I’ve been doing a lot of contracts and agreements lately, and one thing I’ve noticed is that I’m using whole lot of paper. And I mean whole lot! Just yesterday I had to print four copies of a 20 page agreement. Two for me and two for a supplier.
It strikes me as a waste, not only of paper, ink but also of valuable time. Even Web-based businesses often still require printed and signed contracts to be sent to their offices or legal departments before contracts take affect. This is crazy! I give much kudos to those companies with foresight and vision who are prepared to invest the time and money it takes to have online agreements in place.
I envisage a Web application that allows two or more parties to engage on a Web-based document with digital signatures, collaboration and security to enable agreements to be signed and authorised without printing a single page. I imagine the agreement could be e-mailed as a PDF attachment to all of the stakeholders. To be honest, I don’t think this would be too difficult. Of course, the legal enforce ability of such a contract would have to be confirmed before the parties engaged in its use.
Maybe such a Web application already exists? I don’t know of any that can be used on a per use, or subscription basis, but I’m pretty sure there will be a market for it in the future.