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Ask HN: I Need a Software Contracts Lawyer

3 points by gavinhoward 3y ago

I'm building a software business. I need legal help drafting a standard contract for clients. I tried in my local area, but unfortunately, the only lawyer I could find that was capable of what I need was not a good fit. My business model is excellent support and some limited liability for my software. I intend to trailblaze a path toward professional liability in our industry. If you know of a lawyer, please comment with their name, but only if they are taking new clients and there is a good chance they would be interested in the work. If you are such a lawyer and are interested in the work, please contact me at <my_first_name>@<business_site_in_my_profile>. Bonus points for lawyers used to working in FOSS because I've got some licenses that need professional revision. [1] However, I'm willing to use a separate lawyer for that work. [1]: https://yzena.com/licenses/

galaxyLogic 3y ago
How much do you expect to pay for such a service? Not offering any but possibly looking for a lawyer myself .
- gavinhoward 3y ago
  A lot. I expect it to take 5-10 hours, and I expect to pay about $500 an hour. So $2500-5000. But I already have a contract drafted, with footnotes explaining my thought process, details about what must be kept and what can be tweaked, etc. This is supposed to make it so the lawyer needs little time to understand my intention and draft the real thing based on pre-existing templates. Basically, I did hours of work upfront to save hours of lawyer time.
graderjs 3y ago
Talk to chat-gpt4, consider the Polyform licenses.
- gavinhoward 3y ago
  No, I will not talk to ChatGPT. I hate AI, and I need professional help. I'm going to be accepting some liability; I need this contract to be bulletproof. The Polyform licenses are good, but they do not quite serve my needs.
brudgers 3y ago
If you are in the US, your state bar association has a referral service. You could probably contact an out of state bar as well if you live in a small state, but I am not totally sure. But, to ME: I intend to trailblaze a path toward professional liability in our industry. makes zero business sense (again to ME). For starters, clients want contracts that look like other contracts because it makes things easy. But more deeply, if in the face of a real problem people are pointing at contract clauses, the relationship is fucked and that's always a bigger problem than the technical problem. Stable business relationships allow for humans being human because that's how we understand each other. Finally, the last thing your clients want is to have to involve lawyers and insurance because that all costs more than the amount of your contract. Complicated non-standard contracts are a red flag. Collecting on insurance is pennies on dollars. Good luck.
- themodelplumber 3y ago
  > the relationship is fucked and that's always a bigger problem than the technical problem. That's a really good point. Plus, a big focus on "us" having professional levels of liability is sometimes a foil for a subjective focus on "how amazingly liable / responsible / moral a person I am compared to everyone else in my field," which is really off-putting, whether op intends it to be taken that way or not...

3 points by gavinhoward 3y ago

galaxyLogic 3y ago

How much do you expect to pay for such a service? Not offering any but possibly looking for a lawyer myself .

gavinhoward 3y ago
A lot. I expect it to take 5-10 hours, and I expect to pay about $500 an hour. So $2500-5000. But I already have a contract drafted, with footnotes explaining my thought process, details about what must be kept and what can be tweaked, etc. This is supposed to make it so the lawyer needs little time to understand my intention and draft the real thing based on pre-existing templates. Basically, I did hours of work upfront to save hours of lawyer time.

graderjs 3y ago

Talk to chat-gpt4, consider the Polyform licenses.

gavinhoward 3y ago
No, I will not talk to ChatGPT. I hate AI, and I need professional help. I'm going to be accepting some liability; I need this contract to be bulletproof. The Polyform licenses are good, but they do not quite serve my needs.

brudgers 3y ago

If you are in the US, your state bar association has a referral service. You could probably contact an out of state bar as well if you live in a small state, but I am not totally sure. But, to ME: I intend to trailblaze a path toward professional liability in our industry. makes zero business sense (again to ME). For starters, clients want contracts that look like other contracts because it makes things easy. But more deeply, if in the face of a real problem people are pointing at contract clauses, the relationship is fucked and that's always a bigger problem than the technical problem. Stable business relationships allow for humans being human because that's how we understand each other. Finally, the last thing your clients want is to have to involve lawyers and insurance because that all costs more than the amount of your contract. Complicated non-standard contracts are a red flag. Collecting on insurance is pennies on dollars. Good luck.

themodelplumber 3y ago
> the relationship is fucked and that's always a bigger problem than the technical problem. That's a really good point. Plus, a big focus on "us" having professional levels of liability is sometimes a foil for a subjective focus on "how amazingly liable / responsible / moral a person I am compared to everyone else in my field," which is really off-putting, whether op intends it to be taken that way or not...