Project Update
We connected with and advised quite a few projects that use alternative forms of web monetization. The web monetization community has been critical to connecting folks to our legal services. We worked on 17 different matters during the grant period.
Progress on objectives
Our proposal was to serve as a support to creatives and innovators experimenting with web monetization, and so far, we have steadily been accomplishing that. We expected to put in at least 200 hours of legal services, and we have met and exceeded our 200 hours, with over 350 hours of legal services provided. Clients have ranged from startup web services to filmmakers and other creatives. These individuals and organizations need exactly the kind of intellectual property, contract drafting, and privacy legal work that is our specialty. Some came directly through the Grant for the Web community, others came to us directly through our website.
Key activities
Our activities have ranged from brief 1-3 hour consultations, to extensive service engagements that last for months.
Communications and marketing
We made posts on the web monetization community detailing the services we provide and how to request the services. For example,
https://community.webmonetization.org/pslawmi/new-media-rights-free-legal-consultations-2l2f
Due to attorney confidentiality, we aren’t able to share details of specific representations online, but we have been hearing from a number of grantees and applicants that need a variety of legal services for their web monetization related project.
What’s next?
We learned alot about the needs of projects that us new types of web monetization. There is certainly a demand for legal services in this community and we’re excited to support alternative web monetization models. We want to make ourselves available to the community for legal services, and will be requesting additional support to continue our legal work with web monetization projects in the future. Based on what we've learned, we will also be considering educational resources that can be useful for the community. If folks have ideas for educational information or legal apps that could be useful to the web monetization, we're interested in hearing your ideas as well.
What community support would benefit your project?
For those in the community who we worked with, it would be helpful to let other GFTW community members know (without sharing confidential details) how important it is to get early stage legal services for your project.
Folks can send projects that need legal services to our legal services request form at this link.
Top comments (1)
Legal assistance is extremely helpful for startups of all sorts and creators. I hope you recieve additional funding because your services would come in handy with my proposed project as well. Best of luck!