DEV Community: richie

Why I Pivoted InkSafe From a Contract Scanner to a Full Contract Platform

richie — Sat, 07 Mar 2026 19:03:38 +0000

InkSafe launched as a single-feature product.
Paste a contract. Get a risk report. See the red flags before you sign.
That was it. Clean, focused, useful. I was happy with it.
Then I started paying attention to what people were actually saying.

The feedback I kept ignoring
Every few days someone would try InkSafe and leave a comment, send an email, or post something that followed the same pattern:
"This is great — but what do I do when I need to send a contract, not receive one?"
"Can it generate a contract for me?"
"I don't have a contract yet — I need to write one first."
I ignored it at first. Single-feature products are easier to build, easier to explain, and easier to market. I didn't want to lose focus.
But the feedback kept coming. And eventually I stopped ignoring it and started actually thinking about it.

The realisation
The scanner solves one half of the contract problem.
Someone sends you a bad contract — InkSafe helps you understand it and negotiate better terms. That's genuinely useful.
But a huge portion of people who need help with contracts aren't receiving them. They're sending them. They're the ones who need to write the contract, set the payment terms, include the right clauses, and send it to a client before the project starts.
They don't have a lawyer. They don't have a template that's actually good. They have a Google Doc they copied from someone else three years ago that's missing half the clauses that would actually protect them.
That's the other half of the problem. And I wasn't solving it.

Why I almost didn't build it
Contract generation is a harder problem than contract scanning.
Scanning is relatively forgiving — the AI reads a document and produces analysis. If one clause gets misread the report is slightly less accurate but the user isn't harmed.
Generation is different. If the AI produces a bad contract and someone signs it and sends it to a client, real consequences follow. Missing a kill fee clause costs someone real money. A badly worded IP transfer creates a real legal dispute.
The quality bar is higher. The responsibility is higher. And I'm not a lawyer.
I spent a while sitting with that concern. Then I looked at what already exists — Bonsai, AND.CO, HelloSign's templates, dozens of others — and realised they all do this already, all with the same AI disclaimer, all without being law firms.
The disclaimer exists for a reason. Use it, mean it, and build something that's genuinely good.

What I actually built
The Contract Writer is a 7-step guided form inside the dashboard:

Contract type — 10+ options from web development to photography to consulting
Your details
Client details
Project scope and deliverables
Payment terms and structure
Protection clauses — individual toggles with plain English explanations
Review and generate

The generation itself runs through Gemini with a system prompt I spent a lot of time on. The instruction is to write as a senior contract attorney — formal legal language, defined terms used consistently, "shall" for obligations, "may" for permissions, dollar amounts written as both numerals and words, no placeholder text anywhere.
The results are genuinely good. A consulting agreement for an $18,000 engagement came back with proper WHEREAS recitals, a 3-stage payment breakdown calculated to the dollar, a 10-day cure period on breach, and weekly advisory calls scheduled for every Tuesday at 10:00 AM GMT — a detail the AI inferred from the project inputs.

The feature that ties it together
After generating a contract you can hit Scan This Contract and immediately feed it into the scanner.
That loop — write a contract, then check it for risks and missing protections before sending it to a client — is something no other contract tool does. It took about an hour to build once everything else was in place. It might be the most valuable thing in the product.

What the pivot meant for positioning
InkSafe was a contract scanner for freelancers.
InkSafe is now an AI contract platform for anyone who signs or sends contracts.
That's a bigger market. It's also a more defensible product — a platform is harder to replicate than a single feature, and the two features reinforce each other in a way that makes the whole more valuable than the sum of its parts.
The pricing reflects it too. Contract Writer is a Pro and Agency feature — it gives the higher tiers a genuinely distinct value proposition rather than just "more scans per month."

What I'd do differently
I'd have built both features at launch.
The scanner alone was always going to be a partial solution. The feedback made that obvious within the first week. If I'd launched with both I'd have had a stronger product hunt listing, a cleaner positioning story, and a more compelling reason for people to upgrade beyond the free tier.
The lesson isn't "build more before launching" — it's "think harder about what the complete version of the problem looks like before you ship the first version."

Where it is now
InkSafe 2.0 is live at inksafe.ai with both features. Free contract scan on the homepage, no signup needed. Contract Writer is on Professional and Agency plans with a 7-day free trial.
Still early. Still building. Still figuring out what the next right thing to add is.
If you've built something similar or have thoughts on the pivot — drop a comment. Always good to hear from other builders.

We Just Added AI Contract Writing to InkSafe — Here's What's New

richie — Thu, 05 Mar 2026 03:38:54 +0000

When we launched InkSafe a few weeks ago, it did one thing — scan contracts for hidden risks and flag dangerous clauses before you sign.
That was the core idea. Paste a contract, get a plain-English risk report in seconds. No lawyer required.
But we kept hearing the same thing from people using it:
"This is great for contracts clients send me — but what about when I need to send one?"
So we built it.

What's New: Contract Writer
InkSafe now has two core features:

Contract Scanner — paste or upload any contract, get a full risk report with color-coded flags, clause-level analysis, and negotiation tips.
Contract Writer — generate a professionally worded contract from scratch in minutes, tailored to your specific project, payment terms, and protection needs. The writer supports 10+ contract types:

Web Development
Freelance Design
Photography
Copywriting & Content
Video Production
Consulting
Social Media Management
Brand Identity
Motion Graphics
General Contract
Custom / Other

How It Works
The contract writer is a 7-step guided form inside the dashboard:

Pick your contract type
Enter your details
Enter client details
Define project scope and deliverables
Set payment terms and structure
Choose your protection clauses
Review everything and generate

On step 6 you get individual toggles for each clause with plain-English explanations of what each one does:

Intellectual property transfer (conditional on full payment)
Kill fee with custom percentage
Confidentiality / NDA
Non-solicitation
Portfolio rights
Acceptance criteria
Dispute resolution
Exclusivity (off by default)

Every clause that's toggled on gets written into the contract in proper legal language automatically.

The AI Prompt
The quality of the output was the thing we spent the most time on. Generic AI contract generators produce template-level output that reads like it came from a form filler.
We wanted something that reads like it came from a law firm.
The system prompt instructs the model to write as a senior contract attorney, use "shall" for obligations and "may" for permissions consistently, define terms on first use, calculate all dollar amounts as both numerals and words, generate an Exhibit A with milestone dates automatically, and output a complete ready-to-sign document with no placeholder text.
The results have been genuinely impressive in testing. A consulting agreement for a $18,000 engagement came back with proper WHEREAS recitals, a 3-stage payment breakdown calculated to the dollar, a 10-day cure period on breach before termination, and weekly advisory calls scheduled for every Tuesday at 10:00 AM GMT — details the AI inferred from the project scope inputs.

The Loop That Makes It Interesting
The feature we're most happy with is the Scan This Contract button on the results page.
After generating a contract, you can immediately feed it into the scanner to check it for risks and missing protections. It creates a complete loop — write a contract, then verify it's fair and balanced before sending it to a client.
That's something no other contract tool does right now.

What's on the Pricing

Starter $9/month — Contract Scanner only (5 scans/month)
Professional $29/month — Scanner + Contract Writer (10 generated contracts/month) — 7-day free trial
Agency $79/month — Everything unlimited

Tech Stack

Built on React with Lovable
Supabase for auth, database, and edge functions
Gemini via the AI gateway for contract generation
PDF export with custom legal document styling
Row-level security so contracts are only accessible to the user who created them

What's Next

E-signature integration so contracts can be sent and signed directly in InkSafe
Contract templates library so users can save and reuse their best contracts
Team collaboration features for Agency users

We're still early — a few weeks post-launch, building in public, iterating fast.
If you want to try the contract writer it's live at inksafe.ai. Free scan available on the homepage, no signup needed.
And if you're building something similar or have thoughts on the contract writer approach, drop a comment — always keen to hear what other builders think.

InkSafe 2.0 what I rebuilt after the first launch and why the AI is completely different now

richie — Sat, 28 Feb 2026 00:18:24 +0000

After my first dev.to post about InkSafe got some readers I did what I probably should have done before launching — I sat down and stress tested the AI properly.

What I found was uncomfortable. The original version was good at catching obvious red flags but it was missing subtle issues, it wasn't explaining the real world consequences clearly enough, and it had a JSON parsing bug that occasionally made results look like someone had dropped a keyboard into the output.
So I rebuilt it.
Here's everything that changed in InkSafe 2.0.
The AI model

The original version ran on a lighter, faster AI model that sometimes missed nuance in complex legal language. 2.0 runs on a significantly more powerful model. The difference in output quality is noticeable — better at understanding context, better at catching subtle language, better at explaining what a clause actually means for the person signing it.

The analysis prompt — rebuilt from scratch
This was the biggest change. The original prompt was good but vague in places. The new version has a 30-point checklist that the AI works through on every single contract:

Termination rights and notice periods. Payment forfeiture on termination. Subjective payment approval. Payment timeline. IP assignment scope. IP transfer timing. Template and workflow ownership. Non-compete scope and duration. Non-solicitation. Exclusivity. Warranty period. Liability cap imbalance. Consequential damages exposure. Indemnification balance. Penalty clause proportionality. Scope modification rights. Revision limits. Portfolio and publicity rights. Mandatory social media obligations. Storage and archiving obligations. Auto-renewal notice periods. Unilateral contract modification. Arbitration location and costs. Governing law and legal cost allocation. Name and likeness usage. Backup or substitute restrictions. Cancellation penalty proportionality. Equipment and delivery liability. Confidentiality scope and duration. Assignment rights.
Every contract gets checked against all 30 points. No shortcuts.
Compound risk detection — the most important upgrade
This is the change I'm most proud of.
The old version flagged individual clauses. A non-compete here. A payment issue there. What it missed was how clauses interact with each other to create compounded risk.
Here's a real example of what I mean.
A contract might have two clauses that each look manageable on their own:
Clause 4: Client is entitled to unlimited revisions until fully satisfied.
Clause 6: Final payment due upon Client's written acceptance of all deliverables.

Neither clause alone is catastrophic. But combined they create a situation where a client can demand infinite rounds of revisions indefinitely while withholding 100% of the final payment — because they haven't accepted the deliverables yet. You could work for months and legally receive nothing.
InkSafe 2.0 now identifies these combinations explicitly and explains the compounded danger, not just the individual clauses.
Other dangerous combinations the AI now catches:
Termination without notice plus payment forfeiture — client can take your work and pay nothing.

IP assignment of templates plus exclusivity — you lose your tools and cannot work elsewhere simultaneously.
Penalty clauses plus no equivalent client penalty — you bear all the financial risk, they bear none.
Mandatory social media posting plus confidentiality — contradictory obligations that put you in breach no matter what you do.
What InkSafe 2.0 now scans
The original version was built primarily around developer and designer contracts. The new version handles everything a freelancer gets asked to sign:

Developer agreements, design contracts, photography SOWs, video editing retainers, consulting MSAs, copywriting contracts, brand strategy agreements, NDAs, subcontractor agreements, and general independent contractor agreements.

The AI also adjusts its analysis based on what type of freelancer the contract is for. A photography contract gets scrutinized for RAW file demands and equipment liability. A developer contract gets scrutinized for pre-existing code library grabs and open source warranty traps. A design contract gets scrutinized for template ownership and unlimited revision traps.

The bug fix nobody noticed but everyone experienced
The JSON parsing bug. If you used InkSafe before the fix you might have seen results that ended with a wall of characters like }b}nalysis}e}s}result} after the summary.
That's fixed. Clean results every time now.
What the scoring looks like in practice
Since rebuilding the prompt I've run the AI through seven different contract types. Here's the range:
A 15-clause developer contract loaded with traps — 5/100, 9 issues caught.

A photography contract with one-sided cancellation penalties and unlimited consequential damages — 12/100, 7 issues caught.
A video editing retainer with template ownership grabs and impossible turnaround penalties — 10/100, 7 issues caught.
A consulting SOW with exclusivity that contradicted independent contractor status — 15/100, 7 issues caught.
A balanced, well-written freelance agreement — 88/100, 3 minor improvements suggested.

The scoring works in both directions. A genuinely fair contract gets a good score. The AI isn't alarmist.

What's next
The core product is solid now. The next focus is getting real users and real feedback on contracts I haven't written myself.
If you're a freelancer with a contract sitting in your inbox right now I'd genuinely love you to run it through InkSafe and tell me what the AI gets wrong, misses, or explains badly. That feedback is worth more to me than any feature I could build right now.
Free to try at inksafe.ai — one free scan, no credit card needed.

As always — AI analysis for informational purposes only, not a substitute for qualified legal advice.

I built an AI contract scanner for freelancers in a day, it just caught a $52,000 trap in a $15,000 contract

richie — Fri, 27 Feb 2026 03:39:21 +0000

I'm a solo builder. A few weeks ago I got frustrated watching freelancers — designers, developers, writers — sign contracts they didn't fully understand and get burned badly.
One bad clause can mean working a full month for free. Another can hand over tools you spent years building. Another can ban you from your industry for years.
Lawyers charge $300-400 per hour to catch these things. Most freelancers just sign and hope for the best.
So I built InkSafe.
What it does
You paste in any freelance contract or upload a PDF. InkSafe reads every clause, scores the contract from 0-100, and flags the dangerous parts in plain English with negotiation tips you can copy and paste straight to your client.
No legal jargon. No $300/hour lawyer. 30 seconds.
The test results
I tested it on seven different contracts before launching. Here's what happened:
The worst one was a 15-clause developer contract. Scored 5/100. Caught 9 issues including a worldwide 3-year non-compete, an IP grab that included pre-existing code libraries, and a termination clause that let the client take the work and pay nothing.
The most interesting result was a web design SOW that looked completely normal on the surface. Buried in it was a performance warranty clause that required the developer to maintain a Google PageSpeed score of 90 or above for 24 months — with a $500 per week penalty if it dropped below that threshold.
PageSpeed scores are affected by things completely outside a developer's control. Client installs a new plugin. Google updates their algorithm. Score drops. Suddenly the developer owes $500 per week.
Total exposure on a $15,000 job: $52,000.
InkSafe caught it in seconds.
I also tested a genuinely fair contract. It scored 88/100 and flagged only three minor improvements. The scoring works in both directions.
The stack
Built with React, TypeScript, Tailwind, Supabase, Stripe, and Gemini 2.0 Pro. Put together in Lovable. The AI prompt took longer to get right than the actual product — getting it to explain legal risk in plain English the way a trusted friend would explain it took a lot of iteration.
Where it is now
Live at inksafe.ai. Free to try with one scan, then $9/month Starter, $29/month Pro, $79/month Agency with team features.
Currently in beta looking for freelancers to try it and tell me what's wrong with it.
What I learned
The hardest part wasn't the build. It was calibrating the AI to score accurately across very different contract types — from genuinely predatory to genuinely fair — without being alarmist or missing real issues.
If you're a freelancer who has ever signed a contract without fully understanding it I'd genuinely love your feedback.