For the sheer heck of it, I’ve added another T-shirt to my collection of snarky contract-drafting gear. It uses a design by Russell Christian that I commissioned years ago. I used to call it “The Scrivener”, but now I’m calling it “The Traditionalist”. On the back is the Adams on Contract Drafting logo. The T-shirt is available here. As always, … Read More
In addition to public series of my online course Drafting Clearer Contracts: Masterclass (information here), I also do private series for organizations. The dynamic is different when the only participants are people from your organization. And I customize my PowerPoint presentations with examples drawn from your templates. I’m a little lax about harvesting testimonials, mostly because I don’t want to … Read More
As I wait for various shoes to drop, I’m currently devoting much of my attention to the training I offer. Part of the process involves promoting what I do. I’d rather be understated about that, but I assume that understated doesn’t always get you far enough these days. In that spirit, here’s some feedback I received this week: But I’m … Read More
Today I received a tip from reader Brad Axelrod. He told me about the recent opinion of the Delaware Court of Chancery in Intrepid Investments (here). This case involves a fight over interpretation of a provision in which the parties agreed to exclusive jurisdiction of Delaware courts “[a]s to any dispute, claim, or litigation arising out of or relating in … Read More
This morning, while I was banging out an email, Grammarly saw fit to offer the following suggestion: Hmm. Interesting. Should we say data-sharing agreement, not data sharing agreement? Some background is in order. This is from Garner’s Modern English Usage 827 (5th ed.): When a phrase functions as an adjective preceding the noun it modifies … the phrase should ordinarily … Read More
Series of Drafting Clearer Contracts: Masterclass continue to sell out, and the feedback continues to be positive, so why stop now! I’ve just made available three new series of Masterclass: The goal of Masterclass is to help you become a better-informed consumer of contract language. It’s the antidote to the copy-and-paste machine and its doppelganger, generative AI. For more information … Read More
A recent post on LinkedIn (here) attracted more attention than usual (by my modest standards), so here’s a screenshot: The blog post mentioned is here.
In this 2018 blog post, I made available what I called the “quick reference” chart outlining my “categories of contract language” framework. Yesterday someone asked me whether that was still the most current version available for download, so I thought it appropriate to make available the version from the fifth edition of A Manual of Style for Contract Drafting. So … Read More
I’ve previously mentioned, in this blog post and in this LinkedIn post, my “blue-sky bolt”—a design that has morphed into an enamel pin. Well, soon I’ll start sending enamel pins as a thank-you gesture to those who do something to further the cause or help me out in some manner. For that, I’ll need a card, so here it is … Read More
Occasionally I see someone invoke Strunk & White’s The Elements of Style in connection with drafting contracts. Two things come to mind, one specific, the other general. First, Strunk & White doesn’t have an unblemished reputation. Linguist Geoff Pullum did a number on it in this article, in which he says this: I believe the success of Elements to be … Read More
