We are working on all these features, even an optional webcam capture during signing. This is just the beginning. Even with current features we are arguably the most complete solution in this space in open-source world.

I appreciate what you're doing but we buy DocuSign so the problem is far far away from us. This turns it into a problem we have to manage ourselves or a problem of finding a vendor stable enough to host your stuff that will make it not our problem long enough for the longest contract retention to expire. Which is difficult.

I'm sure these problems were also difficult for DocuSign in the beginning.

Not really. They actually ran mock trials with legal professionals as test cases. That was an instant win for anyone wanting assurance of admissibility.

No open source startup is going to win there because it's about entities and process, supported by technology not technology on its own. The technology is absolutely worthless without the framework and legal entities surrounding it. It's a unique position no one really understands that well.

They began when Digital signatures were not understood well even by legal professionals. Somewhere fear might have came in picture. Today, its easier to digest the fact that digital signatures are just cryptographic functions that guarantee the authenticity and integrity of documents and various actions on those docs. Plus the legal framework around it is better defined now. I am confident that we will be able to change the perception and make this the de-facto digital signing solution. The movement has just began, there is a long way ahead.

This answer is incredibly technocratic, and misses the mark on what a digital signature is.

A digital signature is a legal construct that stands up in court.

The movement might have begun, but you need to change your perception. You have to stop talking like a technocrat and address the business problem that signatures solve.

I agree. This is the result of being surrounded by developers all day long lol. Will try to focus more on the business problem.

That is a great input, we need to put efforts into ensuring that we are seen as a long term player, in-fact we envision to be one, assuming some contracts might be really long term. I hope a day comes when you trust us enough :)

Gaining trust is one thing, I wish you the very best of luck with that.

Not losing it is another.

The people to preserve trust with are all potential signatories (ie. the public), not the initiating counterparties. Because there are many more of them.

Of course this reputation problem is one you'll share with banks, PayPal and every other "official" type entity that phishers want to jump on.

Now most "Docusign" communications go straight to my spam folder or /dev/null if arriving by email and not from (forwarded) a whitelisted business I already have a relation with. Those that come directly from Docusign (as sender even if DKIM passes) are ignored unless I think there's a reason to be contacted.

Docusign is one of the juiciest spoofing targets for phishing attacks because people act rashly to what they think is something requiring a signature. They also have no timeout on repeat sends, relentlessly spamming users to sign something, which makes them look exactly like, well.... phish-spammers.

Try not to make these same mistakes as Docusign.

No business cares about whether it is open-source or not. They care about when things somehow end up in the court, there is clear understanding of a signed document and nobody has any question about it. More or less a guarantee -- probably not really a guarantee but good enough to hold in court. If your selling point is open source or "free" you have already lost.

We take pride in being open source as we are sure being open source brings a lot more transparency in the entire process. When it comes to the authenticity of a signed document, the cryptographic proofs generated by our solution and digital traces are no different than those generated by DocuSign. It will hold equally true in any court. We understand that we might need some time to be universally acceptable in terms of the perception of the people, but we are confident that we will reach there.

DocuSign doesn't provide anything other than convenience. Generally, in the law, either a signature must be notarized or it doesn't. Docusign isn't a notary, it's really just an electronic document courier. If the legitimacy of a signature is challenged, Docusign isn't going to hire a forensic expert to testify that John Smith was actually the person who logged in and clicked the link. All they can say is that someone with access to the link from IP address 1.1.1.1 clicked Agree.

Um, no. They do full ID verification as well. If you pay for it.

Where is that required? Maybe POAs? At least Florida and Georgia real estate law (the only ones I'm aware of) don't require anything of the sort for any of the paperwork (before closing).

They certainly don't require it but it tends to be used in other transactions where SEC is going to hang you for example.

And my memory of Florida law (when I was signing an apartment rental contract 4 years ago) was that any electronic signature agreed to by the contracting parties was valid. So I simply typed my name in the contract, emailed it to my landlord, and we were done.

Of course, I also used https:/.opentimestamps.org to store the hash of our contract on bitcoin's block chain, because that way we both had proof that the contract existed in a certain form on that date. (I never needed that proof, because he was a good landlord, and I paid rent on time.)

While probably enough to prove it existed, you'd probably need to pay a lot for an expert witness to testify to "hash of file on blockchain means it existed" if you did have to go to court over the existence of the contract.

Interesting, my mom just sold her house and there was no verification.

My point stands, legally either a signature has to be notarized or it doesn't. If it doesn't, any signature can be effective. I'll agree that 3rd party hosting provides an element of independence, however, legally it's not required, and could be done by anyone. E.g., a self-hosting a solution that required the signer to upload a video of them clicking I AGREE would provide just as much certainty as anything Docusign can.

An optional paid feature that not many people seem to use isnt a deal breaker really.