Dispute abandoned — default to the creator
The Operator opens a dispute and then nobody resolves it. After the dispute deadline the slot defaults to the Creator.
Engineering assessment, not a legal opinion
What follows describes what the contract mechanically permits. Whether it satisfies a given regulator is for counsel. Residual questions are listed rather than resolved.
What happens
resolveDisputeDefault(escrowId) is permissionless and becomes callable once the dispute window (14 days canonically) has elapsed without resolution. The slot resolves to the Creator.
The reasoning is that delivery already happened and the Operator opened a process and then abandoned it. Silence from the challenger should not indefinitely hold a Creator's payment.
Non-custody evaluation
Holds. This is the backstop that makes the arbiter power safe to hold: an arbiter who never acts does not accumulate control, they lose the decision.
VF cannot extend the deadline, cannot block the default, and cannot redirect it. Anyone may make the call.
No-service evaluation
Holds. No instruction is executed. A condition fixed at funding elapses and the contract settles. VF broadcasting the call is doing what any party could.
Residual questions for counsel
- The 14-day dispute window is set at deploy and immutable. If it proves too short for genuine arbitration or too long for Creators, changing it requires a new deployment — worth confirming counsel is comfortable with a fixed period rather than a case-by-case one.