A Canadian judge ruled that a thumbs-up emoji could be considered an agreement to a contract:
A Canadian judge has ordered a farmer to pay more than $CAD82,000 ($92,000) in damages following a legal battle over what the thumbs-up emoji means.
Chris Achter, the owner of a farming company in Swift Current, Saskatchewan, had sent a thumbs-up emoji in response to a photograph of a flax-buying contract from a grains buyer in 2021.
Months later, the buyer — which had been doing business with Mr Achter for several years — did not receive the flax as expected.
That started a dispute that led to "a far-flung search" to unearth what the thumbs-up emoji means, according to the June court ruling that surfaced in local media this week.
The buyer, South West Terminal, argued that the emoji implied acceptance of contractual terms, while Mr Achter said he used it only to indicate that he had received the contract, but not to indicate his agreement.
[...] He [the judge] said: "I am satisfied on the balance of probabilities that Chris okayed or approved the contract just like he had done before except this time he used a thumbs-up emoji."
(Score: 5, Insightful) by turgid on Tuesday July 11 2023, @07:01AM (3 children)
There's a reason the world moved on from hieroglyphics. But seriously, a thumbs up emoji is ambiguous.
I refuse to engage in a battle of wits with an unarmed opponent [wikipedia.org].
(Score: 2) by Opportunist on Tuesday July 11 2023, @10:17AM (1 child)
Back in the good old days, when the TTRPG Cyberpunk 2020 was young, there was the disadvantage "illiterate". It meant that you were unable to decipher the written word and your only way of communicating in "writing" was by the ubiquitous pictograms that could not only easily be used by everyone but that were also in heavy use because more and more people were this kind of illiterate.
Did it have to be that part that came true? Couldn't we have gotten the ability to jack our brains into computers instead?
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 11 2023, @10:37AM
Be careful what you wish for.
(Score: 3, Funny) by DannyB on Tuesday July 11 2023, @05:54PM
Would a middle finger emoji be considered acknowledgement and acceptance of a contract?
When trying to solve a problem don't ask who suffers from the problem, ask who profits from the problem.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by istartedi on Tuesday July 11 2023, @07:20AM (8 children)
IANAL, let alone a *Canadian* lawyer but that seems like a sucky ruling. There's a difference between saying the contract is OK, and signing the contract. I've been in that situation just recently, with something far less ambiguous--I had used my mouse to sign a PDF contract to get a tree removed. The crew lead still ran paper copies by my house and had me sign 3 of them. IMHO, the "thumbs up" means the contract terms are agreeable and that you are WILLING TO SIGN, not that you have actually signed.
Pray tell, your honor, who's signature it is? Some dude with a big yellow thumb? That's the guy who owes the money. OK, being just a bit silly here--there's an e-mail associated with it; and maybe Canadian laws says that mere assent to a contract via e-mail is a valid e-signature. If so, it's a correct ruling I suppose but seems to fly in the face of customs in the US, and we both have a heritage in Common Law from England (and sometimes France), and signatures need more than assent everyplace I've ever been. To reiterate, agreeing that the terms are acceptable and actually signing are two different things as far as I'm concerned. This ruling sucks.
Appended to the end of comments you post. Max: 120 chars.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by pkrasimirov on Tuesday July 11 2023, @08:49AM (4 children)
I also think 👍 means "I like it" or "I support it" or "I agree with your stance", not "I accept your terms and conditions". But the judge ruled so because they had a years-old history of such agreements and were long-time partners. In this case I really feel one tried to weasel-out of the contract.
(Score: 5, Funny) by inertnet on Tuesday July 11 2023, @10:37AM (1 child)
👍
(Score: 2) by Freeman on Tuesday July 11 2023, @05:29PM
Ooff... "This exact comment has already been posted. Try to be more original... ", It's hilarious, though.
Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Runaway1956 on Tuesday July 11 2023, @11:11AM
Yeah, I caught that part. This story seems to make an argument for being literate, and stating exactly what you mean, as precisely as possible. And, for putting everything in writing. Getting lazy, and relying on silly pictograms leads to ambiguity. Of course, there is also a history of "gentlemen's agreements", where nothing was put into writing. With those, it was a matter of which guy does the judge believe more, because you couldn't prove anything.
(Score: 2) by istartedi on Tuesday July 11 2023, @05:52PM
Ah, OK. Then it's only a ruling that applies to *this specific case*, so that's not sucky. The headline seems to imply that it's deciding this in general for everybody; when it's probably not.
It's like they had another (valid) contract, oral or written that specified assent was binding. It's not a smart thing to do, since you're forfeiting something that most people would regard as an important part of the business relationship because you value convenience that much; but he did that and has to bear the consequences.
Appended to the end of comments you post. Max: 120 chars.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by helel on Tuesday July 11 2023, @01:32PM
The key detail everyone ignores about this case is that the farmer routinely accepted contracts via text message. It was based on his history of typing back "ok" or "yup" to accept contracts that the court came to the conclusion that "👍" was accepting the contract.
(Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Tuesday July 11 2023, @08:16PM
You seem to have the misconception that a contract needs a signature to be valid. This is not the case. A signature is a quite good proof that you indeed agreed to that contract, therefore it is commonly done, and often required by the other party. But it is by no means necessary.
Note that every time you buy something you enter a contract. You rarely sign anything on that occasion.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 2) by darkfeline on Sunday July 16 2023, @11:52PM
If you read the case, you would know that the defendant had a long history of approving contracts with the plaintiff using short SMS replies, and subsequently fulfilling those contracts.
If you had a history of signing contracts on paper, then this ruling does not apply.
Join the SDF Public Access UNIX System today!
(Score: 5, Touché) by Opportunist on Tuesday July 11 2023, @08:20AM (2 children)
Next: Eggplant emoji considered sexual harassment.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 11 2023, @10:35AM
https://slate.com/technology/2019/11/emoji-court-cases-crime-free-speech-contract-law.html [slate.com]
Only a matter of time.
(Score: 2) by DeathMonkey on Tuesday July 11 2023, @08:01PM
How am I going to accept contracts now?
(Score: 5, Touché) by SomeGuy on Tuesday July 11 2023, @11:25AM (4 children)
So is the poop emoji legally considered rejecting the contract?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 11 2023, @03:13PM
It depends upon whether the poop is smiling or not.
(Score: 2) by Freeman on Tuesday July 11 2023, @05:33PM (2 children)
In the event that all of the replies to any e-mail are a poop emoji, it's just called being juvenile.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/mattnovak/2023/03/19/elon-musk-makes-twitter-respond-to-all-questions-from-reporters-with-poop-emojis/?sh=cc2a84270316 [forbes.com]
Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
(Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Tuesday July 11 2023, @08:17PM (1 child)
Does that mean, Twitter is now officially shit?
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 2) by Freeman on Tuesday July 11 2023, @09:39PM
They certainly are showing something when anyone sends a message to their PR e-mail. Twitter has always occupied a weird space to me. Then again, I don't feel like posting how well my bowels moved every day. SoylentNews is awesome as a forum and interesting news site. It also isn't a giant advertisement page with a couple of sentences of content thrown in. Even when I was young, I avoided the likes of MySpace and Facebook. I have taken to using Discord and have used the occasional IRC server, but aside from face-to-face, generally I communicate via phone(voice or text)/e-mail.
Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
(Score: 1, Flamebait) by Mojibake Tengu on Tuesday July 11 2023, @05:38PM (5 children)
So, the Canadian judge does not understand the concept of protocol.
Fundamental purpose of protocol of any kind is transfer of meaning, preferably without loss of any part of meaning. This is not just an invention of digital age, it works that way for millenia.
In any historical epoch, contracts were made by proper protocols. Always.
A thumb emoji sent out does not satisfy this fundamental property of a proper protocol. It does not carry the meaning of willing to make a contract.
The judge is an idiot.
I consider this a catastrophic failure of legal system, because in legal processing there are plenty of formal protocols employed already and the ignorant judge demonstrated the decadence.
Respect Authorities. Know your social status. Woke responsibly.
(Score: 5, Touché) by dwilson on Tuesday July 11 2023, @07:31PM
I'll quote helel's comment from further up the page here, since it's pertinent:
On that basis alone, it can be argued that there is an existing, ad-hoc protocol in use here, and judgement rendered with that in mind. The judge is not, in fact, an idiot.
Stating unequivocally (as you did) that human beings have always used proper protocol for contracts any-where and any-when, is at best ill-informed on your part. At the very least, you'd have to agree that 'proper' is subject to revision over time? Or are you still entering in to contracts via clay tablets with cuniform.
- D
(Score: 3, Interesting) by SomeRandomGeek on Tuesday July 11 2023, @10:05PM (3 children)
You are correct that there is a protocol. But perhaps you are not familiar with the protocol?
http://jec.unm.edu/education/online-training/contract-law-tutorial/contract-fundamentals-part-2 [unm.edu]
The protocol requires "acceptance." Not necessarily written acceptance. Oral contracts are considered valid. There is no requirement that both parties sign in front of witnesses, then get everything notarized and everyone gets a copy. Such measures are a good idea when one of the parties might try to weasel out of the contract later. But they are not, and never have been, required.
The question is: Does the thumbs up emoji constitute acceptance?
In my mind, it might. If I text a friend "Do you want to go out for beers?" and they reply with a thumbs up, I interpret that as "Yeah, let's go" not "I got your message and am thinking it over." On the other hand, if my real estate agent texts me a formal offer on a house I am considering buying, and I reply with a thumbs up, that definitely means "I got your message and am thinking it over."
(Score: 1, Offtopic) by Mojibake Tengu on Tuesday July 11 2023, @10:36PM (2 children)
That's complete and utter nonsense. What about... marriage?
In a stupid legal system like this, you can get married by emoji, aren't you... 🤦
Perhaps you should get more familiar with what's mojibake really about https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mojibake [wikipedia.org]
Anyone and all their platforms could get involved into unwanted contracts by a trivial technical glitch. If that's what you all wanted, so be it. You'll get the pain one day.
Respect Authorities. Know your social status. Woke responsibly.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 12 2023, @07:15AM
See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common-law_marriage [wikipedia.org]
(Score: 3, Informative) by SomeRandomGeek on Wednesday July 12 2023, @03:44PM
I live in Colorado. We have common law marriage here. You don't even have to say "I do" to get married here. The state publishes this helpful guide to assist people in figuring out if they're married: https://www.coloradolegalservices.org/node/347/what-common-law-marriage-colorado [coloradolegalservices.org]