This seems like just the sort of thing big banking would've caught whiff to and become engaged in. Though I imagine it would remain under wraps...not the sort of thing well suited to be interfacing the general public. At least until perhaps some startups had gotten the ball rolling on this ball of wax. But for big multinational (secret) interactions? How better to enforce contracts? The advantages on that scale of avoiding legal entreaties and a digitized security system would be enticing.
Cryptocontracts Will Turn Contract Law Into a Programming Language
11–20 of 91 posts
Re: Cryptocontracts Will Turn Contract Law Into a Programming Language
#12[deleted]
Re: Cryptocontracts Will Turn Contract Law Into a Programming Language
#13> Essentially what we are talking about is a real democratization of contractual agreements. Whereas today contracts are restricted to deals with enough value to justify a lawyers time (mortgages, business deals, land transfer etc…), in the future there is no limit to what could be codified into simple contracts. You could imagine forming a self-enforcing contract around something as simple as sharing a lawnmower wit…
by keeping money in escrow until said conditions are met.
Re: Cryptocontracts Will Turn Contract Law Into a Programming Language
#14[deleted]
Yes contracts are meatspace focused, but meatspace isn't object oriented only because it is obscured by the observer right now - more the legislative bodies behind law than the practicing attorneys or the parties to contracts.
With the entrance of pure theory and object oriented worldviews necessary to "open the eyes of the machine" onto what's going on in what it's tracking and providing an environment for, the programmers and administrators of legal systems can finally remake law in the image of reason, and not the obfuscations which tainted reason early on that we have now.
Re: Cryptocontracts Will Turn Contract Law Into a Programming Language
#15[deleted]
Contracts create obligations. Obligations can be substituted with penalties. "We will attempt to acquire you. If we can't, we pay you a breakup fee."
If you had formal contracts around informal things like babysitting, you'd end up requiring licensed and bonded babysitters. "Henceforth, unto be known, babysitting shall commence at 1500 on Thursday, June 22, in the year of our lord 2014. Unto forthwith, inability to sit for baby will result in a $1 (one) million dollar ($) penalty payable in DOGE."
Not sure how "forming a coffee club" requires a contract unless "gourmet coffee" is code for "meth distribution."
Re: Cryptocontracts Will Turn Contract Law Into a Programming Language
#16> Essentially what we are talking about is a real democratization of contractual agreements. Whereas today contracts are restricted to deals with enough value to justify a lawyers time (mortgages, business deals, land transfer etc…), in the future there is no limit to what could be codified into simple contracts. You could imagine forming a self-enforcing contract around something as simple as sharing a lawnmower wit…
by keeping money in escrow until said conditions are met.
How does the computer know conditions have been met, and what prevents using those same mechanisms with ordinary contracts?
Re: Cryptocontracts Will Turn Contract Law Into a Programming Language
#17> Essentially what we are talking about is a real democratization of contractual agreements. Whereas today contracts are restricted to deals with enough value to justify a lawyers time (mortgages, business deals, land transfer etc…), in the future there is no limit to what could be codified into simple contracts. You could imagine forming a self-enforcing contract around something as simple as sharing a lawnmower wit…
by keeping money in escrow until said conditions are met.
[deleted]
Re: Cryptocontracts Will Turn Contract Law Into a Programming Language
#18Charles Stross anticipated this in Accelerando: "Amber scans the READ ME quickly. Corporate instruments are strong magic, according to Daddy, and this one is exotic by any standards -- a limited company established in Yemen, contorted by the intersection between shari'a and the global legislatosaurus. Understanding it isn't easy, even with a personal net full of subsapient agents that have full access to whole librar…
I don't remember that ending well...
Warning, this is a spoiler. If you want to read the book, don't read it.
I simply can't get how the characters kept being human, even after not locked into a body anymore, and turning themselves into several different forms just for fun. In those circumstances, it could end in no other way... but it is a very bizarre set of circumstances.
Also, the lack of ambition of post-singularity beings annoys me to no end.
Re: Cryptocontracts Will Turn Contract Law Into a Programming Language
#19[deleted]
Contracts create obligations. Obligations can be substituted with penalties. "We will attempt to acquire you. If we can't, we pay you a breakup fee." If you had formal contracts around informal things like babysitting, you'd end up requiring licensed and bonded babysitters. "Henceforth, unto be known, babysitting shall commence at 1500 on Thursday, June 22, in the year of our lord 2014. Unto forthwith, inability to s…
[deleted]
Re: Cryptocontracts Will Turn Contract Law Into a Programming Language
#20"While I imagine that larger contracts would likely be built with some sort of failsafe mechanism for arbitration, there is no need for such a thing to exist."
I don't understand why. If I were to use a large cryptocontracts, I would make sure that an impartial third party could 'debug'/judge a bad situation.