https://www.lars-schoenwald.com/code-and-clause.html Essays, deep dives, briefings and case notes at the intersection of technology law and the digital economy. en Copyright 2026 Lars Schönwald mail@lars-schoenwald.com (Lars Schönwald) Sun, 30 Aug 2026 07:00:00 +0000 https://www.lars-schoenwald.com/code-and-clause/ep2_data_protection_rag_systems.html https://www.lars-schoenwald.com/code-and-clause/ep2_data_protection_rag_systems.htm RAG is widely regarded as the privacy-friendly alternative to fine-tuning. But the vector database itself becomes a personal data store — with concrete deletion obligations under Art. 17 GDPR, ghost chunk risks and multi-tenancy requirements. Tue, 1 Sep 2026 07:00:00 +0000 Deep Dive https://www.lars-schoenwald.com/code-and_clause/outlook_2026-09.html https://www.lars-schoenwald.com/code-and-clause/outlook_2026-09.html New legislation, announced dates for hearings and rendering judgments, as well as updates on Code & Clause and lars-schoenwald.com —September brings numerous updates Mon, 31 Aug 2026 07:00:00 +0000 https://www.lars-schoenwald.com/code-and-clause/sunday_coffee_four_weeks_art_50_eu_ai_act.html https://www.lars-schoenwald.com/code-and-clause/sunday_coffee_four_weeks_art_50_eu_ai_act.html Art. 50 EU AI Act has been in force for four weeks — and has triggered a wave of misinformation. What the labelling obligation actually covers, why the moon golfer has no compliance obligations, and what all this has in common with the GDPR panic of 2018. Sun, 30 Aug 2026 07:00:00 +0000 Sunday Coffee https://www.lars-schoenwald.com/code-and-clause/case_note_olg_koeln_domain_hijacking_en.html https://www.lars-schoenwald.com/code-and-clause/case_note_olg_koeln_domain_hijacking_en.html The Cologne Court of Appeal prohibits the automated redirection of a confusingly similar competitor domain: interception domains without their own content are not legitimate performance marketing measures, but violations of § 4 No. 4 UWG — independent of formal trade mark law. Fri, 28 Aug 2026 07:00:00 +0000 Case Note https://www.lars-schoenwald.com/code-and-clause/sunday_coffee_clerkship_ai.html https://www.lars-schoenwald.com/code-and-clause/sunday_coffee_clerkship_ai.html From the Franz-Senn hut, a thought on the upcoming trainee placement: should an aspiring lawyer today still be taught to manually type out a Relation? Or is the real skill now about critically validating AI output? Sun, 23 Aug 2026 07:00:00 +0000 Sunday Coffee https://www.lars-schoenwald.com/code-and-clause/case_note_conseil_constitutionnel_en.html https://www.lars-schoenwald.com/code-and-clause/case_note_conseil_constitutionnel_en.html The Conseil constitutionnel declares France's planned social media access ban for minors under 15 unconstitutional. Three grounds: disproportionate interference with fundamental rights, overbroad scope, and the absence of a legal basis for population-wide age verification. Fri, 21 Aug 2026 07:00:00 +0000 Case Note https://www.lars-schoenwald.com/code-and-clause/sunday_coffee_ki_korrekteur_en.html https://www.lars-schoenwald.com/code-and-clause/sunday_coffee_ki_korrekteur_en.html The University of Passau is testing AI correction in mock exams. But what if AI marks real papers – and thereby co-determines professional futures? A personal look back at human marking inconsistency and the question of whether algorithms really do it better. Sun, 16 Aug 2026 07:00:00 +0000 Sunday Coffee https://www.lars-schoenwald.com/code-and-clause/case_note_olg_stuttgart_art20_en.html https://www.lars-schoenwald.com/code-and-clause/case_note_olg_stuttgart_art20_en.html OLG Stuttgart rules clearly: image PDFs and scans do not satisfy Art. 20 GDPR. Platform operators who export datasets in unstructured PDF formats violate the right to data portability — with concrete consequences for SaaS backends and compliance workflows. Fri, 14 Aug 2026 07:00:00 +0000 Case Note https://www.lars-schoenwald.com/code-and-clause/sunday_coffee_ki_sandbox_en.html https://www.lars-schoenwald.com/code-and-clause/sunday_coffee_ki_sandbox_en.html Sandbox breaks, autonomous exploits and the question of how much is genuine technical systemic risk — and how much cleverly staged PR in the battle over AI regulation. Plus: the legal liability dimension of autonomously caused harm. Sun, 09 Aug 2026 07:00:00 +0000 Sunday Coffee https://www.lars-schoenwald.com/code-and-clause/case_note_gema_suno_en.html https://www.lars-schoenwald.com/code-and-clause/case_note_gema_suno_en.html Munich District Court I has issued a preliminary injunction against AI music generator Suno. A paradigm shift for training generative models on copyright-protected material — with massive implications for LLM pipelines and data governance. Fri, 07 Aug 2026 07:00:00 +0000 Case Note https://www.lars-schoenwald.com/code-and-clause/ep1_smart_contracts_and_contract_law.html https://www.lars-schoenwald.com/code-and-clause/ep1_smart_contracts_and_contract_law.html Decentralised smart contracts are technically impressive and legally risky. The hybrid contract model — comprising a legal layer, execution layer and circuit breaker — closes the doctrinal gap between autonomous code and German contract law. Mon, 03 Aug 2026 07:00:00 +0000 Deep Dive https://www.lars-schoenwald.com/code-and-clause/briefing_eu_ai_act_en.html https://www.lars-schoenwald.com/code-and-clause/briefing_eu_ai_act_en.html Key operational provisions of the EU AI Act come into force today. Why AI compliance is no longer a legal opinion — and the three architectural consequences that arise immediately for developers and legal teams. Sun, 02 Aug 2026 07:00:00 +0000 Briefing https://www.lars-schoenwald.com/code-and-clause/ep0_when_code_meets_paragraphs.html https://www.lars-schoenwald.com/code-and-clause/ep0_when_code_meets_paragraphs.html The digital transformation has left its Sturm und Drang phase behind. Today, autonomous agents, decentralised infrastructures, and generative AI systems shape reality — colliding with legal systems still rooted in an analogue world. Sat, 01 Aug 2026 07:00:00 +0000 Deep Dive