Legal contracts for freelance developers on Github | Hacker News Reader

Legal contracts for freelance developers on Github

blog.danielbeardsley.com

4 pointsdbeardsl6 comments

From earlier today (since it's related, especially the HN comments): http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2612245

Personally, I would be wary of using any contract written by someone who isn't a lawyer. Telling people that you feel "there is no need to state the obvious as many contracts do" doesn't instil a lot of confidence either: how do you know what needs to be explicitly stated and what doesn't?

I mentioned that because I'd seen a lot of contracts that included drivel about how the developer is free to have other contracts, free to set their own hours, ... stuff that is implicit.

Getting a contract like this worked over by a lawyer would be a great help. That's why I open-sourced it, hoping to get more exposure and some feedback from knowledgeable people.

It may be implicit, however some tax laws (I'm Australian, not sure of how this works in the states) can look through contracts and treat them as employment arrangments unless the contracts specifically allow for the ability to subcontract out work, the ability to work for other people and for the responsibility regarding rectification of work. I'd be interested to know if the US has similar look through arrangements for contractors.

Some comments (IANAL):

You might want to retain copyright until the work is paid for in full.

You can't really "issue" a contract. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meeting_of_the_minds. This messes up your definition of "Developer". Just state the two parties by name.

The copyright assignment makes no sense. It basically reads "the client has copyright, except when he doesn't".

Termination: so I give you 14 days notice within the 30 day payment window and then all your outstanding invoices are cancelled so I never have to pay? Great!

I don't think you should have to get a lawyer, but you do need a contract to be unambiguous. I don't think that yours is.

Good points, This is why I put it on github, to get feedback and improve.

Github repo: https://github.com/danielbeardsley/service_contracts/blob/ma...

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