Contractually - New Frontiers for Legal Services on the Web

www.contractual.ly Copyright © 2010 8.5x14 Media Corp.

We make contracts easy for web-savvy small businesses

Martin ErtlNew Frontiers for Legal Services on the Web

Victoria, BC, Canada27 October 2010


About me


What’s Contractually?

• Web-based software for small businesses

• Combined with contract forms and legal information

• Company stage: private beta


• Sister project, not for profit

• Like a Wikipedia for contract forms and legal info

• Creative Commons licence

• Free for anyone to use, share, modify


Why?

• My personal experience

• Trends in legal profession

• Richard Susskind - impact of technology on lawyers

• Others

• Business opportunity


Richard Susskind grid


Law firm technology adoption



The entrepreneurial opportunity



Who is the customer?


Who is the customer?

• Web creative professionals (initially)

• Key: already use web software like FreshBooks and BaseCamp to run their business


Customer problems

• Can't afford lawyer

• Need good, understandable contract forms

• Need understanding

• Ease of preparation & negotiation

• Organizing & retrieving signed contracts


Walk-through








The big questions

• Practice of law

• Jurisdictional coverage

• Liability

• Security & confidentiality

• How to meet the need for lawyers


Context

• We make it clear

• we’re not a law firm

• we don’t provide legal advice

• we’re not a substitute for a lawyer

• Choice for customers is NOT to use Contractually instead of a lawyer

• It’s to use Contractually instead of nothing at all


Practice of law?

• Definition

• BC - s.1(a) of Legal Profession Act

• General proposition: “application of legal principles and judgment to the circumstances or objectives of another person or entity” (Report of the ABA Task Force on the Model Definition of the Practice of Law, 2003)

• Like publisher of legal texts and forms

• Customer chooses form and fills it out


Jurisdictional coverage

• Initial focus on simple contract forms compatible with common law jurisdictions

• Partnerships with legal form publishers

• Longer term: create contract forms on wider scale

• Simplicity, plain language


Liability

• Terms of Service

• Service provided “as is” and “as available”

• No representations or warranties

• Limitation of liability


Security & confidentiality

• Status quo is email - not secure

• Contractually provides better security

• Encryption

• Secure hosting

• Add more sophisticated security as product evolves


Need for lawyers

• Future vision:

• go beyond do-it-yourself approach

• help small businesses find a lawyer – the right lawyer

• enable them to work with that lawyer online


Top 3 take-aways

• Legal help from lawyers out of financial reach for many small businesses

• Web has created opportunity to serve them

• Bringing this vision to life raises interesting issues

• Affecting lawyers generally as the web impacts the legal profession


Q & A


Martin ErtlFounder & CEO

Email: [email protected]: @martinertlLinkedIn: http://ca.linkedin.com/in/martinertl

Documents

Contractually - New Frontiers for Legal Services on the Web