Can lawyers be replaced by smart contracts? (From Zero Hedge)

southerncross

southerncross

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Most people not directly involved with Crypto's are actually unaware of the underlying technology that it can provide, or of the endless disruption possible that it offers in today's society.
Legal contracts are a part of everyday life, everything from signing a Real Estate contract to buying Health or Funeral Insurance involves some sort of legal contract, Loans, Buying a car or even getting a landscaper in to sort out your yard can involve one.

How many times have you heard of someone getting done over by one of the above scenarios due to shoddy or shady business practices ? Maybe Blockchain can fix that issue ?

Ignorance of the law excuses no one. Every business has to be aware of and abide by regulations that concern their operations. It’s not only large corporations who should be aware of certain legal liabilities and issues.

Ventures exploring innovation may touch on legal gray areas and even small businesses still have to deal with routine compliance. Having legal input is necessary to mitigate exposure and risks down the line.

Unfortunately, legal expertise is often seen as a luxury especially by startups and small enterprises. Legal services aren’t exactly cheap. However, forgoing legal consultations can be quite the risky especially for businesses operating in highly litigious societies.

Any hint of bad service can be seen as an opportunity for a lawsuit. Suits, no matter how frivolous, can be unnecessary burdens for growing operations.

Technology is starting to offer solutions to this concern. Blockchain, the technology that powers cryptocurrencies like bitcoin, provides secure and immutable record keeping.

This capability makes it promising for legal applications. New blockchain platforms are now also capable of enabling smart contracts – software that could record the terms of agreements on the blockchain and even automate their fulfillment as conditions are met.

As such, smart contracts appear poised to take over certain legal functions. But will they be enough to replace lawyers?

Smart contracts made easy
Many ventures are already embracing blockchain. Secure and immutable records are crucial in most business functions so applications of blockchain are now explored in a variety of industries.

Even large enterprises and traditional financial institutions have embarked on their respective blockchain projects. Gartner projects that blockchain and smart contracts will be in use by more than 25 percent of organizations worldwide by 2025.
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http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-10-10/can-lawyers-be-replaced-smart-contracts
 
Basically there is no comeback on either side of a smart contract, the contract is what the contract is, and there is Zero ambiguity on either side, IE nothing to argue about. If one side of the contract is contravened then the contract is null and void. EG: A tenant fails to pay rent in time in the example of a Real Estate contract then they forfeit their bond under the contract. No if's or Buts, the Tenant is out and there is a complete record of the legal agreement via the blockchain for the lessor to refer to.
Alternatively for the Lessee there is a likewise rock solid record of both the agreement and a record of payment as well that is unarguable due to the blockchain record.

This might or might not be a missed single rental payment and you are out or not, it all depends on the actual contract itself, but there is not any he said they said argey bargey about such things: It is just what it is under the Blockchain agreement ..... Full Stop.

Such agreements provide a rock solid record of he said she said things, and avoid the need for a third party on either side to come to terms in the middle. IE it is either one side or the other who is right, and the Blockchain is irrefutable evidence as to that evidence chain.
 
Don't know about lawyers per se, some of the complex legal cases could not really be handled by smart contracts or AI robots for that matter.

I see smart contracts as effectively being able to Automate Legal Transactions so a rental agreement, a property or asset sale, maybe even a marriage/divorce could be done by individuals on a blockchain via smart contract without ANY 3rd party involvement. This would be a cheap, quick and risk free way of doing it compared to the status quo.

You'd still need lawyers to write the smart contract in the first place. At the start they would be atomic, generic, repeatable legal transactions but it's not far away.
 
Quick, easy, fully transparent, cheap, standardised. What else do you need?

Imagine something like a holiday apartment which has a security code to unlock the front door and put the power on. A code that changes every day. You could rent that out via a blockchain smart contract. Send payment to an address for X days and get the code for X days. The cleaner gets the code for X+1 day. No booking fees, no agents, it's instant, it's refundable.

Sure, maybe it'll take 10-20 years to see this kind of implementation in action. Maybe there are some kinks to get worked out. So what? It'll happen. I don't need to convince you and not urging you to invest in the crypto space if you don't see it. But this stuff is possible and it WILL have advantages.

You probably still have doubts. Thats OK. Here's a fun one I came across yesterday if you need any reminders :-

https://steemit.com/technology/@pen...ull-of-wrong-predictions-about-new-technology
 
I look forward to the day this happens.

At the moment the legal system seems to be a complete mess, with a never ending stream of new laws, old laws still on the books, new laws modifying old laws etc.

If your lawyer is better than the oppositions lawyer you may well win, if not, you may lose. You are simultaneously in the right and in the wrong until one lawyer prevails.

If your lawyer is having a bad day you might lose anyway.

It will never* happen though as it seems a lot of the law is how you interpret it, or at least, how it has been interpreted in the past. It would be nice to be able to have an impartial electronic lawyer/judge that gets fed all the pertinent facts and then spits out a result. Cheaper too.

You would be able to input scenarios and then decide whether to follow through with them based on how legal it is, knowing that if you actually follow through with your scenario, the outcome will not change.


Looking forward to AI doctors too :)



*It will happen far in the future when someone has digitised all the laws on the books, cross referenced them against each other weeded out the old ones and gone to all that effort. Sounds like a job for artificial intelligence to me.
 
Bullion Baron said:
The whole process you are outlining could be implemented through some rule based software
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I think you're missing the point. Where does this software exist? On a server somewhere? Managed by a 3rd party? With it's own hosting costs, transaction fees for the provider etc?

It's only ever small incremental change. It is only disruptive in that a whole bunch of middle men (and industries) are going to be made redundant. That's either a big deal, or it isn't, depending on if you happen to be one of those made redundant.
 
@BuggedOut et al, can you see this technology challenging the State’s monopoly on civil law enforcement? The very nature of our overly complex legal system means we are reliant on vast numbers of lawyers - which of course is great if you’re a solicitor, magistrate or judge.

That would be the most promising possibility from my perspective.
 
It's not about get rich quick, though I won't deny it's possible.

For me the greatest impact and benefit of the blockchain technology is the redundancy of the centralised banking system and centralised power structures. The breaking of the monopoly of fiat currency that governments have and the fact that once this happens we will have removed the power (and wealth generation) from those who have been behind every war and conflict for centuries. That alone could deliver peace and prosperity to the world.

Then you can look at the way Decentralised Autonomous Organisations can work and see the possibility of self-governance is real. To me, that's about as disruptive (or revolutionary if you like) as it gets.

Perhaps it is a Libertarian or Anarcho-Capitalist fantasy but I think it is a dream that could become real if people embrace the ideals and the technology together.
 
Of all places this forum is not somewhere where I should have to explain how broken our financial and political systems currently are. Here is a potential solution right in front of us. Can we recognise it for what it is?
 
Where I work, a multinational, we have introduced a system whereby "standard" contracts are somewhat automated. The original agreement was obviously created by a lawyer, however new "standard" agreements bypass our in house legal practitioners - using a software solution. Examples are NDA's and a sub set of less than 50k engagements (think low risk). Everything else goes past an attorney eyes. This will certainly expand.

It has zero correlation to blockchain. Indeed it is likely the inverse whereby there is no distribution.

Do I see our legal team reduce in the next few years? Not a chance. The team is in ever increasing demand. Are new legal students going to be under more pressure (than the existing crazy number of grads vs practicing lawyers)...possibly.*

* every year there are approx 1 in 4 law grads for every practicing lawyer in AU (ie either many lawyers kick the bucket or give up law each year, or there is a significant surplus of legal grads)
 
@barneyrubble
Would it be accurate to say that lawyers will be in even greater demand if the adoption of smart contracts goes main stream?
Would a considerable amount of 3rd parties now involved as part of the contractual process potentially be replaced by Smart contracts?
The current Real Estate system springs to mind as an example where Real estate agents, Conveyancer's,Bank interaction,Title and document searches,Government stamp duty,Utility settlement accounts could be automated or replaced entirely with a live interactive document triggered and responding to event inputs.
I would assume a Lawyers input would still remain as critical as ever to assess each smart contract and advise their clients?
A Will springs to mind as another one of those examples where it would seem logical if services such as Births,Deaths & Marriages,Banks,solicitors etc were linked to the execution phase of a Smart contract triggered by the information input of a death.
 
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BuggedOut said:
Of all places this forum is not somewhere where I should have to explain how broken our financial and political systems currently are. Here is a potential solution right in front of us. Can we recognise it for what it is?
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I can't recognise it as a solution.

While we remain bound to operate under the laws of a centralised authority I can't see any blockchain making a meaningful contribution to enhancing liberty. It may save some $$$ but it's not going to fix our legal system.

The overriding laws of the State will prevail, regardless of how individuals go about engaging in contractual relationships, yes there may be less legal personnel which is always a good thing as the system is unnecessarily complicated and purposefully designed to create confusion and reliance and bureaucracies, but unlike cryptocurrencies which offer an alternative to fiat currency and a solution to some of our broken financial systems as they are private currencies, blockchain technology can't create an alternative legal system while there exists a system provider that has a monopoly on the whole legal process.

But I'm always open to any really simple explanations to the contrary. :)
 
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