Hello all, I am an attorney in the U.S. and I also own and operate a few e-commerce retail sites running on Drupal with Ubercart. Currently my law practice is primarily focused on U.S. immigration law but I have some good friends that run a Drupal development shop (Commerce Guys) and I frequently help them out with contracts and other things they need for their business. I am far from a Drupal expert but I am pretty proficient and understand a lot of the issues related to web-development and e-commerce that affect both developers and site owners. I am considering expanding my legal practice to include offering contract, copyright and other legal services that may be commonly needed by members of the Drupal community. There are lots of things I need to consider and look into before I decide whether or not this makes sense but I thought before I did that I might ask for some input from the community regarding the types of legal issues that are most commonly faced by Drupaler's so I can get an idea of what types of services I might want to offer and if it is viable for me to do so. Thanks for sharing your thoughts on this.
Comments
My experience
Hi Phil,
This is a conversation that is very much needed. If I were you, and wanted to help the most people in the simplest way, I'd consider contributing a document to drupal.org, outlining the reasons why contracts are important. I'd focus in on the fact that a very well qualified and reputable customer rids one of the need for contracts overall, which is why they are so important. If a customer is above board, then they're completely at peace with a contract that benefits both Drupal service provider and themselves equally.
Most Drupal designers who might need your services are likely to be currently in a negative relationship about which they immediately need guidance. If they encountered your overall document on the subject, they'd likely give you a call. In my experience, this is how it works. Contribute a little and benefit greatly from the momentum that Drupal generates.
As far as defining exact service offerings, I'd see this as a work in progress initially. Craft a document regarding how important contracts are, then see what services people need.
My experience is that getting paid, is the most contentious issue where Web design overall is concerned.
Because customers are so busy, they rarely have time to create reasonable specification documents around which deliverables can be defined, costed, and scheduled. They give a total dollar amount for a finished unspecified Website. If the designer doesn't deliver an amazing website that magically suits what the customer is dreaming, then the customer simply withholds payment. It happens all the time. Web designers want work so they take on projects under these conditions and have no legal recourse when payment is withheld.
A document explaining why a project needs to be properly defined in order for any contract to be worthwhile, outlining the logic behind it would save a lot of grief for a lot of new Drupal designers. You could title it "Supplier Beware" or something like that.
Anyway, good luck,
Robbie Jackson
www.drupalcreations.com
robbiejackson@drupalcreations.com
Great input
Hey Robbie, thanks a lot for taking the time to provide some thoughtful input. I really like your idea about doing some sort of document about contract management in general and sharing that with the community. And you've hit the nail on the head with the primary issue developers face and I think you have described it quite well. No one wants to take the time to properly plan for or specify a project but when it doesn't turn out as the envisioned they are mad and don't want to pay. It happens in all kinds of service industry including construction, landscaping and a lot of other things. I've seen this issue in many different service industries over the course of my professional life. In fact, a good friend of mine runs a landscape company in Seattle and he called me yesterday because a customer did not want to pay him. Apparently, he was hired to bring in some new dirt to create some landscape beds at a new construction home and the contract specified that he would bring in 2-3" of top soil. The customer did not want to pay because the top soil "raised the grade" of his landscape. The point of that detail was that sometimes even when you have adequate specifications it is not sufficient to deal with those special assholes we all encounter so we have to learn how to screen these people out and be prepared to manage them if they sneak through.
I used to do a lot more contract work and business transactions than I am doing now and I used to always preach to my clients the importance of taking the time to properly document their business relationships and transactions. No one wants to spend the money on legal services when relationships are all warm and fuzzy at the beginning but if they don't and the relationship falls apart they have no clear contract to enforce and are usually stuck with the option of eating the loss or pursuing litigation which is a terribly expensive and inefficient process for resolving disputes. Many these people didn't take my advice and called me months later and wasted more money on litigation.
The other thing that I think people don't realize about the value of good contracts is why they actually minimize the chances of disputes. A good contract does not minimize the chances of a dispute because it allows one party to beat the other up with it and threaten to enforce it; rather, a good contract prevents disputes because the process of preparing the contract forces the parties to hammer out details that might not otherwise be considered.
Ok, I could go on for a while here but this has got some ideas flowing so I think I'll but the rest of it in a document and post it. Thanks again for your thoughtful input.
Philip C. Curtis
www.pcurtislaw.com
phil@pcurtislaw.com
Philip C. Curtis
phil@pcurtislaw.com
http://www.pcurtislaw.com
Open source law
First off, I think it's a great idea to have legal professionals that are knowledgeable about the needs of businesses that do software consulting and services. Specialization in some of the ins and outs of open source is even more useful. So yes, I think there is a market and as Robbie posted, I think you should write about the importance of contracts.
Secondly, I think you should have an open source, base contract - see http://lexpubli.ca/ for more detail. Not every contract is boilerplate, but those that have simple needs aren't likely going to pay you anyway, and those that will pay will come to you since the contract is something you are an expert in.
So, if you are familiar with Drupal, you'll see how that would appeal to the community here, while at the same time promoting yourself as an expert in the space. I would be happy to introduce you to the folks at LexPublica if you want to discuss it further -- just contact me.
Serving Many Markets
More great input! Really glad I made this post. I totally agree with this. Legal services are expensive and many small transactions simply don't present significant risks that warrant payment of high legal fees to have a custom document drafted for each situation. I took a quick look the the lexpubli.ca site and I like what they are doing there. I am working on the document Robbie suggested now and thought I might spend some more term learning more about issues and see if I can come up with a document template that people can use as a starting point. Most attorneys work with templates of some sort anyway and its really just customization of those documents to more specialized needs or just to match the specific business practices of the business who will use the document. Another problem is that there are a lot of professional rules that govern lawyers which prevent delivery legal services in manners which I think make perfect sense and would allow attorneys to serve clients in different types of markets. I've taken a similar approach with respect to my immigration law practice by pubishing free guides for certain immigration processes and can (in most cases) be adequately managed by a non-lawyer. I don't particularly enjoy those types of engagements and I would rather position myself as someone who can offer a lot of good open source resources and be available to assist in matters that are more complicated and I can really add value. I've been practicing for about 9 years and spent the first 5 years doing a lot of civil litigation. No one ever won, everyone lost and it was a terribly inefficient and miserable process for all involved. Clients were never happy with the service that was provided even if they got a good result because no one wants to be sued or sue and spent money on legal fees. That's one of the reasons I started doing immigration law. My clients get something of great value to them and they are always gracious. Plus, I don't have to deal with other lawyers :) The other problem with lawyers is they are so afraid of getting sued for malpractice they often over-lawyer things when the economic circumstances of the deal don't warrant that kind of investment. I could go on and on...
Anyway, I would really like to talk to the lepubli.ca folks but I am still sort of in the initial phases about hashing out how I might do this and want to finish the informational document I am working on first. I'll contact you for an introduction one I get that far. Thanks so much for taking the time to give this some thought and provide the great input.
Philip C. Curtis
phil@pcurtislaw.com
http://www.pcurtislaw.com