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Proposal: Software Law

Read the included topics from the Programmers Stack Exchange site FAQ.

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I agree with you here. I think this should go on programmers or possibly nowhere? What are the chances of finding enough actual lawyers who care to give out free legal advice on a site dedicated to something as narrow as software law. – Andy White Jun 1 '11 at 5:44
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Totally agree +1 – Soner Gönül Aug 17 '11 at 9:53
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4 Answers

up vote 13 down vote accepted

Programmers can talk about legal issues but that does not make them "lawyers and specialists in software-related law." This would have to be predominantly a legal site for legal advice or it won't fly.

We don't have a lot of statistics, yet (we just started collecting this data), but the breakdown doesn't sound like a place of deeper legal help.

committer roles

  • 71.4% unknown
  • 12.5% Enthusiast
  • 7.1% Beginner
  • 5.4% Expert
  • 1.8% Academic
  • 1.8% Curious

users also committed to

  • 8.9% Not Programming R...
  • 7.1% Database Administ...
  • 7.1% Project Management
  • 5.4% Fitness & Nutrition
  • 17.9% only this proposal

committers active in

  • 82.1% Stack Overflow
  • 48.2% Super User
  • 44.6% Server Fault
  • 42.9% Meta Stack Overflow
  • 39.3% Programmers
  • 28.6% Web Applications

We'll see how the rest of the proposal process plays out.

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"This would have to be predominantly a legal site for legal advice". There are plenty of people with experiences that would be very valuable to lots of others going through similar circumstances. For example, frivolous suits are all too common and can cost you a lot of money. This would be a great place to get ideas on what course of action you can take. My own dad wasted a lot of money on a lawyer who did nothing for him. Finally my dad did for himself what the lawyer should have to begin with. This could be a great way to help people avoid those situations. – Brandon Moore Nov 19 '11 at 1:54
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The big problem with creating a site for lawyers to provide advice is that the BAR association has some fairly stringent ethics laws that severely restrict just what sort of information they can provide to random people over the internet. – LessPop_MoreFizz Nov 19 '11 at 15:50
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up vote 7 down vote

Very often over at Programmer's.SE the responses will be something to the sound of:

You wont find solid, legally sound advice here.

Though there are many times programmers who have run into similar legal issues in the field will chime in and help if they can.

Personally, I think programmer's (especially those trying to start their own projects) could really use deeper legal help. Practically, I'm not sure we can attract enough lawyers and such but I have very little experience to say either way.

I don't have much of an opinion on the issue myself, but it could be some users feel that there are just too many legal questions on Programmer's and it may warrant it's own site.

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Even programming guru's can be found asking questions on Stack Overflow. I suspect when this site is created we may find there are law experts who will use it too. – Brandon Moore Nov 19 '11 at 1:48
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up vote 3 down vote

To update, there was a discussion on Programmers Meta about including software law that I created. I noticed there were too many questions about patents, trade secrets, and licensing that were simply too complex and needed an understanding of the law that many software developers didn't have.

As of now, only software licensing questions (typically dealing with open source licenses) are included as on-topic. The reason for this is that, as developers, we often deal with creating, using, maintaining, and extending open source projects in our own and have some basis for discussion. Less often do we deal with the intricies of patent, trademark, and trade secret law.

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up vote -1 down vote

It may be in theory, but in practicallity you will run into a brick wall when 5 moderators arbitrarily decide it's not a good place for your question before anyone gets a chance to answer. I haven't used the programmer's site as much as overflow, but I know there the moderators tend to be far stricter than what the actual guidelines allow for.

Furthermore, sometimes you don't want to talk to a lawyer as much as you want to hear from others who have dealt with similar experiences. Bad lawyers routinely screw people out of a lot of money and do little to nothing for them... it happens all the time. This would be a great place to hear what someone else did in your situation and hear creative ideas that you may never hear from a lawyer.

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