Groups of AI agents struggle because reading every message overloads their limited memory. Today's systems push messages directly into the agent's context.
Researchers simulated societies of up to sixteen thousand agents testing an inbox where messages wait outside the context. Each agent sets its own rules for what to read and keep.
Push fails: an agent managing twenty negotiations proposes a rejected option 97% of the time because it forgot. An inbox rule recovered about 60% of needed agents under heavy noise. Managing attention is as important as delivery.