10 ms·

Detangle: AI-generated summaries of legal docs

112 points by Shpigford 4y ago

mtlmtlmtlmtl 4y ago
How is this tested to make sure the summaries aren't wrong?
Shpigford 4y ago
Detangle gives you AI-generated summaries of your legal docs so you can understand what you're signing. Here's the YC SAFE, for example: https://detangle.ai/examples/yc-safe https://detangle.ai/examples/yc-safe
- andrewfromx 4y ago
  I wonder, what happens when you read just the summary of a complex section, sign, and then years later are in a lawsuit. If Detangled's algorithm in shown to have clearly written the summary wrong... are they in any way liable? hehe notice their own terms with summaries: https://detangle.ai/terms https://detangle.ai/terms
  - Shpigford 4y ago
    That was the big reason for adding the massive disclaimer everywhere, but I guess we'll see. I also intentionally didn't just give an output of the summary but instead showed it next to each paragraph so the implication isn't that the summaries replaces the legal, but rather tries to clarify. Glad you noticed the Terms. :)
  - NoboruWataya 4y ago
    From the original text: > We may suspend or terminate your right to use our website and terminate these Terms of Service immediately upon written notice to you for any breach of these Terms of Service. From the summary: > We can end this agreement any time we want. I read these as being quite different? The original text says they can only terminate for a breach by the user of the ToS, not simply "any time we want". I get that the service isn't supposed to replace actual legal advice but surely differences as glaring as these limit the usefulness of the summaries.
- ryanlitalien 4y ago
  Absolutely fantastic! This is a great use of AI here, definitely using this going forward. A bit concerned though, the LLC name doesn't give confidence when reading through the output with confidence.
- simonista 4y ago
  I'm excited to see where this goes because I think it is a cool application of AI. That said, two of the first three paragraph summaries are wrong in this example: > [Investor Name] gave [Company Name] the right to certain shares of its Capital Stock in exchange for [Amount] on [Date]. This is backwards > The Post-Money Valuation Cap is a number that is written in Section 2. This isn't true, the number is here, "additional defined terms" are later.
  - treis 4y ago
    It's anywhere from slightly to very wrong for each section. Pretty cool as a tech demo but definitely should not be used to understand a legal document.
- ahepp 4y ago
  > AI-generated summaries of your legal docs so you can understand what you're signing. If you sell me a summary of a legal document, which was advertised as being useful to understand the legal document, that seems like just about the most straightforward case of legal advice I can imagine.
Ryanb58 4y ago
Love it! This is one of the best uses of ML/AI IMHO. I really dislike reading leasing agreements.
- Shpigford 4y ago
  Thanks so much!
falcolas 4y ago
Given how confident AI can be when it's incorrect, it feels like a bit of a problem to use AI with legal docs, since you can't really trust it to be correct (and the cost of being incorrect may be absurdly high).
- oa335 4y ago
  Agreed, I would still want a lawyer to take a look or anything of importance.
  - Shpigford 4y ago
    I also would want a lawyer to take a look. Hence the note saying to talk to a lawyer. ;) The reality is, even knowing what to ask a lawyer can be difficult and it's not economically viable to ask a lawyer to summarize a 100-page legal document into text you can wrap your head around. Detangle just helps give some clarity so that you can further a conversation with a lawyer, or even just ask for clarification from the person who sent you the document. "Hey, this paragraph seems to imply XYZ...is that the case?" I'm making zero claims that this should replace a lawyer or be used as a replacement for legally binding text.
    - traceroute66 4y ago
      > even knowing what to ask a lawyer can be difficult That's the lawyer's job, to guide you through ! If they're not doing that, then find a different lawyer. The whole point is we are talking about legal document review here. Reviewing legal documents necessarily involves an active discussion with a lawyer, it is not something you can turn up with pre-prepared questions for.
      - drbwaa 4y ago
        > That's the lawyer's job, to guide you through ! If they're not doing that, then find a different lawyer. Yes! And if you happen to know that, and have a good lawyer, then you're all set. But a hell of a lot of lawyers won't volunteer to do this, or aren't competent enough to have this conversation productively with a layperson, and most people don't know to ask for it. I have my doubts as to the practicality, but a tool that could summarize and then prompt laypeople go to their lawyer to start that discussion seems like it could definitely have value. I suspect most people interested in this tool may already be knowledgeable enough to ask for a walkthrough anyway, but you could imagine implementations where the summary is presented directly, and could guide more people toward the help they need.
nerdponx 4y ago
What are they doing with all the uploaded document data? I didn't see that in their terms of use.
- Shpigford 4y ago
  We use GPT-3 to summarize it the document data. Then 24 hours later we completely delete all text, URLs and file uploads.
  - mrstone 4y ago
    You do nothing with the data in the interim? I find that hard to believe.
  - muttantt 4y ago
    No way any respectable lawyer thinks it's OK to upload a client agreement with confidential information to some fly by night website the promises to delete.
fellerts 4y ago
Who is the target audience for something like this? I'm not sure anybody is going to pay to have Apple's ToS simplified before clicking "agree". On the other hand, if you are squinting at a contract that actually matters, I don't think a service like this gives sufficient understanding of what all that legalese would actually mean if shit hits the fan. For example, changing the applicable law in a contract can yield wildly different interpretations without changing a word in the contract iself. This is why you should seek professional help when in doubt. You say "The summaries are to help inform conversations with actual lawyers", but would a lawyer give a rats ass about a layman's interpretation of an AI-backed translation of a legal doc from a company who "does not guarantee that the stuff on the website is good or works"? IANAL but I don't think so.
- fnordpiglet 4y ago
  I assume lawyers could benefit from a tool that can summarize a large document rapidly. They’re often faced with thousands of pages of documents, and in large class actions possibly hundreds of thousands to millions.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
  - traceroute66 4y ago
    > I assume lawyers could benefit from a tool that can summarize a large document rapidly. They’re often faced with thousands of pages of documents, and in large class actions possibly hundreds of thousands to millions. That tool is a human called a Junior Associate. And, no, you cannot replace a Junior Associate with AI for the reasons already outlined by @kkielhofner below. TL;DR: context... Junior has it. AI doesn't and will never do.
  - alexdoesstuff 4y ago
    I imagine for use cases such as class action there may be a place for AI to effectively extract information from hundreds or thousands of similar but slightly different contracts. Same goes for other such situations, such as commercial landlords with significant rent portfolios, investors/banks with loan terms, or even investors more easily understanding the difference between various bond and/or loan terms. One of the key advantages of the recent advances in AI/ML to me is that it allows users to more efficiently extract unstructured information.
nashashmi 4y ago
I work through a bunch of contract documents reissued with a just a few changes. I need a service that would identify what the changes are instead of me going through each document and reading it over again Or doing a comparison of previously issued documents with this one.
- yakshaving 4y ago
  Interesting, what is your job? Contract lawyer? do you work in biglaw or in house counsel? or a vc firm?
  - nashashmi 4y ago
    Engineering marketing concentrating on government proposal requests. That involves contracts, described scopes of work, etc.
- NoboruWataya 4y ago
  What do you mean exactly, are you just looking for software that will highlight the differences between two documents? That software exists already.
  - nashashmi 4y ago
    Yes that software does exist and currently my go to method (convert pdf to word document, compare changes in word). The ideal system would highlight (sets of) text that that's common between both documents and underline text that is original. Or vice versa.
    - freejazz 4y ago
      You can run redlines of PDFs in Adobe Acrobat pro, no need to conver to word. "The ideal system would highlight (sets of) text that that's common between both documents and underline text that is original. Or vice versa." Just change your settings in microsoft word.
- 4y ago
traceroute66 4y ago
I'm sorry, but in the nicest possible way, this is bullshit. Anybody who has been in business-roles that involve reviewing legal documents will tell you that. TL;DR three things: 1. The AI will NOT tell you if it is the right document for the context, only a lawyer will do that 2. The AI is unlikely to correctly analyse the document, clauses in a legal document have inter-relation with each other and with the general context (perhaps even with other legal documents you have previously signed). That sort of analysis is only something a lawyer can do. 3. Perhaps MOST IMPORTANTLY ... with legal documents, often the important thing is not what is IN the document, but what is NOT IN there. Only a lawyer can tell you what is missing in a legal document AND help you get that missing stuff negotiated into it. Really, I'd run away from something like this as fast as you can.
- kemitchell 4y ago
  Whether you're using the right start point and picking the right optional pieces are definitely important. But for most kinds of agreements I see and advise on, there's nothing lawyers know that nobody else could know. What you need doesn't have to come from a lawyer, though it often does. Meanwhile, specifics of the deal and the broader context can also matter, sometime more than the abstractions legal forms tend to deal in. A lawyer may or may not notice those and reason through them. Paving an AI path over ill-fitting or over-standardized legal terms isn't great for the industry. Neither is reinforcing lawyer monopoly over business knowledge.
  - freejazz 4y ago
    Lawyers don't have a monopoloy over business knowledge, they have a monopoly over providing legal services.
    - okennedy 4y ago
      Lawyers also have a _legally binding obligation_ to provide accurate, context-aware, complete advice.
planede 4y ago
Uh, I wanted to try it with GPL v3, but no way I'm paying $111 for it.
tasseff 4y ago
Can this idea be turned on its head to engineer adversarial legal language that sounds reasonable but actually has terrible implications for the signee?
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- make3 4y ago
  I'm sure it would work with a LLM if you give it a few examples
- lordgrenville 4y ago
  I've heard that in situations like this courts will usually uphold the spirit and not the letter of the contract (same as eg if you have a typo and add a zero somewhere). Not a lawyer and might be 100% wrong on this.
  - awb 4y ago
    INAL, but I think this is true to a certain extent. I’m pretty sure for a contract to be legal both sides need to receive “valuable consideration” (something of value). So, if you get completely screwed over, I think there can be a legal remedy. But, I don’t think there’s much a court will do if you come out on the losing end of a contract, just based on the terms themselves as long as both parties still received something of value.
    - singleshot_ 4y ago
      I’d say it has more to do with the notion that a contract that represents a unilateral mistake of which the no mistaken party knew or should have known of, then the contract is voidable by the mistaken party. After all, it’s unlikely that you’re going to get no consideration in a contractual transaction… but if you get absolutely nothing, sure, the contract could be void for lack of consideration.
  - zopa 4y ago
freejazz 4y ago
It says all documents and summaries are deleted after 24 hours, but are the contents of the documents incorporated into a model? I'd imagine for some kinds of legal documents (say those under a court's protective order) this would present issues.
- adamsmith143 4y ago
  Are you able to convert the weights of a Neural Network into the training text that adjusted them?
  - freejazz 4y ago
    Simply allowing someone to do this could violate the court's order, is the point. Maybe detangle should give a summary on the kind of documents it can help with and how to identify them, if it's going to pretend to be anything like a lawyer.
    - adamsmith143 4y ago
      I'd question if that would hold up in court. Can the court order also be violated if I burn a contract and use the ashes to grow vegetables? Presumably about as much information in the contract is extractable from the vegetable as from a NN weight.
      - freejazz 4y ago
        If you gave the contract to someone (to burn) when the court order prohibited giving it to a non-party, yes, absolutely. No need to be obtuse about it and to fight the hypo. It isn't entirely unusual for a contract in a litigation to be marked as attorney's eyes only, or highly confidential, and for there to be a protective order limiting the distribution of such documents. Also would not be unusual for a party to produce such a document in the discovery process, to which a protective order would also apply.
      - amelius 4y ago
        Transformer based models have been shown to reproduce training text verbatim.
muttantt 4y ago
I tested with a 4 page basic agreement. Price quoted was $50+.
jmacd 4y ago
https://www.spellbook.legal https://www.spellbook.legal is another one I have seen that is doing the opposite (helping with the writing of contracts)
alexmolas 4y ago
With these prices they could have a lot of people in some cheap country summarizing the documents.
- xiphias2 4y ago
  It wouldn't be a bad idea either
t_serpico 4y ago
anyone else worried about how tools like this will make us dumber?
- quaintdev 4y ago
  It depends what you use the tool for. You can use tool for menial tasks while doing something highly creatives. Tools inherently don't make us dumber. The choice is always lies with the individual.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
quaintdev 4y ago
The summaries are good but I wish it also had the ability to answer my questions about document like whether something is allowed or not or what are my rights, etc,.
ahepp 4y ago
How is this "not legal advice"? You're _selling_ summaries of legal documents.
- superfrank 4y ago
  I assume their argument would be that they are just summarizing information that you provided and not giving you advice on what to do with this information. Similar to how summarizing a book's plot isn't an endorsement of that book. I'm not a lawyer though, so I have no idea if that logic would hold up in court. I'm just guessing that's the rational they are using.
bernardv 4y ago
The fact I have to upload to a server and my document will not be deleted for up to 24 hours, makes it a no go for most corporate users. Make this a standalone desktop app, with zero cloud dependency and it would be useful. This is very useful for a first pass through a legal doc, for example, to triage documents.
- binarymax 4y ago
  Also, it uses OpenAI services (GPT3) - so now you also need to understand their TOS and data retention policies. Makes it a non starter for any private or confidential documents.
peter_d_sherman 4y ago
I uploaded a copy of the U.S. Constitution... It told me that it would cost $123 USD to summarize... It also told me: >"This document summary is not legal advice or legally binding in any way. You should consult a lawyer." Opinion: A Lawyer would cost me less... <g> (Perhaps I could get a cheaper rate if I uploaded the Magna Carta or The Twelve Tables (of Ancient Rome) or the Ten Commandments or Newton's Three Laws -- or the Two Laws of Richard J Maybury: o Do all you have agreed to do o Do not encroach on other persons or their property ) All I know is, $123 is too expensive for me -- and, What if the AI takes the Law -- and interprets it all wrong? ? ???
denton-scratch 4y ago
I started wading through the Google example. I got about 0.25 of the way through. The glosses all seem accurate, if incomplete sometimes. I got a strong sense that they had been reviewed/polished by a human "expert". That might explain the pricing. I didn't find the glosses much clearer than the original, just shorter. The Google legalese I read was fairly clear. With the document being a legal contract, it's obviously vital to understand the legalese. I'd be impressed by an AI that can read an employment contract, and say "Whoah! Clause 31-B(ii) is implicitly asking you to sign your descendants into servitude in perpetuity! Perhaps you should take a look!", or "Did you notice that all benefits are contingent on stuff beyond your control?". I'd probably have paid $25 for that, because I've never had a lawyer scan my employment contract. I read them myself, but IANAL.
- goldforever 4y ago
  [dead]
jamesdwilson 4y ago
Does anyone know of a "Tangle" - it would be neat to do the inverse!
tluyben2 4y ago
You would actually want to discuss the document with a lawyer (AI), for instance asking if not paying the 100k in point 3.4.7a is enough for termination of the contract, show the reasons (copied from the doc and explained) and if yes, are there any clauses that invalidate that clause or any logical inconsistencies regarding that clause etc. As someone (no legal background) who has to read legal documents sometimes (perks of being a founder cough) and would take advice (yet) from an AI over a lawyer; the above would give me enough of an idea how exposed we are or not and if a lawyer should be contacted. I can read legalise quite well (perks of having been a founder for 35 years), but if its 100s of pages, I need to be able to ask questions about the doc to get an idea of where I stand. Which is why I would hire a lawyer to do a review after I send them my questions anyway.

112 points by Shpigford 4y ago

How is this tested to make sure the summaries aren't wrong?

Detangle gives you AI-generated summaries of your legal docs so you can understand what you're signing. Here's the YC SAFE, for example: https://detangle.ai/examples/yc-safe https://detangle.ai/examples/yc-safe

andrewfromx 4y ago
I wonder, what happens when you read just the summary of a complex section, sign, and then years later are in a lawsuit. If Detangled's algorithm in shown to have clearly written the summary wrong... are they in any way liable? hehe notice their own terms with summaries: https://detangle.ai/terms https://detangle.ai/terms
- Shpigford 4y ago
  That was the big reason for adding the massive disclaimer everywhere, but I guess we'll see. I also intentionally didn't just give an output of the summary but instead showed it next to each paragraph so the implication isn't that the summaries replaces the legal, but rather tries to clarify. Glad you noticed the Terms. :)
- NoboruWataya 4y ago
  From the original text: > We may suspend or terminate your right to use our website and terminate these Terms of Service immediately upon written notice to you for any breach of these Terms of Service. From the summary: > We can end this agreement any time we want. I read these as being quite different? The original text says they can only terminate for a breach by the user of the ToS, not simply "any time we want". I get that the service isn't supposed to replace actual legal advice but surely differences as glaring as these limit the usefulness of the summaries.
ryanlitalien 4y ago
Absolutely fantastic! This is a great use of AI here, definitely using this going forward. A bit concerned though, the LLC name doesn't give confidence when reading through the output with confidence.
simonista 4y ago
I'm excited to see where this goes because I think it is a cool application of AI. That said, two of the first three paragraph summaries are wrong in this example: > [Investor Name] gave [Company Name] the right to certain shares of its Capital Stock in exchange for [Amount] on [Date]. This is backwards > The Post-Money Valuation Cap is a number that is written in Section 2. This isn't true, the number is here, "additional defined terms" are later.
- treis 4y ago
  It's anywhere from slightly to very wrong for each section. Pretty cool as a tech demo but definitely should not be used to understand a legal document.
ahepp 4y ago
> AI-generated summaries of your legal docs so you can understand what you're signing. If you sell me a summary of a legal document, which was advertised as being useful to understand the legal document, that seems like just about the most straightforward case of legal advice I can imagine.

Ryanb58 4y ago

Love it! This is one of the best uses of ML/AI IMHO. I really dislike reading leasing agreements.

Shpigford 4y ago
Thanks so much!

falcolas 4y ago

Given how confident AI can be when it's incorrect, it feels like a bit of a problem to use AI with legal docs, since you can't really trust it to be correct (and the cost of being incorrect may be absurdly high).

oa335 4y ago
Agreed, I would still want a lawyer to take a look or anything of importance.
- Shpigford 4y ago
  I also would want a lawyer to take a look. Hence the note saying to talk to a lawyer. ;) The reality is, even knowing what to ask a lawyer can be difficult and it's not economically viable to ask a lawyer to summarize a 100-page legal document into text you can wrap your head around. Detangle just helps give some clarity so that you can further a conversation with a lawyer, or even just ask for clarification from the person who sent you the document. "Hey, this paragraph seems to imply XYZ...is that the case?" I'm making zero claims that this should replace a lawyer or be used as a replacement for legally binding text.
  - traceroute66 4y ago
    > even knowing what to ask a lawyer can be difficult That's the lawyer's job, to guide you through ! If they're not doing that, then find a different lawyer. The whole point is we are talking about legal document review here. Reviewing legal documents necessarily involves an active discussion with a lawyer, it is not something you can turn up with pre-prepared questions for.
    - drbwaa 4y ago
      > That's the lawyer's job, to guide you through ! If they're not doing that, then find a different lawyer. Yes! And if you happen to know that, and have a good lawyer, then you're all set. But a hell of a lot of lawyers won't volunteer to do this, or aren't competent enough to have this conversation productively with a layperson, and most people don't know to ask for it. I have my doubts as to the practicality, but a tool that could summarize and then prompt laypeople go to their lawyer to start that discussion seems like it could definitely have value. I suspect most people interested in this tool may already be knowledgeable enough to ask for a walkthrough anyway, but you could imagine implementations where the summary is presented directly, and could guide more people toward the help they need.

nerdponx 4y ago

What are they doing with all the uploaded document data? I didn't see that in their terms of use.

Shpigford 4y ago
We use GPT-3 to summarize it the document data. Then 24 hours later we completely delete all text, URLs and file uploads.
- mrstone 4y ago
  You do nothing with the data in the interim? I find that hard to believe.
- muttantt 4y ago
  No way any respectable lawyer thinks it's OK to upload a client agreement with confidential information to some fly by night website the promises to delete.

fellerts 4y ago

Who is the target audience for something like this? I'm not sure anybody is going to pay to have Apple's ToS simplified before clicking "agree". On the other hand, if you are squinting at a contract that actually matters, I don't think a service like this gives sufficient understanding of what all that legalese would actually mean if shit hits the fan. For example, changing the applicable law in a contract can yield wildly different interpretations without changing a word in the contract iself. This is why you should seek professional help when in doubt. You say "The summaries are to help inform conversations with actual lawyers", but would a lawyer give a rats ass about a layman's interpretation of an AI-backed translation of a legal doc from a company who "does not guarantee that the stuff on the website is good or works"? IANAL but I don't think so.

fnordpiglet 4y ago
I assume lawyers could benefit from a tool that can summarize a large document rapidly. They’re often faced with thousands of pages of documents, and in large class actions possibly hundreds of thousands to millions.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- traceroute66 4y ago
  > I assume lawyers could benefit from a tool that can summarize a large document rapidly. They’re often faced with thousands of pages of documents, and in large class actions possibly hundreds of thousands to millions. That tool is a human called a Junior Associate. And, no, you cannot replace a Junior Associate with AI for the reasons already outlined by @kkielhofner below. TL;DR: context... Junior has it. AI doesn't and will never do.
- alexdoesstuff 4y ago
  I imagine for use cases such as class action there may be a place for AI to effectively extract information from hundreds or thousands of similar but slightly different contracts. Same goes for other such situations, such as commercial landlords with significant rent portfolios, investors/banks with loan terms, or even investors more easily understanding the difference between various bond and/or loan terms. One of the key advantages of the recent advances in AI/ML to me is that it allows users to more efficiently extract unstructured information.

nashashmi 4y ago

I work through a bunch of contract documents reissued with a just a few changes. I need a service that would identify what the changes are instead of me going through each document and reading it over again Or doing a comparison of previously issued documents with this one.

yakshaving 4y ago
Interesting, what is your job? Contract lawyer? do you work in biglaw or in house counsel? or a vc firm?
- nashashmi 4y ago
  Engineering marketing concentrating on government proposal requests. That involves contracts, described scopes of work, etc.
NoboruWataya 4y ago
What do you mean exactly, are you just looking for software that will highlight the differences between two documents? That software exists already.
- nashashmi 4y ago
  Yes that software does exist and currently my go to method (convert pdf to word document, compare changes in word). The ideal system would highlight (sets of) text that that's common between both documents and underline text that is original. Or vice versa.
  - freejazz 4y ago
    You can run redlines of PDFs in Adobe Acrobat pro, no need to conver to word. "The ideal system would highlight (sets of) text that that's common between both documents and underline text that is original. Or vice versa." Just change your settings in microsoft word.
4y ago

traceroute66 4y ago

I'm sorry, but in the nicest possible way, this is bullshit. Anybody who has been in business-roles that involve reviewing legal documents will tell you that. TL;DR three things: 1. The AI will NOT tell you if it is the right document for the context, only a lawyer will do that 2. The AI is unlikely to correctly analyse the document, clauses in a legal document have inter-relation with each other and with the general context (perhaps even with other legal documents you have previously signed). That sort of analysis is only something a lawyer can do. 3. Perhaps MOST IMPORTANTLY ... with legal documents, often the important thing is not what is IN the document, but what is NOT IN there. Only a lawyer can tell you what is missing in a legal document AND help you get that missing stuff negotiated into it. Really, I'd run away from something like this as fast as you can.

kemitchell 4y ago
Whether you're using the right start point and picking the right optional pieces are definitely important. But for most kinds of agreements I see and advise on, there's nothing lawyers know that nobody else could know. What you need doesn't have to come from a lawyer, though it often does. Meanwhile, specifics of the deal and the broader context can also matter, sometime more than the abstractions legal forms tend to deal in. A lawyer may or may not notice those and reason through them. Paving an AI path over ill-fitting or over-standardized legal terms isn't great for the industry. Neither is reinforcing lawyer monopoly over business knowledge.
- freejazz 4y ago
  Lawyers don't have a monopoloy over business knowledge, they have a monopoly over providing legal services.
  - okennedy 4y ago
    Lawyers also have a _legally binding obligation_ to provide accurate, context-aware, complete advice.

planede 4y ago

Uh, I wanted to try it with GPL v3, but no way I'm paying $111 for it.

tasseff 4y ago

Can this idea be turned on its head to engineer adversarial legal language that sounds reasonable but actually has terrible implications for the signee?

deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
make3 4y ago
I'm sure it would work with a LLM if you give it a few examples
lordgrenville 4y ago
I've heard that in situations like this courts will usually uphold the spirit and not the letter of the contract (same as eg if you have a typo and add a zero somewhere). Not a lawyer and might be 100% wrong on this.
- awb 4y ago
  INAL, but I think this is true to a certain extent. I’m pretty sure for a contract to be legal both sides need to receive “valuable consideration” (something of value). So, if you get completely screwed over, I think there can be a legal remedy. But, I don’t think there’s much a court will do if you come out on the losing end of a contract, just based on the terms themselves as long as both parties still received something of value.
  - singleshot_ 4y ago
    I’d say it has more to do with the notion that a contract that represents a unilateral mistake of which the no mistaken party knew or should have known of, then the contract is voidable by the mistaken party. After all, it’s unlikely that you’re going to get no consideration in a contractual transaction… but if you get absolutely nothing, sure, the contract could be void for lack of consideration.
- zopa 4y ago

freejazz 4y ago

It says all documents and summaries are deleted after 24 hours, but are the contents of the documents incorporated into a model? I'd imagine for some kinds of legal documents (say those under a court's protective order) this would present issues.

adamsmith143 4y ago
Are you able to convert the weights of a Neural Network into the training text that adjusted them?
- freejazz 4y ago
  Simply allowing someone to do this could violate the court's order, is the point. Maybe detangle should give a summary on the kind of documents it can help with and how to identify them, if it's going to pretend to be anything like a lawyer.
  - adamsmith143 4y ago
    I'd question if that would hold up in court. Can the court order also be violated if I burn a contract and use the ashes to grow vegetables? Presumably about as much information in the contract is extractable from the vegetable as from a NN weight.
    - freejazz 4y ago
      If you gave the contract to someone (to burn) when the court order prohibited giving it to a non-party, yes, absolutely. No need to be obtuse about it and to fight the hypo. It isn't entirely unusual for a contract in a litigation to be marked as attorney's eyes only, or highly confidential, and for there to be a protective order limiting the distribution of such documents. Also would not be unusual for a party to produce such a document in the discovery process, to which a protective order would also apply.
    - amelius 4y ago
      Transformer based models have been shown to reproduce training text verbatim.

muttantt 4y ago

I tested with a 4 page basic agreement. Price quoted was $50+.

jmacd 4y ago

https://www.spellbook.legal https://www.spellbook.legal is another one I have seen that is doing the opposite (helping with the writing of contracts)

alexmolas 4y ago

With these prices they could have a lot of people in some cheap country summarizing the documents.

xiphias2 4y ago
It wouldn't be a bad idea either

t_serpico 4y ago

anyone else worried about how tools like this will make us dumber?

quaintdev 4y ago
It depends what you use the tool for. You can use tool for menial tasks while doing something highly creatives. Tools inherently don't make us dumber. The choice is always lies with the individual.
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]

quaintdev 4y ago

The summaries are good but I wish it also had the ability to answer my questions about document like whether something is allowed or not or what are my rights, etc,.

ahepp 4y ago

How is this "not legal advice"? You're _selling_ summaries of legal documents.

superfrank 4y ago
I assume their argument would be that they are just summarizing information that you provided and not giving you advice on what to do with this information. Similar to how summarizing a book's plot isn't an endorsement of that book. I'm not a lawyer though, so I have no idea if that logic would hold up in court. I'm just guessing that's the rational they are using.

bernardv 4y ago

The fact I have to upload to a server and my document will not be deleted for up to 24 hours, makes it a no go for most corporate users. Make this a standalone desktop app, with zero cloud dependency and it would be useful. This is very useful for a first pass through a legal doc, for example, to triage documents.

binarymax 4y ago
Also, it uses OpenAI services (GPT3) - so now you also need to understand their TOS and data retention policies. Makes it a non starter for any private or confidential documents.

peter_d_sherman 4y ago

I uploaded a copy of the U.S. Constitution... It told me that it would cost $123 USD to summarize... It also told me: >"This document summary is not legal advice or legally binding in any way. You should consult a lawyer." Opinion: A Lawyer would cost me less... <g> (Perhaps I could get a cheaper rate if I uploaded the Magna Carta or The Twelve Tables (of Ancient Rome) or the Ten Commandments or Newton's Three Laws -- or the Two Laws of Richard J Maybury: o Do all you have agreed to do o Do not encroach on other persons or their property ) All I know is, $123 is too expensive for me -- and, What if the AI takes the Law -- and interprets it all wrong? ? ???

denton-scratch 4y ago

I started wading through the Google example. I got about 0.25 of the way through. The glosses all seem accurate, if incomplete sometimes. I got a strong sense that they had been reviewed/polished by a human "expert". That might explain the pricing. I didn't find the glosses much clearer than the original, just shorter. The Google legalese I read was fairly clear. With the document being a legal contract, it's obviously vital to understand the legalese. I'd be impressed by an AI that can read an employment contract, and say "Whoah! Clause 31-B(ii) is implicitly asking you to sign your descendants into servitude in perpetuity! Perhaps you should take a look!", or "Did you notice that all benefits are contingent on stuff beyond your control?". I'd probably have paid $25 for that, because I've never had a lawyer scan my employment contract. I read them myself, but IANAL.

goldforever 4y ago
[dead]

jamesdwilson 4y ago

Does anyone know of a "Tangle" - it would be neat to do the inverse!

tluyben2 4y ago

You would actually want to discuss the document with a lawyer (AI), for instance asking if not paying the 100k in point 3.4.7a is enough for termination of the contract, show the reasons (copied from the doc and explained) and if yes, are there any clauses that invalidate that clause or any logical inconsistencies regarding that clause etc. As someone (no legal background) who has to read legal documents sometimes (perks of being a founder cough) and would take advice (yet) from an AI over a lawyer; the above would give me enough of an idea how exposed we are or not and if a lawyer should be contacted. I can read legalise quite well (perks of having been a founder for 35 years), but if its 100s of pages, I need to be able to ask questions about the doc to get an idea of where I stand. Which is why I would hire a lawyer to do a review after I send them my questions anyway.