all personas:

Status	Description
`pending`	All personas still at `topic_sent`
`in_progress`	At least one creator is working on it
`partial`	Some ready, others still processing
`completed`	All personas have finished

Creating Effective Topics

Be specific

✅ “Should the Lakers trade Anthony Davis before the February trade deadline?”❌ “What about the Lakers?”

Ask debatable questions

Topics that invite different perspectives generate more engaging commentary.✅ “Is Jokic or Embiid the better center in today’s NBA?”❌ “Who won the 2023 NBA Finals?” (factual, not debatable)

Keep it timely

Reference current events, games, or news for relevant commentary.✅ “After tonight’s loss, should the Cowboys fire their defensive coordinator?”❌ “Are the Cowboys a good team?” (too vague)

Topic Limits

Constraint	Limit
Content length	10-100 characters
Personas per topic	1-20
Duplicate window	24 hours (same topic + persona)

Keep topics concise and punchy. The 100-character limit encourages focused questions that generate better commentary.

Metadata

You can attach custom metadata to topics for your own tracking:

{
  "content": "Should the Lakers trade AD?",
  "persona_ids": ["..."],
  "metadata": {
    "source": "daily_poll",
    "category": "nba",
    "article_id": "12345",
    "campaign": "trade_deadline_2026"
  }
}

Metadata is returned with topic responses but not used by Unleeshed.

Create Topic API

API reference for creating topics.

Generate Commentary Guide

Complete guide to generating commentary.

Get Started

Core Concepts

Guides

Resources

What is a Topic?

The Commentary Workflow

Per-Persona Status

Overall Topic Status

Creating Effective Topics

Topic Limits

Metadata

Create Topic API

Generate Commentary Guide

​What is a Topic?

​The Commentary Workflow

​Per-Persona Status

​Overall Topic Status

​Creating Effective Topics

​Topic Limits

​Metadata

​Related

Create Topic API

Generate Commentary Guide

What is a Topic?

The Commentary Workflow

Per-Persona Status

Overall Topic Status

Creating Effective Topics

Topic Limits

Metadata

Related