I’m confused. “render internet related services as requested by the Company from time to time” is not at all a contractual obligation to produce content on an ongoing basis. If there were a contractual obligation to produce content on an ongoing basis, I’d expect the contract to specify how much content, for how long. I’d understand ‘internet related services’ to mean help with access to the account, authentication, etc. as relevant, not as an ongoing job as a content creator.
I agree that Emerson argues that Emerson alone created content for the site, and that Deck doesn’t dispute this, but neither of them seem to actually argue Deck had a contractual obligation to create such content (and reading the contract, I think he clearly did not). Instead, I parse Emerson making this claim as a sort of moral claim to the high ground (“I’m the one doing the hard work here”), not a claim that Deck failed to fulfill contractual responsibilities. I don’t see anywhere where Emerson actually alleges breach of terms by Deck, as opposed to alleging that Deck is trying to take advantage of Emerson’s hard work by backing out of the contract.
Again, not a lawyer so I’m willing to accept I’m wrong.
I think this very much depends on how “services requested by the company” is interpreted.
“render internet related services as requested by the Company from time to time
Failure by the Contractor to meet deadlines for performance of services or failing to meet the standards required by the Company in the performing of services
You could argue that access is what’s requested, yes. Personally, I don’t, because access by default is already assumed under a later clause that uses a different wording: “The Contractor agrees not to change any passwords for any Company-related projects without the consent of the Company”
Or you could argue that if Emerson reasonably demands active posting, he is entitled to it under the terms of the contract, and entitled to terminate the contract if this is not fulfilled. We could argue over what constitutes reasonable demands, but I would think it’s more than “almost nothing”.
Not specifying the exact timings didn’t stand out to me. In my experience, it’s not very common to specify exact posting schedules for a long-term brand partnership with a teenager. There’s a certain expectation that teenage influencers are a little bit inconsistent.
In any case, my point with this whole thread is that … the whole Deck thing is really not that much of a red flag? A fairly standard contract was signed with a minor and his parent, who tried to sue by invalidating the entire validity of a contract with a minor+guardian, and it seems Deck wasn’t actively involved the whole time.
I’m not seeing obvious predatory behaviour here. Maybe poorly defined contract terms, but I really don’t see why people keep bringing this up a decade later as evidence against Emerson’s character. Keep in mind, we haven’t seen how many such contracts Spartz Inc signed without any incident.
If this is the absolute worst example an investigation could dig up from Emerson’s 2-decade-long career, it just doesn’t seem very convincing, ya know?
I’m confused. “render internet related services as requested by the Company from time to time” is not at all a contractual obligation to produce content on an ongoing basis. If there were a contractual obligation to produce content on an ongoing basis, I’d expect the contract to specify how much content, for how long. I’d understand ‘internet related services’ to mean help with access to the account, authentication, etc. as relevant, not as an ongoing job as a content creator.
I agree that Emerson argues that Emerson alone created content for the site, and that Deck doesn’t dispute this, but neither of them seem to actually argue Deck had a contractual obligation to create such content (and reading the contract, I think he clearly did not). Instead, I parse Emerson making this claim as a sort of moral claim to the high ground (“I’m the one doing the hard work here”), not a claim that Deck failed to fulfill contractual responsibilities. I don’t see anywhere where Emerson actually alleges breach of terms by Deck, as opposed to alleging that Deck is trying to take advantage of Emerson’s hard work by backing out of the contract.
Again, not a lawyer so I’m willing to accept I’m wrong.
I think this very much depends on how “services requested by the company” is interpreted.
You could argue that access is what’s requested, yes. Personally, I don’t, because access by default is already assumed under a later clause that uses a different wording: “The Contractor agrees not to change any passwords for any Company-related projects without the consent of the Company”
Or you could argue that if Emerson reasonably demands active posting, he is entitled to it under the terms of the contract, and entitled to terminate the contract if this is not fulfilled. We could argue over what constitutes reasonable demands, but I would think it’s more than “almost nothing”.
Not specifying the exact timings didn’t stand out to me. In my experience, it’s not very common to specify exact posting schedules for a long-term brand partnership with a teenager. There’s a certain expectation that teenage influencers are a little bit inconsistent.
In any case, my point with this whole thread is that … the whole Deck thing is really not that much of a red flag? A fairly standard contract was signed with a minor and his parent, who tried to sue by invalidating the entire validity of a contract with a minor+guardian, and it seems Deck wasn’t actively involved the whole time.
I’m not seeing obvious predatory behaviour here. Maybe poorly defined contract terms, but I really don’t see why people keep bringing this up a decade later as evidence against Emerson’s character. Keep in mind, we haven’t seen how many such contracts Spartz Inc signed without any incident.
If this is the absolute worst example an investigation could dig up from Emerson’s 2-decade-long career, it just doesn’t seem very convincing, ya know?