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Show HN: OpenSign – Open source alternative to DocuSign

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Re: Show HN: OpenSign – Open source alternative to DocuSign

#121
post #2

My understanding (possibly incorrect) is that competing with DocuSign is hard because of the need to follow obscure state and National laws (many of which are defined by case law rather than published law) in order for the signatures to be legally binding. Is that the case? And if so, is there evidence OpenSign has done this kind of SME research to make sure the electronic signatures are legally binding, or is this m…

I haven't researched the law here in a while, but my general impression the last time I did was that there isn't much in the way of legal requirements for signing things digitally beyond the federal ESIGN Act, general principles of state contract law, and the smattering of very particular kinds of transactions that require processes like notarization or recording. For everyday deals between the vast majority of peopl…

Does this hold true in the rest of the world?

Re: Show HN: OpenSign – Open source alternative to DocuSign

#123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I haven't researched the law here in a while, but my general impression the last time I did was that there isn't much in the way of legal requirements for signing things digitally beyond the federal ESIGN Act, general principles of state contract law, and the smattering of very particular kinds of transactions that require processes like notarization or recording. For everyday deals between the vast majority of peopl…

Does this hold true in the rest of the world?

I am in Australia and the situation is largely the same.

Re: Show HN: OpenSign – Open source alternative to DocuSign

#124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The self hosted version will always be free :)

Your CONTRIBUTING.md file says "By contributing, you agree that your contributions will be licensed under its MIT License." Since OpenSign is AGPLv3, why don't you allow contributions under the same license, if the self hosted version will always be free? I'm worried that the purpose of that might be to let you make it proprietary later.

I guess this allows them integrate with proprietary code on their back end if necessary, whilst making it hard for a competitor to take their code and undercut them, since most corps with proprietary software to protect won't touch AGPLv3 with a barge pole.

Nothing prevents an AGPLv3 fork if OpenSign goes proprietary in future.

I'd rather this approach than yet another non-standard Amazon-proof licence.

Re: Show HN: OpenSign – Open source alternative to DocuSign

#125
post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> this year the Supreme Court has set a new precedent that they can now overturn their own rulings from decades earlier What happened this year specifically? Dobbs was in June 2022, but that isn't even close to the first time that the Supreme Court overturned precedent from 50+ years prior -- Brown v Board largely overturned Plessy v Ferguson ("separate but equal") from nearly 60 years prior. And, we've had plenty of…

Roe v. Wade

That is covered by the comment you replied to

Re: Show HN: OpenSign – Open source alternative to DocuSign

#126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I haven't researched the law here in a while, but my general impression the last time I did was that there isn't much in the way of legal requirements for signing things digitally beyond the federal ESIGN Act, general principles of state contract law, and the smattering of very particular kinds of transactions that require processes like notarization or recording. For everyday deals between the vast majority of peopl…

Does this hold true in the rest of the world?

Canada you can use what ever you want, and it also includes things like "doing activities". Like if you click an "approve" button that can be considered a signature.

Re: Show HN: OpenSign – Open source alternative to DocuSign

#127
post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Rent seeking is trying to create a legal/regulatory structure that means you can farm people. E.g. coming to the UK from some countries you need to prove you can speak English. Assuming you can, and you need a waiver on the test, there is a sole organisation you can pay hundreds of pounds to to send them your degree certificate, and for them to say in some government UI "yes, this probably means they can speak Englis…

Regulatory lock-in is certainly one method of guaranteeing rent. I'd argue copyrights and patents are as well. Microsoft and Google get accused of rent seeking because of their near monopolies, but I don't think most of their income is particularly based on regulation. You find other forms of lock-in can come from network effects in social media (Facebook), or B2B lock-in due to outsourcing of basic business operatio…

I think the accusations can be divided into several categories:

- actual rent-seeking (as you say, not really true for companies such as Microsoft and Google, except where you see e.g. government documents needing to be submitted in Word. But that's very likely incompetence on behalf of the bureaucracy rather than Microsoft)

- having a dominant market position due to having a very high quality product, or set of products that work together well

- a random grudge phrased as rent-seeking, because the Twitter user in question doesn't know what rent-seeking is, but has seen their friends accuse companies of it

I don't know what the proportions are, but I suspect the former is minimal to nonexistent for e.g. Google.

Re: Show HN: OpenSign – Open source alternative to DocuSign

#128
post #2

My understanding (possibly incorrect) is that competing with DocuSign is hard because of the need to follow obscure state and National laws (many of which are defined by case law rather than published law) in order for the signatures to be legally binding. Is that the case? And if so, is there evidence OpenSign has done this kind of SME research to make sure the electronic signatures are legally binding, or is this m…

You're getting a lot of responses to the effect that there aren't really any laws that require particular formalities to sign contracts, and while this is true in the "normal case" in many jurisdiction, there certainly are some categories of document that have more specific signing requirements. In most common law jurisdictions, for example, certain agreements must be signed as deeds which require certain formalities to be observed, and without enabling legislation it's not always easy to square these formalities with electronic signatures.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deed

Re: Show HN: OpenSign – Open source alternative to DocuSign

#129

> You will need to create an AWS S3 bucket or digital ocean space in order to store your uploaded documents The org I work for would love to self-host on-premise a digital signing solution so they definitely won't use external dependencies like AWS. Theoretically they could swap with minio but last time we used it it was not a drop-in replacement yet.

We will be supporting more storage providers including self hosting soon.

Good to hear !

It's not a problem if Minio is bundled into the self hosted stack as long as it's officially supported (paying for support is also okay).

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