Legal Tech NYC 2015 – A Short Recap #LTNY #LTNY15

Screen Shot 2015-02-10 at 10.11.51 AMSome scenes from my LegalTech NYC 2015 experience in the pictures above (including getting stuck in an elevator).

As Oliver Goodenough has noted – #LegalTech NYC features between “$20 billion to $30 billion a year in commercial activity.”  Curated by Stanford CodeX (where I am now an external faculty affiliate) and Mike Bommarito is a fellow, this year’s legal tech offered ten early to mid stage legal tech startups who collectively cover a wide range of practice areas.

I presented on a panel sponsored by FTI Technology which featured Judge John Facciola (United States Magistrate Judge in the District of Columbia),  David Horrigan (451 Research) and Cliff Nichols (Day Pitney).

Check out a Cartoonist’s recap of our panel!  #LTNY  #LTNY15

Katz + Bommarito Joining Forces for Joint Research Activities with CodeX – Stanford Center for Legal Informatics

Screen Shot 2014-11-11 at 7.08.57 PMWhile our primary home will remain here MSU Law, Mike Bommarito and I are excited to be joining up with the good folks at CodeX – Stanford Center for Legal Informatics. Based upon our shared interests, we plan to work together on some joint research activities with some of the many talented individuals in the Stanford CodeX ecosystem.  I will be joining CodeX as an External Affiliated Faculty and Mike will be joining as a CodeX Fellow.  We are very excited to push forward together in the short, medium and long term!

Innovation and Emerging Legal Technology (Slides by Ron Dolin from Stanford Center on the Legal Profession)

This past Thursday Ron Dolin and I spole on a panel at the 19th Annual Thomson Reuters Legal Executive Institute Law Firm Leaders Forum. Above are Ron’s slides which many of you might find interesting. Below is a modified version of my presentation Five Observations Regarding Technology and the Legal Industry (which I gave at the LegalWeek Corporate Counsel Forum last month).

Thanks to Ralph Baxter (Chairman Emeritus @ Orrick) for inviting me to present to this extremely accomplished group of AMLaw 200 managing partners.

The 19th Annual Law Firm Leaders Forum – NYC (Presented by Thomson Reuters Legal Executive Institute)

Thomson Reuters Legal Executive InstituteTomorrow I will be speaking at the 19th Annual Law Firm Leaders Forum in NYC (Presented by Thomson Reuters Legal Executive Institute).  This annual event draws a large number of leaders from the AMLaw 200 law firms. The focus of my panel will be the Emerging Role of Technology in the Law Firm Model.  I am joined by a world class faculty which includes representatives from Law firms, In House, Legal Tech and the Legal Academy, etc.

Law 2050 – A Forum about the Legal Future (via JB Ruhl @ Vanderbilt Law)

Screen Shot 2014-09-02 at 10.47.19 AMLaw 2050 is a blog operated by J.B. Ruhl from Vanderbilt Law School in conjunction with his course on legal futurism offered to 2L + 3L students @ Vandy.  There are two major classes of legal futurism and J.B.’s course does a nice of covering both.

First, there are changes in the world that require lawyers, judges, lawmakers, etc. to develop new legal rules to take stock of shifting realities over time.  Driverless cars and drones, 3-D printing, the internet of things, humans living until age 120, climate change, augmented reality and many other related innovations/developments will transform society. Law schools must produce agile and creative lawyers who can craft appropriate solutions to these developments (as they come online).  Lawyers who are able to operate in such ever changing environments are the true value creators whose bespoke expertise will *never* be subjected to automation, etc.

Changes in way the lawyer work is the other class of changes for which we must prepare our students. Technology, design thinking, process engineering (lean six sigma, etc.), analytics, outsourcing, etc. have already changed and will continue to modify the legal production function.  Law’s information revolution will continue to unfold and creep up the value chain.  Organizing / managing / participating in this unfolding dynamic is also a form of bespoke activity. Unfortunately for many students at many schools, it has received very little (typically zero) curricular coverage (with MSU (and Vandy) excluded).

Students in J.B. Ruhl’s Law 2050 course are extremely lucky as they get the opportunity — while in law school — to consider how they fit into one or both of these forms of legal futurism.

This is Law School? Socrates Takes a Back Seat to Business and Tech (via New York Times)

ThisIsLawSchoolNice coverage of our efforts at MSU Law to inject our students with important skills that can be competitive differentiator in this difficult legal marketplace.  As Dan Rodriguez described it – one sweet spot for differentiation is located somewhere in and around “the law/business/technology interface.” I completely agree.  While it is far from the only mission, there is arbitrage located in this sweet spot because many law schools do not have faculty with the appropriate technical skills necessary to teach in this space (see also a lack of desire/vision).  This creates room for others.  I outlined all of this in some detail in my Keynote Address at the Stanford CodeX Conference last year (and in the forthcoming paper called “The MIT School of Law“).  As MSU Law Dean Joan Howarth said “[L]egal education has been stronger on tradition than innovation …. What we’re trying to do is educate lawyers for the future, not the past.” Well said!  I joined the faculty at MSU three years ago with the goal doing the very things that are now up and running – however – there is always more to do – so stay tuned for more.