Regulatory Compliance & Legal Risk Management

Regulatory compliance and risk management for technology companies — FTC enforcement, state regulators, sector-specific frameworks, and the operational systems that turn compliance into competitive advantage.

Filmmakers

Talent, Location, and Music Releases: The Clearance Package Every Indie Film Needs Before Delivery

No distributor will take your film without E&O insurance, and no insurer approves it without a complete clearance package. A practical guide to talent, location, and music releases, life rights, and the chain of title that makes an indie film deliverable.

Musicians

AI Voice Clones and the NO FAKES Act: Protecting Your Voice and Likeness as a Creator

An AI track faked Drake and The Weeknd and racked up millions of plays before it was pulled. If your voice or likeness can be cloned, here's the legal toolkit that protects creators today—and what the NO FAKES Act would change.

Hardware Founders

Manufacturing and Supply Agreements for Hardware Startups: NRE, Tooling Ownership, MOQs, and the Clauses That Protect Your Product

Hardware founders negotiate the unit price and sign the rest. But the manufacturing agreement decides who owns the tooling you paid for, what 'conforming' means, and whether you can ever leave. A clause-by-clause guide to NRE, tooling title, MOQs, warranty, IP/anti-cloning, and your exit.

Writers

Newsletter Legal Checklist: CAN-SPAM, Privacy Policy, and Platform Risk for Substack and Ghost Creators

Running a paid newsletter also means running an email marketing operation. Federal law, state privacy statutes, and FTC disclosure rules apply to your subscriber list whether you have 200 readers or 200,000.

Writers

The Legal Guide for Newsletter Creators: Copyright, FTC Disclosures, and Privacy Compliance

Running a paid newsletter is running a business. Here's what every newsletter creator needs to know about copyright, FTC disclosures, privacy compliance, and platform terms.

In-House Counsel

The EU AI Act's Big Deadline Just Moved to 2027 — What US Founders and In-House Counsel Should Actually Do Now

The EU AI Act's high-risk deadline slipped from August 2026 to December 2027 under the Digital Omnibus. But several obligations did NOT move, and US companies are squarely in scope. Here's what changed, what didn't, and what to do with the runway.

Practice Transitions

How to Sell a Law Practice in Texas: The Legal and Ethical Roadmap for Solo and Small-Firm Attorneys

Selling a law practice in Texas is not prohibited — but it triggers a web of ethical obligations most attorneys don't know about. Here's what you must do under the TDRPC before you hand over the files.

Practice Transitions

Succession Isn't a Listing: Why Selling Your Firm Is the Smaller Half of the Plan

Brokers and valuation tools pitch retiring lawyers a one-time sale — but a sale is the smaller half of succession. The bigger half is continuity: who keeps serving your clients. Even Rule 1.17 centers the client, not your payout. Here's succession reframed from exit to stewardship.

Law Firms

Locum Tenens for Law Firms: Who Covers Your Cases When You're Gone?

Solo and small-firm lawyers can't take a real vacation because no one can cover their cases. Medicine solved this with locum tenens — a vetted, paid coverage market. Law has a handshake. Here's what real coverage infrastructure looks like, and why Rule 1.3 already points there.

Game Studios

Age Ratings and COPPA: What Studios Building Kids' Games Actually Need to Know

An ESRB E rating doesn't create a COPPA safe harbor — and Epic Games' $275 million penalty proved it. Here's how the FTC actually determines whether your game is 'directed to children,' what the 2025 COPPA amendments changed, and what minimum viable compliance looks like for indie studios.

Health Tech

HIPAA and AI — When ML Training Crosses the BAA Line

HIPAA gives business associates only two narrow permissions to use PHI for their own purposes — and AI model training fits neither. A close look at the BAA line, why de-identification is not the escape hatch vendors claim, and what to demand before signing any AI vendor agreement.

Founders

Texas's AI Law Is Now in Force: What TRAIGA Actually Requires of Founders and In-House Counsel

Texas's Responsible AI Governance Act (HB 149) has been in force since January 1, 2026 — and it is far narrower than the bill it grew from. Here is who TRAIGA reaches, what its intent-based prohibitions mean, how the Texas AG enforces it, and the NIST safe harbor to build toward.

Law Firms

Can You Prove That Image Is Real? AI Verification Tools Lawyers Need to Understand

OpenAI just shipped a tool that checks whether an image was AI-generated. It is one of many — and for lawyers, the gap between what these provenance checkers actually prove and what a courtroom requires is where the real risk lives.

Game Studios

The EU Digital Services Act for Indie Game Studios: What Applies to You

The EU's Digital Services Act applies to US game studios selling to European players — and it's been in force since February 2024. Here's how to figure out which obligations apply to your studio and what to do about them.

Game Studios

Loot Box Laws by Jurisdiction: What Indie Game Studios Must Know

Loot box regulation varies dramatically by jurisdiction — from criminal penalties in Belgium to mandatory probability disclosure in Korea to FTC enforcement in the US. Here's how indie studios should structure their mechanics and compliance before launching globally.

Founders

Earnouts, Bad Faith, and a Chatbot: What Fortis Advisors v. Krafton Means for Founders Who Sell

A Delaware court ordered Krafton to reinstate the ousted Subnautica 2 CEO after its own chief executive used ChatGPT to engineer a 'takeover' and dodge a $250M earnout. Here is what founders who sell their companies should take from the ruling.

Startup Central

Legal Planning for First-Time Founders in Their 30s and 40s

If you're starting your first company in your 30s or 40s, you're often bringing real career leverage"10+ years of skills, network, and credibility"1and…

Technology, AI, & Digital Innovation

AI Training Data and Copyright: Fair Use, Licensing, and Governance for Model Developers

Generative AI is colliding with copyright law in real time. Frontier models are trained on enormous, largely scraped corpora, while authors, artists,…

Startup Central

Essential Legal Strategies for Austin Startups to Manage Business Disputes Effectively

For Austin startups and small businesses, a “business dispute” is any conflict that can derail revenue, operations, or relationships — think contract…

Startup Central

Catering Contracts for Startups and Small Businesses: A Practical Guide

Catering seems simple until it isn't: an event runs late, headcount changes, dietary needs are missed, equipment doesn't arrive, or the venue's rules…

Startup Central

Accounting Services Agreements: What Startups Need to Know Before Signing

Many startups and small businesses outsource bookkeeping and tax work long before they hire an internal finance team.

Health Tech

Negotiating HIPAA Business Associate Agreements with Digital Health Vendors

HIPAA's statutory floor for BAAs is lower than most covered entities realize. This guide covers what to demand in BAA negotiations with digital health vendors — from permitted use scope and AI training prohibitions to breach notification, audit rights, and PHI disposition at contract end.

EdTech

Parental Consent UX Patterns That Pass FTC Scrutiny

COPPA requires verifiable parental consent before you collect data from children under 13 — and a checkbox doesn't cut it. Here's what the FTC actually enforces, which consent mechanisms are approved, and a practical UX checklist for EdTech product teams.

Health Tech

FDA Regulation of Software as a Medical Device: A Founder's Guide to SaMD Pathways

FDA regulates software as a medical device based on what it does, not what it looks like. This guide covers the SaMD definition, IMDRF risk classification, 510(k)/De Novo/PMA pathways, FDA's PCCP framework, and clinical evidence requirements for founders.

Hardware Founders

Semiconductor Export Controls: What Engineers and Hardware Founders Need to Know About the EAR

The EAR reaches inside US chip labs, R&D teams, and employee rosters. ECCNs, the deemed export rule, Entity List obligations, October 2022 China chip rules, and a practical compliance checklist for semiconductor engineers and hardware founders.