Legalese has a UI problem: aka spreadsheets are shite

[Billy Te]

Trying to go through the Hello World tutorial felt archaic. Yes you were using google spreadsheets, but why? First of all, the formatting of the spreadsheet was unreadable, with a floating hedgehog on the side of the page. Second of all, the formatting was terrible (as to be expected from a spreadsheet). 

For all the talk about programmers, it almost seems like legalese doesn't have any on board. Is that the case? Why isn't this a web application like Docracy is? 

Also, the website itself has a usability problem. I have no idea from the frontpage what docracy is or does specifically. Searching the website, I have no idea what its vision is of how to apply the concepts thrown about in the webpage. Contract generation using DRY principles, sure. Code, sure. But how is this meant to be done? Surely not in spreadsheets!(?)

I think this is a great idea, but I don't know where you guys are going with this. When I program, I build modules from modules from modules. Its modules all the way down, after all. How would this look in a large contract? What's an example? I'm not familiar enough with how lawyers create contracts to know whether the module pattern even works for contracts. Variables, and if statements, sure, easy. Globbing together multiple contracts into one by simple appending, sure, easy enough. But I can't imagine how you could have a nested structure of contracts that would make sense. What are the basic building blocks of law? This needs to be explained better on the website. 

In fact, the whole website needs a revamp. There is no call to action on the front page. Nothing that indicates how to get started. Nothing that indicates what legalese DOES for you. Where is the library of contract modules I can take a look at? Where are final examples I can see? 

Is this currently vaporware or what?

[Billy Te]

Also, for god's sake, don't put all your research and footnotes at the *top* of the page (eg on the Past and Present pages). I didn't want to read reams of links, and so didn't even find the meat at the bottom of the Present page until going back. That text should be on the front page.

So it looks like the main difference is a multi-document approach. You create a document set, and generate them based on parameters. This is a step in the right direction, but it wouldn't seem that's much more than what something like Docracy offers. More interesting would be to find a way to break down this contracts into components you could compose together into full documents. In fact, that would also be a much better way of generating DRY documentation of any kind. 

[Benjamin Scherrey]

Critique noted and very much well aware.  Actually last week we just kicked off a development effort to replace the spreadsheet with a proper web app. Stay tuned...

  - - Ben

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[Billy Te]

That's great to hear!

On Tuesday, November 15, 2016 at 3:46:16 AM UTC-8, Benjamin Scherrey wrote:

Critique noted and very much well aware.  Actually last week we just kicked off a development effort to replace the spreadsheet with a proper web app. Stay tuned...

  - - Ben

On Nov 15, 2016 5:43 PM, "Billy Te" <fresh...@gmail.com> wrote:

Trying to go through the Hello World tutorial felt archaic. Yes you were using google spreadsheets, but why? First of all, the formatting of the spreadsheet was unreadable, with a floating hedgehog on the side of the page. Second of all, the formatting was terrible (as to be expected from a spreadsheet). 

For all the talk about programmers, it almost seems like legalese doesn't have any on board. Is that the case? Why isn't this a web application like Docracy is? 

Also, the website itself has a usability problem. I have no idea from the frontpage what docracy is or does specifically. Searching the website, I have no idea what its vision is of how to apply the concepts thrown about in the webpage. Contract generation using DRY principles, sure. Code, sure. But how is this meant to be done? Surely not in spreadsheets!(?)

I think this is a great idea, but I don't know where you guys are going with this. When I program, I build modules from modules from modules. Its modules all the way down, after all. How would this look in a large contract? What's an example? I'm not familiar enough with how lawyers create contracts to know whether the module pattern even works for contracts. Variables, and if statements, sure, easy. Globbing together multiple contracts into one by simple appending, sure, easy enough. But I can't imagine how you could have a nested structure of contracts that would make sense. What are the basic building blocks of law? This needs to be explained better on the website. 

In fact, the whole website needs a revamp. There is no call to action on the front page. Nothing that indicates how to get started. Nothing that indicates what legalese DOES for you. Where is the library of contract modules I can take a look at? Where are final examples I can see? 

Is this currently vaporware or what?

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[Meng Weng Wong]

On Tue, Nov 15, 2016 at 5:31 AM, Billy Te <fresh...@gmail.com> wrote:

Trying to go through the Hello World tutorial felt archaic. Yes you were using google spreadsheets, but why? First of all, the formatting of the spreadsheet was unreadable, with a floating hedgehog on the side of the page. Second of all, the formatting was terrible (as to be expected from a spreadsheet). 

Hey, I really appreciate the feedback. The current spreadsheet-based product is version 1. It started life as an internal project that we opened up for public use, mostly floated as a trial balloon to see if people would find it useful.

So far a couple of extremely motivated end-users have managed to fight their way through several levels and win the game … but they had to be extremely motivated.

http://startupquote.com/post/855482768

We concluded that the MVP was a success and will now build v2 and v3 so that the vapourware condenses into something more solid.

That will take some time. Thank you for your patience. Also, I have deleted the hedgehog.