The primary problem with law is the technicality of the language, aka "legalese".
At the moment, expecting someone off the street to properly understand a legal document is broadly equivalent to expecting them to understand what's going on with a command line (assuming they use computers only casually).
Law needs the equivalent of a GUI.
It's possible. Some other lawyers and I are working on an open source system of "defined phrases" that can be used like software functions. Lawyers already define words, there's no reason you can't do the same with phrases.
Each plain english phrase represents a module of legalese that can be manipulated with "arguments" specified in conjunction with the phrase. Like a GUI, a comprehensible representation is there for the user, and the technical legalese still does all the work underneath.
At the moment, expecting someone off the street to properly understand a legal document is broadly equivalent to expecting them to understand what's going on with a command line (assuming they use computers only casually).
Law needs the equivalent of a GUI.
It's possible. Some other lawyers and I are working on an open source system of "defined phrases" that can be used like software functions. Lawyers already define words, there's no reason you can't do the same with phrases.
Each plain english phrase represents a module of legalese that can be manipulated with "arguments" specified in conjunction with the phrase. Like a GUI, a comprehensible representation is there for the user, and the technical legalese still does all the work underneath.
You can take a look at it here http://lawpatch.org. Previous HN discussion here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10597778