> I would argue at this point in collective awareness of public communications, using a form of "sorry if I did any harm" regardless of specific words used is an explicit decision by the writer to not accept full culpability.

Based on my experience with the general public, with academics, and with industry folks, the criteria for what constitutes a sincere apology is not known by the majority. Furthermore, many of those who have heard the criteria do not accept it as a gold standard, and disagree with it (even those who are not being looked to for an apology).

The recipient can always choose to accept or not an apology. However, I find it quite distasteful to attribute intentions to someone simply because they did not follow a recipe (even if the choice not to was intentional).