Negonation, a Spanish start-up, has launched Tractis, a web-based platform to revolutionize the negotiation, management, and execution of contracts in e-commerce.

But it’s not just about helping business get done. Negonation’s goal for Tractis is far more ambitious:

Our goal is to provide a way to make online borderless justice possible. Yeah, you heard us right. We want to develop a new legal system that overcomes the inefficiencies, complexities, injustices and sluggishness of traditional legal systems. We want justice for, from and by the Internet nation. Tractis is only the beginning.

Tractis is designed to manage what Negonation’s founders call “the whole life cycle of contracts”. Users can select from a library of templates to create a contract, invite others to participate, and develop a single text to produce contracts guaranteed to be legally binding. Prior versions of contracts, comments, and attachments are archived and readily accessible. Negonation plans to add an online dispute resolution mechanism for addressing the inevitable disagreements that can arise from contract negotiations.

You can take an online tour of Tractis to gain a sense of its interface or review its FAQs.

O brave new world…

(Hat tip to Law.com Inside Opinions.)

Can you smell the desperation in the air? That’s a sure sign that a major election year is rapidly approaching and at least one political party is getting nervous. Consider the following.

Recently I received a voice mail from the office of U.S. Congressman Tom Cole and the National Republican Congressional Committee. The message informed me that the NRCC wished to “recognize [you] with our highest honor, the Congressional Order of Merit” and asked me to call.

A Congressional Order of Merit? For me? How could I refuse?

The staff person who answered the phone told me that as part of being singled out for this honor, I’d also been invited to serve on a business advisory council, and she asked me to listen first to a recorded message from Congressman Cole before she provided me with further details.

The message was most instructive. I learned that small businesses like mine “are the backbone of our community”. I learned that Democrats think I’m “rich and don’t pay [my] fair share of taxes”, and that I could play an important role in combating their “anti-business agenda”. I also learned that small business owners like me are “the last line of defense against the liberal agenda”. Finally, I learned that Tom Cole and the National Republican Congressional Committee needed my help.

At the end of the message, the staff person asked me if I had any questions. I asked her how much it would cost to take part. She told me that there was no cost–only my participation on the advisory council.

As tempting as the opportunity was, I had to come clean. I confessed that by no stretch of the imagination could I be characterized as a supporter of Republican political causes. I asked how they selected my name in the first place. She sidestepped that last question but hastily reassured me that Democrats and Independents could serve on the council as well.

I regretfully declined the honor.

Which meant, alas, no Congressional Order of Merit for me.

(Just for fun, try googling the phrase “Congressional Order of Merit”. I did. It yielded the news that the NRCC has extended this prestigious-sounding but meaningless honor to numerous others, including a former Democratic congresswoman and National Public Radio science correspondent Ira Flatow. I wait breathlessly to see what honor the Democrats next have planned for me.)

As I’ve discussed here before, the conflict-averse among us (which, I suspect, is actually most of us) go to great lengths to avoid confrontation.

But even among those who are willing to tackle conflict, no one seems to want to do it face to face–which may explain the popularity of leaving notes for roommates, co-workers, neighbors, and others which detail grievances and make demands for behavioral change.

A blog, passiveaggressivenotes.com, collects these messages and displays them for the enjoyment of its readers. A fascinating foray into the stuff that drives people nuts and the way they deal with it.

Thank you to those of you who either posted comments or emailed me following “Requiem for a friend“, in which I wrote about loss, friendship, and the importance of staying connected with the people who touch our lives. This post evidently touched a responsive chord in many of you.

I am so grateful to you for reaching out.

Best wishes to you all–with deepest appreciation–
Diane