<div dir="ltr">I was impressed with this:<i>There are 76 pages in “Words and Phrases” (a legal reference) that summarize hundreds of cases interpreting “shall.”</i><div><i><br></i></div><div>That is quite an indictment.<br><div><i><br></i></div><div>As an Open Source compliance and intellectual property specialist, I consider it one of my main duties to keep the customer out of litigation, and a personal failure if my clients _listen_to_me_ and then are involved in litigation over the issue. There are, surprisingly, some who pay a lot of money for advice and then don't listen. I work for an attorney 100% of the time, so perhaps the ones who get into litigation have first said I'm all wet.</div></div></div><br><div class="gmail_quote"><div dir="ltr" class="gmail_attr">On Wed, Oct 2, 2024 at 12:37 PM McCoy Smith <mccoy@lexpan.law> wrote:<br></div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px 0.8ex;border-left:1px solid rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex"><u></u>
<div>
<p>"Shall" is a huge bugaboo of Bryan Garner, who's a bit of a legal
drafting guru (who some swear by and others think is all wet). He
did write a fairly influential book (with Antonin Scalia) on
interpreting legal texts, and also apparently was pals with, of
all people, David Foster Wallace. And for a time (maybe still)
edited Black's Law Dictionary.</p>
<p>I sort of agree with him on shall (it is potentially ambiguous
and I think a bit antiquated) but its one of those things that is
so ingrained in legal drafting that we'll likely never be rid of
it. And others find it valuable.<br>
</p>
<div>On 10/2/2024 10:48 AM, Aaron Williamson
wrote:<br>
</div>
<blockquote type="cite">
<div dir="ltr">
<div class="gmail_quote">
<div dir="ltr" class="gmail_attr">On Wed, Oct 2, 2024 at
7:48 AM Bruce Perens via License-discuss <<a href="mailto:license-discuss@lists.opensource.org" target="_blank">license-discuss@lists.opensource.org</a>>
wrote:<br>
</div>
<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px 0.8ex;border-left:1px solid rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex">
<div dir="ltr">
<div dir="auto">The word "SHALL" must not be used in a
license. Please replace all occurrences of "SHALL" with
"MUST" and see <a href="https://www.plainlanguage.gov/guidelines/conversational/shall-and-must/" target="_blank">https://www.plainlanguage.gov/guidelines/conversational/shall-and-must/</a>
for the reasons you must do so.</div>
<div dir="auto"><br>
</div>
<div>I am assuming you are not a legal professional, I
think one would not have missed that issue by now.</div>
</div>
</blockquote>
<div><br>
</div>
This may be an emerging best practice, but it's certainly not
ubiquitous practice amongst U.S. legal professionals. On the
contrary, my experience is that "shall" is still more commonly
used, regardless of the type of legal document in question.<br>
</div>
<div class="gmail_quote"><br>
</div>
</div>
<br>
<fieldset></fieldset>
<pre>_______________________________________________
The opinions expressed in this email are those of the sender and not necessarily those of the Open Source Initiative. Official statements by the Open Source Initiative will be sent from an <a href="http://opensource.org" target="_blank">opensource.org</a> email address.
License-discuss mailing list
<a href="mailto:License-discuss@lists.opensource.org" target="_blank">License-discuss@lists.opensource.org</a>
<a href="http://lists.opensource.org/mailman/listinfo/license-discuss_lists.opensource.org" target="_blank">http://lists.opensource.org/mailman/listinfo/license-discuss_lists.opensource.org</a>
</pre>
</blockquote>
</div>
_______________________________________________<br>
The opinions expressed in this email are those of the sender and not necessarily those of the Open Source Initiative. Official statements by the Open Source Initiative will be sent from an <a href="http://opensource.org" rel="noreferrer" target="_blank">opensource.org</a> email address.<br>
<br>
License-discuss mailing list<br>
<a href="mailto:License-discuss@lists.opensource.org" target="_blank">License-discuss@lists.opensource.org</a><br>
<a href="http://lists.opensource.org/mailman/listinfo/license-discuss_lists.opensource.org" rel="noreferrer" target="_blank">http://lists.opensource.org/mailman/listinfo/license-discuss_lists.opensource.org</a><br>
</blockquote></div><br clear="all"><div><br></div><span class="gmail_signature_prefix">-- </span><br><div dir="ltr" class="gmail_signature"><div dir="ltr"><div dir="ltr"><div>Bruce Perens K6BP</div></div></div></div>