Comment by bshipp | Hacker News Reader

Comment by bshipp | Hacker News Reader

I've worked in agriculture all my life and a case like this doesn't surprise me in the least, nor does the inevitable responses in social media that infantalize farmers as dumb hicks who have to be protected from themselves. If you're responding to a buyer offering an $57,000 contract with an emoji you're not acting very professionally. This is nothing more than seller's remorse. You'd better believe that this farmer would be threatening lawsuits if the price for flax had fallen in the meantime and the buyer was the one arguing about the thumbs-up signal.

Regardless, this shouldn't have been an issue at all if the farmer had adequately hedged his position with an offsetting buy option at the sale price that would have captured any significant price movement (outside of any basis shift).

This farmer was playing loose with risk management and wanted someone to eat his $25,000 mistake (higher $82K later crop value minus original approx $57K contract value at $17/bu for 86 tonnes).

EDIT: now that I think more about it, I'd guess this farmer completely forgot about the sale agreement and this argument about the emoji was a post-hoc invention by his lawyer to try and weasel out of paying the terminal $82,000.

> If you're responding to a buyer offering an $57,000 contract with an emoji you're not acting very professionally.

Maybe not, but if I sent a text saying ‘I’ve sent you the contract’ and got a thumbs up or the iOS Tapback thumbs up, 100% I’d assume they were acknowledging my message, not signing the contract.

Would a voice replying saying ‘yes’ or ‘yeah’ constitute a signed contract too?

> Maybe not, but if I sent a text saying ‘I’ve sent you the contract’

That's not what the text here said.

Yes, the same terse response in a different context has a different natural interpretation.

Yeah the article clearly states that the message sent was "please confirm contract" and the response was [thumbs up].

If this is the first time you've interacted with a buyer/seller, absolutely you'd need clarification. But if they've been dealing together for years and the farmer has previously responded--and delivered--on a text message contract, it's a different story.

I standby my assertion that the farmer simply forgot about this exchange and was shocked to get a bill for the replacement value of the contract when he didn't show up with it. This amount of flax is likely grown on about a quarter section in Saskatchewan, or 160 acres. The average grain farm size is almost 1,800 acres, so this size would be less than 10% of the total harvested area, and many farms are double and triple that size. Easy to forget about six months after the text exchange.

Agreement via text in text message and agreement via emoji in text message are two different things. I wish the article would have been more specific about the past texts, if they were also thumbs up, then the farmer clearly agreed, but if the past affirmative agreements were written in text, then I don't think the ruling was reasonable.

The emoji is certainly problematic, but it wasn't the sole piece of evidence regarding the contract.

"The buyer, Kent Mickleborough, later spoke with Swift Current farmer Chris Achter on the phone and texted a picture of a contract to deliver the flax in November, adding 'please confirm flax contract.'"

If I've talked to you on the phone about the contract and then send the image with a request to confirm the flax contract, it's harder to argue that a thumbs-up only reflects receipt of the message instead of a confirmation, especially if no further response is sent by the recipient.

I don’t think it’s hard to argue that. We have multiple people in this thread, including myself, who understand that a thumbs up often denotes acknowledgment rather than acceptance, an “OK” rather than a “yes”. If I discuss an agreement with you and then send it over, and you send me a thumbs up, I’m still going to interpret it that way and follow up later for a clear confirmation.

I can see how the buyer might interpret it as acceptance, but it’s such a vague response that it was irresponsible not to follow up, and I can’t help but disagree with the decision in this case.

If I spoke with you on the phone about the contract and sent you the contract later on WhatsApp with a message please confirm the contract. And you answered with thumbs up. I would assume that you are confirming the contract and not that you received it.

That’s fine. We would both interpret it differently. A lot of reasonable people would. That’s my point. It’s not that a thumbs up can’t mean approval, but that it just as well can mean acknowledgment.

Fortunately in this case they had the opportunity to present their cases in front of a judge and get a specific determination based on the merits!

And fortunately I'm allowed to disagree with and criticize that determination. Or is your position that courts never make mistakes?

"A monk asked Tozan, "What is the Buddha?" Tozan answered, "Three pounds of flax!"

Of course not. The point is we don’t have to care what you (or I) think.

> I would assume that you are confirming the contract and not that you received it.

What’s the point of the contract section where the signature goes? It’s there to remove ambiguity surely?

> thumbs up often denotes acknowledgment rather than acceptance

This is the key. It's a pity there isn't a widely accepted standard here. A 'friendly acknowledge' and an 'I accept'.

That said, this is why contracts exists.

> who have to be protected from themselves.

Taking a look at how much they receive in government subsidies quickly proves that, yes, they need protecting from themselves.

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