Terms Governing Seen by Everyone
The message was delivered to the group. The group has read it. The group has not replied. This is a different outcome from no one reading it, but it produces the same visible result.
TERMS AND CONDITIONS GOVERNING THE EVENT COMMONLY DESCRIBED AS "SEEN BY EVERYONE"
These terms govern the situation where a message sent to a group has been read by all recipients and has received no replies. These terms apply when: delivery has been confirmed, read receipts are visible, and the read timestamp falls within a period during which a reply would have been reasonable.
Article 1: The Nature of the Event
"Seen by everyone" constitutes a group response of confirmed receipt. It is not the absence of response. It is a specific response, defined by its form: collective reading followed by collective non-reply.
The non-reply is not unilateral. All recipients have chosen, independently and simultaneously, to defer response. This is a collective decision that nobody discussed. The collective decision was that someone else would reply.
Article 2: The Distribution of Responsibility
In a group of eight people, the responsibility to reply is divided across all eight. Each person's individual share of responsibility is 12.5%. Each person has calculated that if they do not reply, the remaining 87.5% of group responsibility is sufficient to produce a reply from someone else.
This calculation is made by all eight people. The sum of this calculation is zero replies.
Article 3: Conditions for Reply
A reply will be generated when one of the following occurs:
(a) The sender sends a follow-up message, redistributing responsibility from ambient to specific. (b) One member of the group decides their 12.5% is sufficient and acts on it. (c) The content of the message requires individual response rather than group response, making the distribution calculation irrelevant. (d) Time passes to the point where not replying becomes more uncomfortable than replying.
Condition (d) is the most common trigger. The average time to condition (d) is four hours for practical matters and indefinite for ceremonial ones.
Article 4: No Liability
The message sender accepts, by sending to a group, that collective reading may not produce individual reply. The sender accepts that "seen by everyone" is a valid outcome. The sender may not use this document in any dispute.
The group accepts that silence is a response. The group accepts this in silence.