
Show HN: Why sign a NDA when you can just pinky swear instead? - mjhea0
http://pinky-swear.herokuapp.com/
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gourneau
My friend and I made almost exactly the same thing in Python about 2 years
ago.

[http://pinkyswears.herokuapp.com/](http://pinkyswears.herokuapp.com/)

[https://github.com/yuvadm/pinkyswear](https://github.com/yuvadm/pinkyswear)

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tdumitrescu
Whoa. Those are eerily similar.

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shrikant
As are the (non-Bootstrap) element classes, names and IDs in the code...

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bertil
It is funny, but I doubt is resolves the main issue with NDAs: they tend to be
enforced by people who put too much value on ideas, will over-associate future
successes to the extended memories of their ideas, and who underestimate how
unoriginal they ideas actually are.

Even being an hermit in the middle of the Lapland forest, I have seen too many
unrelated people suggest to me similar ideas within weeks far too many times
not to see any NDA on anything not fully developed as too high a liability to
sign.

~~~
saryant
The dumbest NDA I ever saw was at a 3 Day Startup event I helped run.

This loser (whose idea absolutely sucked) actually had the audacity to make
the first slide of his deck an NDA and then _read it aloud to the entire
audience_ which consisted almost entirely of college kids.

The idea was an online tutoring site. (Did I just break the law?) That was the
magic he didn't want us telling the world about.

I just stood in the back laughing. The domain for his company hadn't actually
been registered—I half-considered buying it right then just to screw with him
out of spite.

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shangxiao
Did you end up explaining to him why NDA's may be counterproductive? Sounds
like a valuable lesson he could've learnt ;)

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saryant
No. I couldn't stand him so I just let his reputation in the community self-
implode until he moved back to the east coast. Dick move? Probably but he
really got on my nerves.

~~~
dnautics
Inaction is rarely if ever a 'dick move' (unless you promised action)

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cfinke
[http://friendda.org/](http://friendda.org/)

"WHEREAS I possess a bright idea that I am choosing to disclose to you, The
Advisor, with the mutual understanding that you are my friend and that you
will not screw me."

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optimiz3
Turned down an "opportunity" to interview at Amazon once because of their
particularly onerous NDAs.

I worked for a competing company, and Amazon's recruiter couldn't get it
through her head that if I signed their NDA, my current employer would be
exposed to potentially false but hard to disprove claims that Amazon's trade
secrets had been leaked.

They kept trying to get me to sign, so I told them that as a professional my
obligation was still to my current employer, and respectfully declined to
continue.

If you have super secret stuff, don't tell it to people.

~~~
rmc
"Would Amazon like to hire someone who turns their back on their current
employer?"

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bulatb
Grammar nits: "A NDA" should say "an NDA." The ellipsis should be three dots,
and there shouldn't be a space before it.

~~~
eatmyshorts
Actually, both are acceptable in this case. If you read the abbreviation using
the words they stand for, i.e. "non-disclosure agreement", then "a" is
correct. If you read the abbreviation as letters, i.e. "N-D-A", then "an" is
correct.

Source:
[http://www.gpuss.co.uk/english_usage/a_or_an.htm](http://www.gpuss.co.uk/english_usage/a_or_an.htm)

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ageigs
We created Shake ([http://shakelaw.com](http://shakelaw.com)) to strike a
balance between simple, short, plain-English language, and legal validity
(marrying those two is harder than you might think). Like them or not, NDAs
are signed all the time (we surveyed nearly 100 startups and found that the
average CEO/Founder signs 3/month). I was surprised by that number, but that's
what the respondents said. I don't advocate signing NDAs for everything, but
we were aiming for a middle ground between a pinky swear and a traditional NDA
full of legal jargon. Simplifying and standardizing the language and making
them easy to create and sign (we started on iOS) takes some of the formality
and awkwardness out of NDAs (and other agreements) without giving up
protections or professionalism. Disclosure: I'm the CEO of Shake, which is
free if you want to check it out.

~~~
bertil
I probably can't really use because I'm not in the US, but thank you so much
for that. Now, to be completely happy, I just need to choose what torture
instrument I'll use on whomever wrote Apple's EULAs, and I'll be a happy man.

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danpalmer
I think a lot of developers and designers underestimate the reasons for NDAs.
I have been asked to sign them for most places I've worked, and have been more
than happy to do so.

\- What if you deal with customer data? I worked at an analytics company, and
"company x" might not like you to disclose that they get 100,000 hits a month.

\- What if you deal with security issues? I worked as a pen-tester and our
clients required certain levels of NDA or security clearance.

It's not all about protecting ideas. Very often it's about protecting customer
data, or it's a requirement from much higher up chain.

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judk
I don't get it. It is just a form where you can write your own NDA.

~~~
collyw
And it also sounds kind of childish. If you are going to charge a customer a
high rate as a consultant, then asking them to sign this seems somewhat
unprofessional.

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ntumlin
How enforceable is this? I like the idea and I remember reading something
(possibly written by pg) about binding text messages, but if I wanted to
actually use this how would I convince someone intent on me signing an NDA.

I hope I'm not over-analyzing something potentially made in jest, but I'm
fascinated on what it takes to make your word legally binding.

~~~
patio11
I think the point is to communicate "I would prefer an agreement enforced by
social norms to one enforced by legal norms here." This is similar to my all-
purpose dodge: "My professional discretion is free. If you want a formal
contract I will be happy to execute it along with my formal invoice."

~~~
andrewfong
It's not a very good dodge. Signing anything, even something done in jest,
creates more risk than if you hadn't.

~~~
scott_s
If you're _also_ sending an invoice, I don't think it counts as "in jest."

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ramigb
So the point of this is ... "Ideas are not important"?

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6d0debc071
Common ideas are unlikely to be protected from competition by an NDA and
constrain the other person's actions in a fairly significant way. Uncommon
ideas are innately protected by requiring consecutive insights in a subject
area which others are highly unlikely (in the sense that if you require 15
ideas that someone might or might not have from a subject area, there's a
three in a hundred thousand chance of whoever someone talks to about it having
that overlap) to be grocked and spread to someone else who's going to leverage
it.

In either case it's difficult to see why someone would sign an NDA, that is
largely to your benefit and the exclusion of theirs. Asking them to do so is
roughly equivalent to the claim you're about to show them a unicorn; a simple,
effective idea that somehow the rest of humanity has missed.

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ycmike
I got a kick out of this. Great project.

