Information Law Possum (discontinued)

A man convicted of multiple murder sought permission to buy the flight simulating software “X-Plane”, arguing that he wanted to leave his prison cell at least virtually from time to time. The request was refused by the prison authority for reasons of security: Due to the high data capacity of DVDs, the effort to search the data carrier for secret messages would be disproportionate. In addition, the authority reasoned that the wish to escape to a virtual world — such as a flight simulator — has to give way to these considerations.

The Federal Supreme Court ruled that this decision is not unconstitutional. (Decision in German is here.)

As Jusletter reports, two attorneys from the French-speaking part of Switzerland have created an online divorce website, divorce.ch.

For a bit more than 30 dollars, users get access to a database containing information on all legal aspects of a divorce.

For about 800 dollars, couples may create their own divorce settlement and the paperwork necessary to demand a divorce by consent (one of the “modes” of divorce the Swiss Civil Code knows). The settlement is created automatically on the basis of a questionnaire that the spouses have to fill out.

For Switzerland, this service is a true innovation. But I wonder how the lawyers who offer their services handle their liability for the automatically-generated settlements. Here is what their terms of use say:

Nous déclinons en outre toute responsabilité quant à d’éventuels dommages susceptibles de survenir du fait de l’utilisation des pages du site divorce.ch, y compris par suite de téléchargement d’éventuels fichiers ou pour ce qui concerne la Convention de divorce ou la Requête en divorce.

I have doubts as to the validity of this waiver, but all depends on the legal qualification of the contract concluded by the couple and the website owners.  Especially the high price of the service and the fact that the website owners are attorneys would make a good case for saying that the contract involves more duties than just offering the online form and its processing “as is”.

For those who haven’t heard it yet: I quit my job at the Research Center for Information Law (FIR-HSG) by the end of July in order to complete my (postgraduate) doctoral thesis.

I’ve had a wonderful time with my colleagues at the FIR-HSG, but I won’t miss them because I will still be around during my writing time. Academically, I guess my work for the FIR-HSG and the Berkman Center has marked my legal thinking as strongly as I had not believed was possible before I started my job.

Since I refuse to see the termination of my labor contract I think it’s inappropriate to thank all the people I’m indebted to yet. Remember: I’m checking out, not leaving.

Feel free to add a comment to my new political blog. My canton’s incumbent MP from the Green Party (they dislike us) has already left one, too. :-)