pjbrow
Joined 14 years ago
Karma
157
Submissions
52
Member since
Apr 11
You can ping me on pat [at] codepact [dot] com
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Comment · 8 years ago
Can't see any contact on your profile, feel free to ping me on [email protected].
Comment · 8 years ago
We'd be interested to see how that'd look. Will contact you via email.
Re jQuery: this is an emphasis in our copy for this post to Hacker News only. We've found that it helps technical people (many of our customers are technical) understand what we're doing.
Comment · 8 years ago
Yes, "compile target" is a very nice way to put it. The key idea is that you only really analyze all the text when there's a problem, which tends to be the job of experts, and that's not often. The wet code that "runs" in a court needs to be part of the doc, but it doesn't mean we need to look at it all the time. :)
Re guarantees, these docs are provided on an informational basis (read: not legal advice). We connect people with lawyers who understand the system and we have some good tech that speeds up their work re the legal sign off they provide. More to come on this.
Comment · 8 years ago
One of the main ideas behind the system is using simplified language to "call" modules of legalese like software functions. This technique abstracts away a lot of complexity on the top layer of the contract (which makes the document much shorter and easier to understand).
Most of the jurisdictional quirks are contained in legalese, so when you abstract it away, you end up with documents that look the same regardless of jurisdiction (the legalese modules change, obviously).
We often compare this approach to jQuery because it lets us:
- get rid of boilerplate "code" for common mechanics to aid in clarity and brevity (thanks, jQuery); and
- use consistent language between jurisdictions (like jQuery's elimination of cross-browser incompatibilities).
There's more explanation of this technique in the second video on this page:
Comment · 10 years ago
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.
You can take a look at it here http://lawpatch.org. Previous HN discussion here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10597778
Comment · 10 years ago
I was considering this out the outset, but one of the benefits of sending responses this way is that other people I work with have started to use it (which they wouldn't if it appeared as a snippet).
Comment · 11 years ago
Yep - that's how the commercial technical detail is often dealt with. We're stretching (and slightly rejigging) the same concept to legally substantive text.
Comment · 11 years ago
Hi everyone, I'm a contributor to LawPatch. We started this project because we wanted legal positions that we could call like functions (as if we were coding).
Our aim is to make legal language simple without introducing ambiguity or extra risk.
We think even the most technical legal agreements could look like term sheets using this drafting method. A spectrum of standardised positions also stops lawyers from constantly replicating work.
This is is an open source project by lawyers who are also developers - we'd love to hear from anyone who's got ideas for improvements or would like to contribute language for other areas.
We have patches drafted for the United States, UK and Australia. Happy to hear from people in other countries too! Creating this extra level of abstraction is also an opportunity to standardize documents across jurisdictions.
Comment · 11 years ago
Agree that foot / end noting is another good way to do it - the important thing is the drafting technique rather than the way it's implemented.
We're using Github permalinks to cover the linking issue for now, but we're discussing more permanent options. Would be interested to hear what other ways people think would work.
There's also the option for users to download the repos and use the commit hash in the document proper for reference.
Comment · 12 years ago
The doctrines underpinning IP law are flimsy and arbitrary. It's normal for technology to change the balance of power (and the laws that enshrine that balance).
In the current environment, Hollywood's business model is unreasonable, and people know it. Until people think it's reasonable, a lot of them are going to pirate. Technology has changed. Hollywood needs to change.
What should be illegal, is threatening to sue someone for working on code with others.