# Double-Text
#tech #social

You text someone.

They don't text back.

It's been a while and they still haven't texted back.

What do you do?

Did they ignore your text because they don't like you? Was it because you said something stupid? Should you take the hint and fuck off?

Or maybe it's actually nothing to do with you. Maybe they are busy. Maybe the network isn't working. Maybe they are minimizing their phone use. Maybe they saw your text — clearing the "new message" notification — while in the middle of doing something, got interrupted before they could compose a reply, never committed the existence of the text to their long-term memory, and completely forgot it existed.

It could be either one, depending on the person and what your relationship is like. So, how do you find out?

**You double-text.**

Being ignored once could mean anything. Don't get neurotic about it; most things in the world have nothing to do with you. Send one more. But if you're ignored twice, it's more likely to be a social signal.

If you merely overlook someone in the course of your day and then get another text from them, you will probably make an effort to reply right away — if you like them — because you'll then suddenly remember the forgotten text and want to reassure them you aren't intentionally ignoring them.

The larger the number of ignored[^ign] messages, the more likely it is to be a signal. The strongest (if often ambiguous!) signal is ghosting — n=infinity. n=1 is basically random noise — who knows what people are doing when you text them. n=2 is like 1 bit of signal, indicating the feeling of the sound "myuhhh...".

It's hard to interpret a non-response, but it must be said that no interpretation is particularly *good* — "I ignored your text because we were literally sitting next to each other all day" excepted. As regards a relationship, a non-response *at best* means that something *calamitous* has befallen them — something outside of their control prevents them from reading and replying to your very good text! — which is not exactly a great outcome either, obviously. Unless you hate them, I guess.

[^ign]: For whatever definition of 'ignore' is relevant to your relationship. Someone you regularly talk to ignoring you for only a few hours could be a stark change in behavior for them, whereas if you cold-call someone a single time and they ignore you it's a much stronger "fuck off" signal than an ignored double-text. Guesstimating the correct ignore threshold is a pivotal and unexplained step.