Time for a Change: The Schema of Contract in the Digital Era

INTRODUCTION: A TRADITIONAL SCHEMA OF CONTRACTING .... 548 I. AN INTRODUCTION TO COGNITIVE MODELS ....................... 549 II. THE ORIGIN OF THE MODERN SCHEMA OF CONTRACT ..... 550 III. CHANGES IN CULTURE HAVE TRANSFORMED THE WRITTEN WORD ...................................................................... 553 IV. FLAWS IN THE CURRENT COGNITIVE SCHEMA OF CONTRACT STEMMING FROM CHANGES IN THE WRITTEN WORD ...................................................................... 557 A. Writing No Longer Indicates a Concise, Immutable Agreement ............................................................................. 557 B. Many Digital-Era Transactions are No Longer BargainedFor ....................................................................................... 560 C. Many Digital-Era Transactions are No Longer Ritualized to Ensure Binding Consent .................................................... 562 D. The Break between Today’s Schema of Contractual Analysis and Today’s Digital-Era Transactions .................................. 563 V. STEPS ALONG THE ROAD: PROPOSED METHODS OF ADDRESSING THE PROBLEM ................................................... 566 A. Contractual analysis should focus on the factors that made writings binding, and accept that a contract’s existence in writing no longer stands in for such factors. ............................ 567 B. The modern schema of contractual analysis should consider equitable principles. ............................................................... 567 C. Courts stand in the best position to resolve the problems of digital-era transactions by adjusting the modern schema of contractual analysis. .............................................................. 568 CONCLUSION ....................................................................................... 570