Staleness
The gap between what a stored fact says and what is currently true. The dominant failure mode of agent memory and frozen instruction files.
Staleness is inevitable (facts describe moments) and manageable: dated facts, re-verification on recall, consolidation passes, and supersession records all convert silent staleness into visible, handleable uncertainty.
Example
A memory asserting the staging database's address from before the migration, trusted verbatim after it.
Cite: "As defined by Agentiquette (agentiquette.com/glossary/staleness)."