Terms of Service

About These Terms

These Terms of Service (the "Terms") are a binding agreement between you and Desired Path Consulting LLC governing your access to and use of legalaigovernance.com and any pages, content, downloadable templates, tools, newsletter, and related services we make available on or through it (collectively, the "Site"). These Terms incorporate by reference our Privacy Policy and Disclaimer.

Who We Are

The Site is operated by Desired Path Consulting LLC, a North Carolina limited liability company owned by Brian Alenduff (collectively, "we," "us," or "Operator"). Our principal place of business is in North Carolina, United States.

We are not a law firm. We do not provide legal services, we do not represent clients, and nothing on the Site constitutes the practice of law or attorney advertising. The Site exists to help licensed attorneys and US law firms document their own compliance with applicable bar rules, court orders, and malpractice carrier requirements.

Eligibility and Audience

The Site is intended for use by attorneys licensed to practice law in the United States and by the administrative staff of US law firms acting under attorney supervision. By using the Site you represent that you either are a licensed US attorney or are accessing the Site under the supervision of one. The Site is not directed to consumers, individuals seeking advice on their own legal matters, or anyone under 16 years old.

Several states, including Florida, Texas, and California, define the unauthorized practice of law broadly and enforce it actively. If you are not a licensed attorney, do not use the Site or its templates as a substitute for retaining counsel, do not provide its content to consumers as legal guidance, and do not redistribute, repackage, or resell the content as legal services to non-attorneys.

Not Legal Advice; No Attorney-Client Relationship

All content on the Site, including state bar opinion summaries, court order entries, sanctions case writeups, policy templates, blog posts, checklists, the newsletter, and any other materials (collectively, the "Content"), is provided for informational and compliance-documentation purposes only. The Content is not legal advice and must not be relied on as a substitute for advice from a licensed attorney in your jurisdiction.

Use of the Site, downloading templates, subscribing to the newsletter, and any email correspondence with us do not create an attorney-client relationship between you, your firm, or your clients and Operator. Communications you send through the Site are not confidential and not protected by the attorney-client privilege or the attorney work-product doctrine. Do not send us privileged or confidential information.

Bar rules, ethics opinions, court standing orders, and statutes vary meaningfully across states and change over time. A rule that is settled law in one jurisdiction may be unsettled, contrary, or absent in another. When the Content discusses a specific jurisdiction, it is limited to that jurisdiction. Citations on the Site link to primary sources; before relying on any cited authority for any purpose, retrieve and read the primary source yourself. The full disclaimer is at /disclaimer/ and is incorporated into these Terms by reference.

License to Use the Site

Subject to your compliance with these Terms, we grant you a limited, non-exclusive, non-sublicensable, non-transferable, revocable license to access and view the Site and the Content for your internal business purposes as a US-licensed attorney or under the supervision of one. This license does not include any right to copy, modify, redistribute, sell, lease, or commercially exploit the Site or the Content except as expressly permitted by the template license below or as permitted by applicable law.

License to Downloadable Templates

The Site offers downloadable templates, checklists, sample policies, court-disclosure forms, verification logs, audit reports, and similar documents (collectively, the "Templates"). Subject to your compliance with these Terms, we grant you a limited, perpetual, worldwide, non-exclusive, non-sublicensable, non-transferable, royalty-free license to:

• Use the Templates internally within a single US law firm at which you are employed, partnered, or engaged as supervised staff
• Modify and customize the Templates for that firm's internal use, including by adding firm name, jurisdiction, matter-specific facts, and similar adaptations
• Distribute customized versions of the Templates internally to that firm's attorneys and staff, and to that firm's own clients in the course of representing those clients

You may not, without our prior written consent:

• Resell, sublicense, or otherwise distribute the Templates or any derivative work, in whole or in substantial part, to any third party
• Include the Templates, in whole or in substantial part, in any product or service you offer to third parties
• Use the Templates to develop a product or service that competes with the Site or its paid offerings, including any tracker, governance platform, compliance documentation kit, or similar work
• Use the Templates or any other Content to train, fine-tune, evaluate, or otherwise develop any artificial intelligence or machine-learning model
• Remove, alter, or obscure any copyright, trademark, source attribution, or other proprietary notice on the Templates as delivered to you

Any rights not expressly granted in these Terms are reserved. The license in this section terminates automatically on your material breach of these Terms; on termination, you must delete master copies of the Templates in your possession, but documents your firm has already used in client matters or filed of record may be retained as part of those matters.

Your Responsibilities

You agree to:

• Use the Site only for lawful purposes and in compliance with these Terms, the rules of your bar, applicable court rules, and any applicable malpractice insurance terms
• Verify every citation, legal authority, court order, and template provision against primary sources before relying on it for any purpose
• Apply your own professional judgment to anything you take from the Site for use in client matters, internal compliance, or court filings
• Promptly notify us of any factual error you discover in the Content (see Contact)

Prohibited Uses

You will not, and will not permit any third party to:

• Use the Site or the Content in any way that violates any applicable law, regulation, bar rule, or court order, or that constitutes the unauthorized practice of law
• Use the Content as the basis for legal advice provided to consumers or other non-attorney members of the public, or otherwise repackage the Content as a consumer-facing legal product
• Scrape, spider, harvest, or systematically extract substantial portions of the Site or the Content by automated means
• Reverse engineer, decompile, or attempt to derive the source code of any software made available through the Site
• Probe, scan, or test the vulnerability of the Site or its supporting infrastructure, or breach any security or authentication measures
• Interfere with or disrupt the Site, including by transmitting malware, sending unsolicited bulk traffic, or overwhelming the Site or its providers
• Misrepresent your identity, your affiliation with any firm, or your bar status when interacting with us
• Use the Site, the Content, or the Templates to train any artificial intelligence or machine-learning model, whether your own or a third party's
• Republish, mirror, or syndicate the Content on another site or service except for short excerpts permitted by fair use with attribution and a link back

Intellectual Property

The Site, including its text, graphics, code, design, organization, the compilation of bar opinion summaries and case writeups, the Templates, and the trademarks "Legal AI Governance" and "Desired Path Consulting," is owned by us or our licensors and is protected by US copyright, trademark, and other intellectual property laws. Except for the limited licenses granted in these Terms, no rights are transferred or licensed.

The Site quotes from and links to government works such as state bar ethics opinions, court orders, judicial opinions, statutes, and regulations. Government edicts of authoritative bodies are generally not subject to copyright. The American Bar Association's formal opinions and similar private-association materials are copyrighted by their authors; the Site quotes them sparingly and with attribution as fair use under 17 U.S.C. § 107. If you believe content on the Site infringes your copyright, contact us at the email below with the elements of a DMCA notice and we will respond promptly.

Submissions and Feedback

If you submit a tip, court-order pointer, citation correction, idea, or other feedback to us through the Site or by email, you grant us a non-exclusive, worldwide, royalty-free, perpetual license to use that submission to operate, improve, and expand the Site, including by incorporating verified court orders or factual corrections into the tracker. We will not claim authorship of your submission, and we will not publish your name in connection with a submission unless you ask us to. Do not submit anything you consider confidential or privileged.

AI and Data Handling

We do not use any of the following to train, fine-tune, or evaluate any artificial intelligence or machine-learning model: information you submit through the newsletter sign-up form, the contents of email you send to us, error reports, court-order tips, or any other personal information described in the Privacy Policy.

The Site itself is hand-curated by people. Where AI tools assist with research or drafting, the resulting Content is reviewed by a human against primary sources before publication. We do not represent that the Content is "AI-generated" or "AI-produced," and we do not market the Site or the Templates as AI products.

Third-Party Services and Links

The Site uses third-party service providers (including Cloudflare for hosting, content delivery, security, and analytics, and Tally for the newsletter sign-up form) and links to third-party websites and primary sources (including bar association sites, court websites, and CourtListener). We do not control, endorse, or guarantee the content, privacy practices, or availability of those third parties, and we are not responsible for them. Your use of a third-party service or website is subject to that third party's terms and privacy policy.

Disclaimers

THE SITE, THE CONTENT, AND THE TEMPLATES ARE PROVIDED ON AN "AS IS" AND "AS AVAILABLE" BASIS, WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND. To the fullest extent permitted by applicable law, we disclaim all warranties, express or implied, including the implied warranties of merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose, non-infringement, title, accuracy, completeness, currency, and any warranties arising from course of dealing or usage of trade.

Without limiting the foregoing, we do not warrant that: (i) the Site or any Content will be available, uninterrupted, secure, or error-free; (ii) any citation on the Site is current, complete, or free from error; (iii) any Template is suitable for any particular client matter, court, jurisdiction, or fact pattern; or (iv) using the Site or any Template will result in compliance with any specific bar rule, court order, or malpractice carrier requirement. The Site supports your firm's documentation of its own compliance work; it does not perform that work for you.

Limitation of Liability

TO THE FULLEST EXTENT PERMITTED BY APPLICABLE LAW, IN NO EVENT WILL OPERATOR OR ITS OFFICERS, MEMBERS, EMPLOYEES, CONTRACTORS, OR LICENSORS BE LIABLE FOR ANY INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, CONSEQUENTIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR PUNITIVE DAMAGES, OR FOR ANY LOSS OF PROFITS, REVENUE, DATA, GOODWILL, OR CLIENTS, ARISING OUT OF OR RELATING TO THESE TERMS, THE SITE, THE CONTENT, OR THE TEMPLATES, REGARDLESS OF THE CAUSE OF ACTION, EVEN IF WE HAVE BEEN ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGES.

TO THE FULLEST EXTENT PERMITTED BY APPLICABLE LAW, OUR TOTAL AGGREGATE LIABILITY FOR ALL CLAIMS ARISING OUT OF OR RELATING TO THESE TERMS, THE SITE, THE CONTENT, OR THE TEMPLATES WILL NOT EXCEED THE GREATER OF (A) ONE HUNDRED US DOLLARS ($100) AND (B) THE AMOUNTS YOU ACTUALLY PAID TO US, IF ANY, IN THE TWELVE (12) MONTHS PRECEDING THE EVENT GIVING RISE TO THE LIABILITY.

The exclusions and limitations in this section do not apply to: (i) our gross negligence, willful misconduct, or fraud; (ii) our indemnification obligations expressly set forth in these Terms; (iii) claims under the North Carolina Unfair and Deceptive Trade Practices Act, Chapter 75 of the North Carolina General Statutes; (iv) any liability that cannot be limited or excluded under applicable law; or (v) any other liability that, as a matter of public policy or governing consumer-protection statute applicable to you, cannot be limited.

You agree that the foregoing allocation of risk is a material part of these Terms, that the pricing and availability of the Site reflect this allocation, and that we would not provide the Site without it.

Indemnification

You will indemnify, defend, and hold harmless Operator and its officers, members, employees, contractors, and licensors from and against any third-party claim, demand, action, proceeding, loss, liability, damage, judgment, settlement, fine, penalty, and reasonable attorneys' fees and costs ("Claims") arising out of or relating to: (i) your breach of these Terms; (ii) your violation of any applicable law, bar rule, court order, or third-party right; (iii) your use of the Templates or the Content, including any provision of the Content as legal advice to a non-attorney or unauthorized practice of law; (iv) any user submission or communication you provide to us in violation of these Terms; or (v) your gross negligence, willful misconduct, or fraud.

We will give you prompt written notice of any Claim, allow you to control the defense and settlement (with counsel reasonably acceptable to us), and provide reasonable cooperation at your expense. You may not settle any Claim in a way that admits our liability, imposes any obligation on us, or limits any of our rights without our prior written consent. Your indemnity obligations do not extend to any portion of a Claim that arises from our gross negligence, willful misconduct, or fraud.

Termination

You may stop using the Site at any time. We may suspend or terminate your access to the Site, in whole or in part, immediately and without notice, if we reasonably believe you have breached these Terms, are using the Site in a way that creates legal exposure for us or for the Site, or are using the Site in a way that interferes with other users or with our infrastructure. Sections of these Terms that by their nature should survive termination (including the IP, license-grant restrictions, submissions, AI and data handling, disclaimers, limitation of liability, indemnification, governing law, and general provisions sections) will survive.

Governing Law and Disputes

These Terms and any dispute arising out of or relating to them or to the Site are governed by the laws of the State of North Carolina, without regard to its conflict-of-laws principles. The United Nations Convention on Contracts for the International Sale of Goods does not apply.

You and we agree that the state and federal courts located in Durham County, North Carolina (or, for federal claims, the United States District Court for the Middle District of North Carolina) have sole and exclusive jurisdiction over any dispute arising out of or relating to these Terms, the Site, the Content, or the Templates. You and we consent to personal jurisdiction and venue in those courts and waive any objection based on improper venue or inconvenient forum.

Changes to These Terms

We may update these Terms from time to time. When we do, we will change the "Last updated" date at the top of this page. For material changes, we will provide reasonable advance notice through a banner on the Site, a post on the newsletter, or email if we have your address. Your continued use of the Site after the effective date of a change constitutes acceptance of the updated Terms. If you do not agree to a change, your sole remedy is to stop using the Site.

General Provisions

Entire agreement. These Terms, together with the Privacy Policy and the Disclaimer, are the entire agreement between you and us regarding the Site and supersede any prior or contemporaneous understandings.

Severability. If any provision of these Terms is held to be invalid or unenforceable, that provision will be enforced to the maximum extent permissible and the remaining provisions will remain in full force and effect.

No waiver. Our failure to enforce any provision of these Terms is not a waiver of that provision or of any other provision. A waiver of any breach is not a waiver of any subsequent breach.

Assignment. You may not assign or transfer these Terms, by operation of law or otherwise, without our prior written consent. We may assign these Terms in connection with a merger, acquisition, sale of assets, or by operation of law. Any prohibited assignment is void.

Independent contractors. No agency, partnership, joint venture, employment, or franchise relationship is created by these Terms.

Headings. Section headings are for convenience only and do not affect interpretation.

Contact

Questions about these Terms, notices of breach, DMCA notices, requests for written consent contemplated in these Terms, and all other notices should be sent to:

Desired Path Consulting LLC
Attention: Brian Alenduff
brian@desired-path.com
North Carolina, United States