Early on, the creators of the World Wide Web envisioned a paperless society. Sadly, they never foresaw the fondness people would develop for their personal printers. We may be still killing/recycling dead trees but we’ve also gotten collectively lazy when it comes to printed material. We don’t need to visit libraries or crack books when we’ve got the greatest research tool ever invented in our own homes. We keep our emails, chat logs, and instant message histories. We fill out online forms and use online money. Today’s Internet commuters and communicators are all about the bits. We make deals online. We consent to terms with the click of a mouse. We send an email and everything’s agreed upon.
While housewives fill their shopping baskets with computer paper for scrapbooking projects, adult webmasters deal in a digital reality. One relic from our pre-web past that we should never let become extinct is the legal document. The contract. The hard copy.
The real victim in this telecommunication dependant business is the written word. We’ve all improved our typing skills. We’ve even cleaned up our grammar thanks to eagle-eyed peers. What we seem to have forgotten is that there is nothing more powerful or binding than a signed contract or document. We’ve gotten so swept up in agreements made through web forms, email and instant messages; we have become legally sloppy.
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If you buy anything, sell anything or trade anything with anyone get it in writing. A contract. A document. An agreement. Something other than just an "okay we’ll do it" in your ICQ logs.
Today’s adult webmaster needs to have at hand all types of legal forms available for the printing, the posting and the signing. Spoken agreements may be legally binding but they have to be proved. On the Internet you can make agreements without witnesses and a lot of us do just that. If you don’t use some form of contract even a virtual one, you’ll have no case if you’re wronged.
Some email messages have been used as evidence in trials recently but a settled/signed contract trumps any inbox missive. If you shoot content you need release forms for models. If you buy and use content you need proper 2257 documents. If you sign up with a sponsor program they make you agree to a virtual contract. You should use such procedures when you make traffic deals or pay for exclusive services. If you begin a partnership or contract your labors to an employer, you protect your interests when you do it in print.
The best way to legally protect yourself is with the help of a lawyer. They can write the kind of binding documents you need to safeguard your venture. We at Cozy Academy always recommend you consult legal counsel, especially if your plan to invest your money. We also understand that lawyers are very expensive and most of them have little understanding of the Internet much less the adult Internet. That’s why we recommend you visit this page:
This site (run by a lawyer specializing in adult Internet law) contains a great selection of free, downloadable forms and documents that are common to adult webmasters. Just copy the ones you need to your hard drive, edit the text to fit your needs and you’re set to go. Nothing can take the place of real paid legal advice but these handy forms will at least get you off to a solid start.
Protect yourself. Make the contracts. Get the signatures and guard your business.