Podcast with Chetan Sikarwar, FOSS Compliance Legal Counsel, Bosch (Part-2)

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Hey guys, welcome back to another episode of LexDiscuss Cafe.

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Today, we are thrilled to continue our insightful conversation with Mr. Chetan.

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He is a FOSS Compliance Counsel at Bosch.

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For people who may not know what FOSS means, it is actually an abbreviation that stands

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for Free and Open Source Software.

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If you missed the part 1 of our conversation with Chetan, make sure to catch up on our

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fascinating discussion about intellectual property law and open source software compliance.

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Now let me tell you a little bit about Chetan.

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He is an alum of IIT Kharagpur.

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He has an impressive background that spans from software engineering, patent analysis

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to legal research.

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Today, we dive deeper into his experiences and his thoughts on the evolving landscape

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of software licensing and compliance.

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Stay tuned for a compelling dialogue.

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So Chetan, welcome again, and please go ahead and appear on the second part of the podcast.

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Thank you.

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Thank you for having me.

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So for the listeners who don't know Chetan, please go and listen to the part 1.

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We have given an amazing introduction to what Chetan does and what kind of things he does

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on a day-to-day basis.

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Just a quick refresher, he is FOSS Compliance Officer at Bosch, right?

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Do you want to just give a quick explanation of what does a FOSS Compliance Officer do?

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As a FOSS Compliance Officer, my part of the job is to ensure that whatever software component

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we are using in our product, they are compliant with the open source licenses.

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Can you please tell us what FOSS stands for?

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So FOSS stands for Free and Open Source Software.

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So there are two major organizations which deal with the open source in general.

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One is Open OSI, that is Open Source Initiative, and another one is Free and Open Source Software,

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FSF.

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So the FOSS is basically a combination of both these two.

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So OSI has a different understanding of what open source means, whereas Free Software Foundation

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have a different understanding to me.

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So any application which is licensed and developed by Free Software Foundation are considered

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to be a free software.

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And anything which is licensed under Open Source Initiative licenses are known as open

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source licenses.

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So collectively, they are known as FOSS.

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Right.

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That's great.

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In the last podcast, you explained it really well, just because something is available

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on the internet for free.

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It's open source.

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And because you have to pay for some software, it doesn't mean that the software is not open

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source.

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Yes.

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Want to repeat that for our listeners?

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Yes.

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So the best example is Wikipedia.

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So if you look into the Wikipedia and go scroll down, you'll see a creative common attribution

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share a license.

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So what it means is that although you have right to use this particular work, reproduce

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that work in your whatever the thing that you are doing, but that does not mean that

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particular piece of work do not have copyright of someone.

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It is still copyrighted by someone, somebody owns that piece of work, he can change, he

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can do whatever he wants to do with this piece of work, but out of his goodwill, he has given

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you the right to use, reproduce, create derivative works out of it, but with certain conditions.

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Now those condition are under creative common attribution share alike licenses that whenever

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you're using work, which is under this particular license, you need to give attribution.

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Now attribution is nothing but the copyright notice means the name of the author, copyright

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sign here and then all right received it.

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So whatever second share alike, what it basically mean is the way you received it, you shall

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reproduce it in the exact manner.

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You cannot make modification to that work.

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So for example, if I downloaded an article from Wikipedia and I want to republish it,

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I cannot make changes in that work as per the license agreement.

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Apart from that, there are various licenses which says that you cannot charge for the

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application itself, but if you want to give maintenance and support, you can charge it

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for that.

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Or if you are distributing a conventional manner, for example, CD DVD and all, you can

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charge it for that.

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Or if you are adding your own application along with it, then you can charge it for

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your application, but not for the something that you have received from us.

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So this is what a lot of lawyers say to me that they say like, okay, we were just starting

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to understand what is an open source software.

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You brought in the concept of free software and then you create a distinction in that.

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You brought in the concept of creative commons, right?

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So thanks for the stuff to meet you.

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You are right now.

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Now you have like, let me just rephrase what you have just said and correct me if I'm

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wrong.

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An open source software essentially means that the source code, like you know that the

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thing that coders have actually written that is available, open to everyone, right?

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Yes.

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Yes.

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Just because it is open to everyone, it doesn't mean that you can do anything with it, right?

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You can open source your software under two frameworks.

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First is software initiative and the second one works.

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Second one is OSI, open source initiative, software foundation, and the other one is

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open source initiative, right?

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So you can know these and they have to be detached with it, right, as a legal audience

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who really understand copyright.

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This is not for you.

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For a general audience, copyright is like a bundle of rights.

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So you have rights, right?

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Yes.

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Which one do you want to access?

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Right to ownership, right to reproduce, right to accreditation, right?

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There are so many rights.

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So in these, what is happening is these foundations and these organizations are standardizing

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these licensing terms essentially, according to their own interpretation.

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Now, there is another thing that comes in, which is Creative Commons, which is nothing

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else but a standardized version of licensing terms.

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And what is exactly Creative Commons?

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I will let Shetan explain a little more.

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So Creative Commons is a set of licenses, which is basically designed to cater the requirement

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of artistic work.

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So if let's say I have a sound recording or an image or a text, and I want this piece

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of work to be protected under copyright information.

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So now under open source, whatever the licenses we have, whether MIT, BSD, GPL, so all these

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licenses are designed for software specific in nature, right?

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So you will find some technical information there as well.

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But Creative Commons is designed in a way that it only caters to your artistic work,

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like, for example, an image or a text, which is Wikipedia or any sound recording.

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But during my course of work, I found out a lot of authors.

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They have also licensed their work under Creative Commons as well.

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Now Creative Commons comes in a way, when you say authors, authors of software or authors?

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Yes.

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No, no, authors of software.

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So these licenses are there on their website.

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So Creative Commons have a huge website where they give you a variety of licenses.

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Similarly, Free Software Foundation has their own list of licenses, General Public License

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1, General Public License 2, General Public License 3, which is their latest version.

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They also have something known as Lesser General Public License, LGPL 2.1 and 3.

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Then they also have Afro General Public License, Faro General Public License, that is AGPL.

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Similarly, Open Source Initiative, what they do is they look at the license text, which

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is designed by a specific author, go through the license text, determine whatever the principle

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they have enshrined in a license, whether those principles are there or not.

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If they found those principles in that particular license, they certify it.

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So OSI is sort of a certification body which certifies the licenses, whereas Free Software

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Foundation is something which drafts their own licenses.

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Let's talk about the Creative Commons or Creative Commons in general comes in a various flavor.

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So they have four or five terms.

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So first term is Creative Commons Attribution.

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Now Creative Commons Attribution is something where you can use the work, do whatever you

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want to do with the work, just attribution is required.

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Now with the same thing, they add another term that is Creative Commons Attribution

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and Share Alike.

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Now the moment I add Share Alike, it becomes a sort of strong copy left, although the term

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is not correct to use here, but in a way it becomes the strong copy left means you need

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to distribute the work in a same manner.

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Now it's up to a person who is licensing his work under Creative Commons to either choose

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this Share Alike or not.

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Then third thing comes, let's say for example, I wrote a novel and I do not want commercial

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people to utilize it.

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So I can do Creative Commons Attribution non-commercial.

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So the moment I do this, what happens is you cannot use my work for commercial purposes.

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So Creative Commons have various things.

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So one is Share Alike, another is your non-commercial.

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I think these are the two major ones where you can customize your license as per your

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requirement and you can release your work under these requirements.

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Now apart from that, they also come up with the various jurisdiction specifics.

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So for example, I am the person who wrote some article in US and I want that article

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to be just in the US jurisdiction.

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So I can go with Creative Commons, Share Alike or whatever, USA.

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So now by that what happens is whatever the list of rights, obligations and restrictions

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are there in the license, they shall be interpreted in terms of United States of America or Canada

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or anywhere else.

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So Creative Commons, I would say, is sort of a la carte basket where you choose rights

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and obligations as per your requirement and then release it to the public.

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It essentially makes the job of lawyers redundant, like you do not have to consult a lawyer every

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time you are doing a licensing of your software, right?

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And this is a very boring and mundane topic as to what these are.

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So we will not go into the detail of this in this podcast, but a friend of mine has

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written a very extensive article on this.

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So some, again, will be interested in understanding the nuances of each and every license.

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I'll put a link in the description.

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You go and read that, right?

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Now moving on to the next very interesting question because we are talking about softwares.

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Patent for software, right?

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Current scenario versus how things were 5 years, 10 years back or patents of software

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in India compared to software patents in the US.

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Do you want to give a comparative analysis on this?

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Okay, so patent, if I talk about patent in general, USA versus India, so patent grant

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in USA is more easier when it comes to these things.

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So they more or less give everything patent, right?

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Because they are more market driven economy.

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When we talk about India, we more or less follow the approach of UK or Europe, where

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we are very selective in order to give exclusive right to anyone.

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Now coming to the software part, in USA you can get a patent for more or less anything

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as long as it is not computer program per se.

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So now per se can be interpreted as in you have an algorithm, you convert that algorithm

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into a machine readable language, either in Java, C, C++, whatever.

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Now in India, what basically happens is that you will not get patent for that particular

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code itself.

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Rather, you'll get the patent for functionality it achieves.

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So if I take an example here, let's say I am developing a washing machine, right?

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Now this washing machine has certain features.

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Feature as in you press a button, it will wash your delicate clothes in a certain manner

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or you press a button, it will wash your woolens.

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Now this functionality is achieved by a software, right?

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So when I press delicate, it will give certain inputs to the hardware and then hardware function

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in certain manner.

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Now I can get patent on this particular software along with the functionality.

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If I go and say, okay, this is my software and give me patent for this software, I will

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not receive it.

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I have to show how it is functioning and how it is enhancing the, either the monetary way

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or enhancing the life of the people in general.

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So in India, if you want to get your software patented, you need to show the functionality

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associated to the application.

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Hence there has to be some hardware and software linkage and how this software is controlling

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that hardware to either assisting people or reducing money.

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Wow, great explanation and you know, do you want to delve into why inventors or companies

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love software patents versus copyright?

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Like just FYI, for people who don't know, copyright software or source code is created

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as a literary work and by the virtue of Berne Convention and the Indian Populite Act, you

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get automatic or protection of it as soon as it is put in a tangible form.

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There is a perception that, you know, if you don't register, it would be, it's not enforceable.

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No, if you don't register, it is harder to enforce.

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But the moment you put it in a tangible format, it is protected.

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It is protected, yes.

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Now, why they love software patents versus software copyright?

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Okay, so it's almost two years since I'm working in this industry and I read a lot of research

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paper and I also work with these software developers.

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So one thing which I found out after this year of experience is that software is something

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which is very functional in character, right?

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So whenever I want a protection, I want the protection for the functionality, not the

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expression, right?

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I am least bothered about my expression because there are n number of ways someone can copy

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that expression and still that expression is different from mine, right?

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Now copyright is designed in a way that it only protects the expression, not the functionality.

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Whereas patent is something which protects your functionality, they are least concerned

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about the expression, how you are expressing it.

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So I think this is one of the reason because of which companies are preferring to go for

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a software patent rather than copywriting.

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Now if I deep dive into this, then I would say in copyright what happens is if you have

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multiple ways to express certain things, right, then your expression is protected, right?

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So for example, I'm developing a software for scientific calculator, let's say.

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Now in developing that scientific calculator, no matter how well I have written that piece

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of code, but if it's the only way to achieve the addition of two numbers, someone else

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can copy it, right?

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Either I have a copyright over it.

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Now because of this particular reason, people are preferring patents.

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Now in patents, there is nothing like such.

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So if I am the first inventor of an application and file the patent for my software, nobody

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can touch me.

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Nobody can touch my product.

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Nobody can even use it or import it.

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Certain sort of things are not available in the copyright.

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So copyright is designed in this way.

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There is one beautiful paper written by, I'm not sure who's the author of it, known as

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spillover.

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So he basically discuss about the fallacies of the copyright law.

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He said the copyright is designed in a way so that it has a lot of fallacy in it.

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Apart from that, I also believe that comparing a novel with the software is not the right

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thing.

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It's like comparing Apple with, I would say a potato.

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They are not even a same family all together.

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Apart from that, one more reason because of which I believe copywriting software is not

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well protected is if you look into the time period.

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So copyright is given for the author's life, 60 years, right?

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And nowadays the technology is fasting such a way that today my software is in market

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tomorrow something new comes and it becomes obsolete.

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Now what will I do for that particular prediction?

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And there are a lot of research papers written by a lot of people.

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I think Pamela Samuelson, she's a well-renowned professor in UC Berkeley, if I'm not wrong.

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She has written a fantastic paper where she has discussed that why copyright is not right

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legislation to protect software.

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Right.

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And you know, from a practical perspective, a lot of people who are writing software,

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they come to me and say like, if I want to register a software, I have to submit a copy

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of it, right?

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Yes.

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Yes.

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I agree that to me, to an author of a software, that seems more risky because I'm sharing

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my copy and I'm making it public domain.

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If I'm so secretive about it, I'd rather just keep it a closed source and keep it as

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a trade secret in protecting it in the copyright, right?

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I also believe that proving patent infringement is comparatively easier than proving the copyright

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infringement.

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Right.

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So when you go for a copyright infringement, a lot of things, firstly, you need to show

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that whatever you have done, this is the fact part of it.

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And these are the expression.

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Now in that expression, they will look into the substantial similarity, right?

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So whatever the work I have in whatever the work infringer have, they will look for the

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substantial similarity in that.

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So the design in such a way that at last, whatever is left, most of the time it is not

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considered as infringement.

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So I don't think so copyright is doing any help to the software industry.

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It's a high time that we look for some new legislature, which is more stronger and stringent.

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On the same time, give protection for a limited period.

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I mean, don't give us a protection for 20 years because technology will be obsolete

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in 20 years.

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Give us for five or seven years and has to be a stronger one.

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And then copyright is specifically expedite the process, a patent granting process.

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And a couple of years back, I think still 2015, 16, when I was actively practicing IP, right?

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At that time, the position of government of India was that we will not grant just the

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software patents.

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We will grant patents if a software is attached with a novel hardware.

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That was the exact term these guys were using.

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Now a lot of that what is happening is that for yourself, imagine that I want to get a

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patent for a software to help people in restaurants order their stuff right from the table that

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they are eating at, right?

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So like me, I want to create a software like that.

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Now in India, I can't get a patent for that software, right?

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So what I'll do, I'll just, just for the sake of getting a patent, I'll attach a software,

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I'll attach a basic computer, which is not novel in any way, and try to get a patent

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that way.

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So do you have any latest updates on it?

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Is this stance has changed or are they still following it?

301
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No, I don't think so.

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They have changed anything on this particular matter.

303
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And to be honest, and it won't be an exaggeration to say that we basically wait for US or UK

304
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to do something and then we implement that in our legislation.

305
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So although they have changed the rule, but I don't think so they have made any changes

306
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so far as granting the patent for the software in general.

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Software patents are usually granted in India, it's all about the way you are drafting it.

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A very previous drafter can get you a patent on any piece of software.

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Just a misnomer now that software patents are not there in India, it's all about the way

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you are drafting it.

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If I can recall correctly, a friend of mine, she used to work in one of the industry and

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she drafted a patent and the functionality for which she got the patent was very naive.

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They have a drop down menu initially, I mean, they had a ribbon initially and then they

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converted that ribbon into a drop down menu and they drafted in a way that it reduces

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the time for the consumer, it is easier to see and so on and so forth.

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And they received the patent for it.

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So nowadays, I mean, you are getting a patent for anything and everything, it's just how

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you are drafting it, thus there shall not be any prior art.

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It brings us to a very interesting concept as to what should young startups at this stage

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do.

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So to be honest, as a startup, a lot of times you come up with new ways of doing stuff,

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especially when there is an emerging technology.

323
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Now the question comes, what should they do?

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Should they invest 2.5 lakhs, this is the minimum amount a decent patent specification

325
00:21:39,720 --> 00:21:42,880
drafter would charge, right?

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Get that and just for the sake of as a competitive advantage, or sorry, should I say as a more

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to sell depends, we could just get that patent in India, get it in the US and other, or should

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we ignore the patent part of it, focus on the building product?

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So I would say that if a startup is in a very nascent phase, and whatever the technology

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they have come up with is not so revolutionary, I believe that keep on working on it rather

331
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investing their time on patent.

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The best way is if they have something which is like revolutionary, nobody has thought

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00:22:17,040 --> 00:22:20,960
of it before, then of course you should go for a patent.

334
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Otherwise you would have no point of going for the patent, right?

335
00:22:24,000 --> 00:22:29,040
So let's say I develop something and somebody develop the same thing, now question comes

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whether I'll go for a patent infringement there or not, right?

337
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If they develop more or less the same thing, do my purse allow me to go for a patent infringement?

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So all of these things do come in picture, whether to go for a patent or not, I would

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say it's best suited on the either the purse or there, I mean how much money they have

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in their bank account plus the nature of technology they want to protect, like if it is something

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which is very unique, then of course they should go for, I mean it's all up to the

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money they have in their bank account.

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People often file patents just for the to file case against other people.

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So by these people called patent trolls, that they will have a company who is not doing

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any business, just hold on to a lot of patents and just go and filing cases against them.

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And because litigation and IP litigation is quite and specifically IP litigation is quite

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expensive in the US, what lawyers what they what end up happening that majority of the

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cases are settled.

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Yeah, so that is what is the case I've seen even in the open source as well.

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So there are a lot of companies who had to settle their cases outside the court and paying

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a hefty sum of money for something which is very, very small.

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I mean, they're not supposed to pay that much, they could have done it in the initial phase,

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but because of lack of information, they have not.

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So for patents, I believe, as I said earlier, if you're post support, then of course go

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for a patent.

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If your technology is very unique and have a distra could have a disruptive effect on

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the market, then of course go for a patent.

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But if it is something which is like, in general, like general in nature, then I would say there

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is no point of wasting your money when getting the patent because you're not anyways going

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for the patent infringement or anything else because litigation in India is still a very

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expensive and a tough job.

362
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But for all reasons, right.

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And see, that's what that's exactly was experience of one of my friends.

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And she was sued by a company which is offering an open source solution.

365
00:24:40,240 --> 00:24:44,080
Right. So that's a misnomer that people don't believe that, you know.

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And that's why in the in the last podcast, I was like, you know, trying to tell you as

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to how, like, you know, young startups can make sure that, you know, they're not infringing

368
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the open source licenses for the.

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So if you like end up in a problem and like they are asking for an FTA money, try to get

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in touch with us. We will probably try to help you as much as we can.

371
00:25:06,560 --> 00:25:07,560
Yeah.

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Our listeners that now they see that's now coming back to your question as to what

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00:25:14,160 --> 00:25:18,240
you said that they should get a patent if the technology is revolutionary.

374
00:25:18,240 --> 00:25:22,440
Right. At the earliest, it's hard to guess that.

375
00:25:22,440 --> 00:25:23,880
Right. Imagine this, right.

376
00:25:23,880 --> 00:25:29,320
Imagine this. We have to let's let's go back 20 years or 20, 25 years back in time.

377
00:25:29,320 --> 00:25:35,800
Right. Now, the imagine the founders of Google is sitting in front of you and they're

378
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asking. Now, what we have done is that getting inspiration

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00:25:41,240 --> 00:25:47,400
from academic papers, where it is a very good indicator of the fact that how credible

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00:25:47,560 --> 00:25:50,480
a scientific paper is taking inspiration from that.

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00:25:50,760 --> 00:25:54,920
We have tried to implement that this concept in the web itself.

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So now we are going to categorize or rank a web page based upon the fact how many

383
00:26:00,600 --> 00:26:03,560
backlinks and what is the quality of those backlinks is coming.

384
00:26:03,600 --> 00:26:06,320
Right. Now, they come to you.

385
00:26:06,320 --> 00:26:08,560
Right. And what would you say to them?

386
00:26:09,560 --> 00:26:14,440
I mean, Google didn't go for a patent for it anyways, and still they're doing absolutely

387
00:26:14,440 --> 00:26:19,680
fine. That's luckily true.

388
00:26:19,680 --> 00:26:21,560
But, yeah, there is no necessity.

389
00:26:21,560 --> 00:26:27,760
Right. Right now, the thing is, when Google was trying to do, IBM wasn't trying to

390
00:26:28,040 --> 00:26:29,640
enter into the search engine market.

391
00:26:29,640 --> 00:26:34,440
Right. Yeah. What is happening is that because a lot of people, in respect of generative

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00:26:34,520 --> 00:26:38,920
AI is coming to me and saying that, you know, this is the thing we should we get a patent

393
00:26:38,920 --> 00:26:44,080
or not. But the problem right now is all the existing incumbents, whether it's Google,

394
00:26:44,080 --> 00:26:50,000
whether it's Microsoft, it's Apple, all of them are trying to enter into the even NVIDIA.

395
00:26:50,120 --> 00:26:53,440
Right. So now, like I give you a very practical example.

396
00:26:53,440 --> 00:26:58,680
Couple of days back, very good friend of mine came to me and he these guys have come

397
00:26:58,680 --> 00:27:04,400
up with the method or process through which they can substantially reduce the

398
00:27:04,400 --> 00:27:07,880
hallucination problem in the large language models.

399
00:27:07,880 --> 00:27:12,000
Obviously, I would not go into that because then it will become part of prior art and

400
00:27:12,000 --> 00:27:16,320
it will invalidate their patent application if they decide to file.

401
00:27:16,320 --> 00:27:22,400
Right. So people from non-legal background, you have certain idea about the

402
00:27:22,400 --> 00:27:25,280
patents. You can definitely discuss this internally.

403
00:27:25,280 --> 00:27:31,080
You can definitely discuss it with your lawyers or loyal friends, but never put it

404
00:27:31,200 --> 00:27:35,000
whenever publish it, because the moment you publish it, it becomes part of the prior

405
00:27:35,000 --> 00:27:41,960
art. And that is a very and if that happens, it's almost invalidate your own

406
00:27:41,960 --> 00:27:47,040
invention. I mean, yeah, there are anticipation clauses there.

407
00:27:47,040 --> 00:27:49,560
But then, again, unnecessary hassle will be there.

408
00:27:50,400 --> 00:27:52,640
That's against the complication. So don't publish it.

409
00:27:52,880 --> 00:27:54,880
Don't publish it. That's the end line.

410
00:27:54,880 --> 00:28:01,280
Yes, right. So now the thing is now a person like Moom is like, you know, these

411
00:28:01,280 --> 00:28:04,120
guys are doing hard work. They are obviously on a shoestring budget.

412
00:28:04,360 --> 00:28:09,400
They have done a really good job at reducing the hallucination problem, which is a very

413
00:28:09,640 --> 00:28:12,480
fundamental problem of large language models.

414
00:28:13,200 --> 00:28:15,800
So what should I say to those guys?

415
00:28:16,520 --> 00:28:21,920
So if the application which they have developed is actually affecting the means

416
00:28:21,920 --> 00:28:24,840
of reducing the hallucination in a large language model, I believe this is a

417
00:28:24,840 --> 00:28:28,240
revolutionary technology. They should go for a patent for this particular

418
00:28:28,520 --> 00:28:33,960
application. Now, when I say general in nature means, let's say I develop a new

419
00:28:34,160 --> 00:28:37,880
device which use AI to do specific tasks.

420
00:28:38,040 --> 00:28:40,880
Now, this is something which is very general and very specific.

421
00:28:40,880 --> 00:28:43,480
I shall not waste my time to get a patent for this.

422
00:28:44,160 --> 00:28:47,840
Now, the example which we have given is resolving a very technical problem, which

423
00:28:47,840 --> 00:28:51,520
is there and most of the AI model are suffering from it.

424
00:28:51,960 --> 00:28:56,480
Now, this is a revolutionary technology, I believe, and they should go for the patent

425
00:28:56,480 --> 00:29:03,520
for this one. So you need to identify and determine the or rather, I should say, weight

426
00:29:03,800 --> 00:29:09,520
your own invention on one end and the amount of money that you are willing to spend on

427
00:29:09,520 --> 00:29:14,920
the other end. Now, if you find that money is well spent, then yes, go for it.

428
00:29:15,240 --> 00:29:20,880
But if you see it is not and you are running low on the budget, I would say save your

429
00:29:20,880 --> 00:29:22,920
money. That is the best way to go forward.

430
00:29:23,480 --> 00:29:26,000
But this technology, I would say, of course, you should go for it.

431
00:29:27,400 --> 00:29:30,440
See, that was that's exactly was my advice as well.

432
00:29:30,600 --> 00:29:31,960
So that's pretty interesting.

433
00:29:31,960 --> 00:29:35,520
And now we're talking about larger English models, chat, GPT.

434
00:29:36,160 --> 00:29:41,600
What is in your opinion as a ex-ingineer and the current lawyer, what is the best

435
00:29:41,600 --> 00:29:44,440
use case for generative AI in legal profession?

436
00:29:45,400 --> 00:29:52,920
In the legal profession, see, interpretation is a major role that lawyers do, right?

437
00:29:53,240 --> 00:29:58,760
And I don't think so the current AI or the generative AI that we have is sufficient or

438
00:29:58,760 --> 00:30:00,720
capable enough to do the interpretation.

439
00:30:01,160 --> 00:30:06,720
As one of our law professors put it in a very well-mannered statement is that that

440
00:30:06,720 --> 00:30:10,480
these generative AI are nothing but text prediction, right?

441
00:30:10,480 --> 00:30:14,200
So what I have in my mobile is more or less the same thing, but on a larger scale.

442
00:30:14,680 --> 00:30:19,280
The right quote is they're over glorified autocorrect.

443
00:30:19,840 --> 00:30:21,640
Yes, over glorified autocorrect.

444
00:30:21,640 --> 00:30:22,160
Exactly.

445
00:30:22,880 --> 00:30:28,640
So as of now, with the current state of the generative AI, what the assistant they can

446
00:30:28,640 --> 00:30:33,440
do in the legal field is the drafting of the contracts, especially the normal contracts,

447
00:30:33,440 --> 00:30:35,800
for example, rental agreement or the sale deed.

448
00:30:36,280 --> 00:30:39,320
They also can help you in analyzing these agreements.

449
00:30:39,440 --> 00:30:44,880
I mean, if I want to get the summary of an agreement, I can go through, but then again,

450
00:30:44,880 --> 00:30:49,000
I would highly recommend not to rely completely on the summary provided.

451
00:30:49,880 --> 00:30:56,040
So on the drafting part, I would say that yes, generative AI can assist a lot, but still

452
00:30:56,080 --> 00:31:01,880
there are a lot of areas where, especially in the legal domain, AI is still not on the

453
00:31:02,280 --> 00:31:04,120
even the closest pedestal, I believe.

454
00:31:04,720 --> 00:31:10,640
So the reason I believe is when we talk about law and core law in general, it's more about

455
00:31:10,640 --> 00:31:11,440
the interpretation.

456
00:31:11,560 --> 00:31:14,880
If I take an example of a criminal law, let's say somebody stabbed me.

457
00:31:15,320 --> 00:31:18,640
Now here, the question is not that person has stabbed me and that's why I'm a murderer.

458
00:31:18,720 --> 00:31:25,080
The point comes into what pressure, where I put the knife into, whether that knife hitting

459
00:31:25,080 --> 00:31:30,200
the vital parts of my body or not, how much I twisted the knife, right?

460
00:31:30,240 --> 00:31:35,240
So evidence comes into a picture and I believe current state of the AI is not able to handle

461
00:31:35,240 --> 00:31:41,200
all of these things and is not able to predict the answers or determine whether the person

462
00:31:41,200 --> 00:31:44,560
is guilty or not of the crime he is accused of.

463
00:31:45,200 --> 00:31:47,920
So in drafting part, I would say yes, AI can assist.

464
00:31:48,680 --> 00:31:53,840
On the analysis part, of course, AI can assist, but still a lot of work is still lawyers need

465
00:31:53,840 --> 00:31:54,080
to do.

466
00:31:54,840 --> 00:31:55,240
Right.

467
00:31:55,320 --> 00:31:55,880
Absolutely.

468
00:31:56,120 --> 00:32:00,880
So this is like in a sense, you're saying the interpretation is a use case where I feel

469
00:32:00,880 --> 00:32:03,520
that AI is really lagging and there's a lot of yes.

470
00:32:05,040 --> 00:32:08,920
That's completely, completely, I completely concur with you on that topic.

471
00:32:09,600 --> 00:32:09,880
Right.

472
00:32:09,920 --> 00:32:14,080
But in addition to these general use cases, like contract drafting, contract analysis or

473
00:32:14,080 --> 00:32:19,280
contract review, do you have anything specific to the kind of problems that you are facing,

474
00:32:19,280 --> 00:32:19,600
right?

475
00:32:19,600 --> 00:32:25,720
Very specific to professors who are doing your kind of work, where you feel generally

476
00:32:25,800 --> 00:32:27,280
I can make a huge difference.

477
00:32:28,040 --> 00:32:32,400
I mean, I would, I won't say that I'm working into this particular area, but yes, there

478
00:32:32,400 --> 00:32:36,560
are a lot of people who are doing the drafting part of the agreement or the analysis part

479
00:32:36,560 --> 00:32:37,240
of the agreement.

480
00:32:37,480 --> 00:32:38,680
I'm also over there.

481
00:32:40,040 --> 00:32:40,440
Yeah.

482
00:32:40,800 --> 00:32:43,280
So for them, it's really helpful.

483
00:32:43,960 --> 00:32:49,800
Just for the fun sake, I try to create a question answering model to see whether they are

484
00:32:49,800 --> 00:32:54,440
functioning, they are sufficient, whether they will assist me or not, although it's

485
00:32:54,440 --> 00:32:55,640
not my part of job.

486
00:32:56,440 --> 00:33:00,920
So I was able to determine exactly what are the rights and liabilities of the obligation,

487
00:33:00,920 --> 00:33:08,040
at least where it is stated, or classify the entire license agreement into the pre-informed

488
00:33:08,800 --> 00:33:09,320
clauses.

489
00:33:09,720 --> 00:33:12,800
So yes, on that particular part, of course, the AI can help you.

490
00:33:14,320 --> 00:33:18,600
But then I would say a second reading is still required because there are a lot of things

491
00:33:18,600 --> 00:33:22,040
which even in my model that AI left.

492
00:33:22,720 --> 00:33:27,880
So if I asked on the right, there are certain things it provided, then certain things I

493
00:33:27,880 --> 00:33:30,600
still have to go through the entire license agreement and then look into.

494
00:33:32,240 --> 00:33:34,440
Have you used any AI for legal research?

495
00:33:35,200 --> 00:33:37,720
No, no, I don't rely on AI for legal research.

496
00:33:37,720 --> 00:33:44,000
I go for both on ICSRN, look for a legal research and then start reading into it.

497
00:33:44,480 --> 00:33:45,000
That's true.

498
00:33:45,000 --> 00:33:50,360
But just to remember that the lawyers before your generation used to say the thing about

499
00:33:50,360 --> 00:33:51,320
Google, right?

500
00:33:52,080 --> 00:33:53,680
Yeah, I remember that.

501
00:33:53,960 --> 00:33:57,760
Yeah, I still believe that books are a better way to go forward.

502
00:33:57,760 --> 00:34:01,560
I have a lot of legal books which are kept outside.

503
00:34:05,920 --> 00:34:07,880
Even if I have to, sorry to cut you a bit.

504
00:34:08,360 --> 00:34:10,760
No, no, books, I completely agree.

505
00:34:10,760 --> 00:34:19,000
But imagine today, I have this question, whether having an indemnity clause with 3x

506
00:34:19,000 --> 00:34:24,840
liability or something of that sort, where would I go and do the research on this?

507
00:34:24,840 --> 00:34:29,760
If I would have to go to the old school and do the research just by using books, how would

508
00:34:29,760 --> 00:34:30,280
I go about that?

509
00:34:31,520 --> 00:34:33,640
Mean drafting an indemnity clause or?

510
00:34:34,800 --> 00:34:36,840
Legal research using just using books.

511
00:34:37,280 --> 00:34:42,560
And I have a legal question, whether this indemnity clause is valid or not.

512
00:34:43,040 --> 00:34:44,000
How would I go about it?

513
00:34:45,000 --> 00:34:49,600
I think for contracts, specifically, there are a lot of good commentaries available.

514
00:34:49,880 --> 00:34:58,880
I believe, I think, OLA or OLA, OLA in OLA, I believe, not OLA, there's some books from

515
00:34:58,880 --> 00:35:06,160
Nexus, Lexis Nexus is there, which has a huge commentary on contract law.

516
00:35:06,560 --> 00:35:09,840
And those commentaries are given on the section specific.

517
00:35:09,880 --> 00:35:12,400
So you go and find the indemnity section.

518
00:35:13,320 --> 00:35:15,200
What is the section number for the indemnity?

519
00:35:15,760 --> 00:35:20,680
Open that book, go to that particular section and go to the entire case laws, whatever is

520
00:35:20,680 --> 00:35:20,920
there.

521
00:35:21,360 --> 00:35:29,920
And I believe if you read five, six, seven research paper, after seventh, you develop

522
00:35:29,920 --> 00:35:36,080
this ability to read few lines and determine whether this particular paper will be helpful

523
00:35:36,080 --> 00:35:36,880
to you or not.

524
00:35:37,760 --> 00:35:43,760
So once you do that research, you will be able to develop this this capacity that after

525
00:35:43,760 --> 00:35:46,960
reading few lines, you will determine, OK, this is not useful for me.

526
00:35:46,960 --> 00:35:47,760
I can move forward.

527
00:35:48,800 --> 00:35:50,800
So, yeah, that's what it is.

528
00:35:51,040 --> 00:35:54,440
And I still believe that is the best way to go forward.

529
00:35:55,720 --> 00:35:56,280
Makes sense.

530
00:35:57,000 --> 00:36:00,080
So, Chetan, thanks a lot for coming on the podcast today.

531
00:36:00,440 --> 00:36:04,440
Are you interested to have your theory or insights?

532
00:36:04,960 --> 00:36:05,400
Yep, sure.

533
00:36:05,520 --> 00:36:06,040
No issues.

534
00:36:06,600 --> 00:36:07,040
Thank you.

535
00:36:08,200 --> 00:36:11,080
That wraps up our enriching discussion with Chetan.

536
00:36:12,080 --> 00:36:17,880
From navigating the complexities of open source software compliance to sharing his personal

537
00:36:17,880 --> 00:36:23,160
journey and hardships, Chetan's insights have been nothing short of enlightening.

538
00:36:23,600 --> 00:36:28,920
If you found this episode valuable, don't forget to subscribe and share it within your

539
00:36:28,920 --> 00:36:29,320
network.

540
00:36:29,880 --> 00:36:34,040
Thanks again to our listeners for joining us on LexDiscuss Cafe.

541
00:36:34,360 --> 00:36:40,200
And a special thanks to Chetan for his time, expertise and sharing his side of story.

542
00:36:40,520 --> 00:36:43,040
This is your host, Avinash Tepati, signing off.

543
00:36:43,280 --> 00:36:46,320
Until next time, stay curious, stay caffeinated.