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evilweasel posted:I have heard a lot less about doc review automation recently than I was hearing five years ago, and my guess is it hit the same wall a lot of "ai" projects have been hitting. Beyond that, I'm not sure what stuff that associates do that would be automated - and the grunt doc review stuff is already outsourced to contract attorneys instead of associates (and the stuff that associates do in that circumstance isn't automatable yet and I have doubts it will be). What other tasks were going to be automated away in the future? The main one discussed at the conference was client intake. In the nonprofit legal world a lot of grunt time is spent listening to the legally ignorant complain and figuring out if there is any remedy for their complaints. A lot of that could potentially be automated with sufficiently sophisticated tools. Past that there are increasingly sophisticated legal research and drafting tools. But yeah "within five years" in tech terms means "there is a problem nobody has solved yet but we think somebody might soon." And you're correct about subcontracted legal work too.
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Jul 30, 2019 18:49
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evilweasel posted:You're not automating away what a paralegal does anytime soon without an actual robot. Legal assistants got largely automated away by the desktop computer and the remaining tasks are bespoke enough AI isn't gonna do poo poo there. Sorry, didn’t mean to suggest it would be soon. But that’s who will eat it first. In like 20-30 yrs. And it’ll likely be arguable AI isn’t the primary driver, just one of many.
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Jul 30, 2019 18:49
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Stupid people are my job security.
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Jul 30, 2019 18:56
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Hieronymous Alloy posted:The main one discussed at the conference was client intake. In the nonprofit legal world a lot of grunt time is spent listening to the legally ignorant complain and figuring out if there is any remedy for their complaints. A lot of that could potentially be automated with sufficiently sophisticated tools. The client intake thing is already happening in British Columbia with their Civil Resolution Tribunal's Solution Explorer. Menus direct them through to see whether they have a legal issue, and the CRT itself prompts litigants to deal with each other directly first, then with a mediator, and then finally to an adversarial process. The CRT started with small claims, but is spreading into other kinds of cases. At no point (yet) is there an AI, though.
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Jul 30, 2019 18:59
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Look Sir Droids posted:Sorry, didn’t mean to suggest it would be soon. But that’s who will eat it first. In like 20-30 yrs. And it’ll likely be arguable AI isn’t the primary driver, just one of many. I think it's an "on the order of ten years" type thing. It depends on when the tech problems get solved, but there could be a watershed moment next year, or not for twenty.
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Jul 30, 2019 19:07
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Look Sir Droids posted:Sorry, didn’t mean to suggest it would be soon. But that’s who will eat it first. In like 20-30 yrs. And it’ll likely be arguable AI isn’t the primary driver, just one of many. I can believe associates will be automated away to some degree, but the whole point of a paralegal is to be the gopher for all of the random stuff that needs to get done that isn't really a "lawyer" job so it's really not susceptible to automation.
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Jul 30, 2019 19:11
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Didn't a while bunch of the "automation breakthroughs" in the last few years turn out to be "hiring sub-minimum wage workers in another country?"
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Jul 30, 2019 19:12
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It’s a shame amazon branded Mechanical Turk because of how applicable it is.
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Jul 30, 2019 19:16
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evilweasel posted:I can believe associates will be automated away to some degree, but the whole point of a paralegal is to be the gopher for all of the random stuff that needs to get done that isn't really a "lawyer" job so it's really not susceptible to automation. In my experience, that depends a whole lot on the firm/organization, the practice group, and the paralegal themself. That said, there are still a lot of little duties that can get stripped away by a reliable AI. I can see an AI e-filing documents, sending mail (since that's accomplished by email a lot), doing legal and non-legal research to a certain degree, drafting documents, etc. In some firms, there won't be enough left to justify having a paralegal and those remaining duties can get reallocated to associates. The point isn't that paralegals will go extinct. It's that the job duties leftover will mean there are fewer of them. This has already happened. Viable AI would just be another wave. It makes less sense to me that associates will be impacted because it's not just work they're there for. They're also there for the future of the firm. Some will have to end up partners. Paralegals, by comparison, are mostly overhead.
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Jul 30, 2019 19:23
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Someone still has to make the binders.
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Jul 30, 2019 19:26
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Hieronymous Alloy posted:
Looking forward to the future where the secret weapons vs. AI-assisted opponents are hiring as many POC as possible and encouraging enterprise-wide intermittent fasting. Hieronymous Alloy posted:The main one discussed at the conference was client intake. In the nonprofit legal world a lot of grunt time is spent listening to the legally ignorant complain and figuring out if there is any remedy for their complaints. A lot of that could potentially be automated with sufficiently sophisticated tools. That's "easy" if the system can understand natural language well enough (or the client can be guided into structured answers) since it's just a rules engine. Getting to something that can full-on understand a person who may not speak the most standard educated English is a long way off, especially since just getting good training samples is probably a challenge. Maybe this exists already, but low-hanging fruit to me is project management software for litigation with built-in civil procedure intelligence. It's another rules engine and there is probably enough of an application for machine learning in there somewhere to put the buzzword on the investor deck. sullat posted:Didn't a while bunch of the "automation breakthroughs" in the last few years turn out to be "hiring sub-minimum wage workers in another country?" The problem is that machine learning systems need known-quantity training data to learn on, and for a lot of use cases (if not all) that data needs to be sorted and tagged by humans. So that introduces human grunt-work into your AI development process and a bunch of related issues.
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Jul 30, 2019 20:06
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euphronius posted:Someone still has to make the binders. and then remake them
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Jul 30, 2019 20:22
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I make my own binders. 
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Jul 30, 2019 20:25
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Automation taking my job as a prosecutor is basically a Rise of the Machines/Terminator situation where we're all dead anyway. Which I welcome.
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Jul 30, 2019 21:35
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ActusRhesus posted:I make my own binders. Jesus
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Jul 30, 2019 21:39
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Follow up on my bitch OC. Motion for extension of time granted. I got a week more than I asked for. That’s some shade from the bench right there. Also follow up on mister in patient sex offender treatment as a condition of probation is a violation of the 8th amendment. Another jurisdiction just got a warrant for his arrest for raping a cell mate prior to his release. Can’t violate his probation Bc it predates his release. But it sure as hell spoonfeeds me my “no really. He needs treatment”’argument.
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Jul 30, 2019 21:53
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Pretty sure a lot of junior level corporate work can be automated - most due diligence, negotiating NDAs, corporate formations and other menial tasks related to the transaction can and should go away.
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Jul 30, 2019 22:42
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Charles Star, channeling that big Mic Dicta energy, did a rundown of the best of Larry Klayman’s bar discipline. https://twitter.com/Ugarles/status/1156231330495119362 Check the thread.
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Jul 30, 2019 23:03
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Well today I learned an important lesson in why you write emails detailing the contents of in person discussions every time you have them
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Jul 30, 2019 23:18
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Kawasaki Nun posted:Well today I learned an important lesson in why you write emails detailing the contents of in person discussions every time you have them Details.
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Jul 31, 2019 01:55
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ActusRhesus posted:Details. Admit you liked Under the Skin
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Jul 31, 2019 01:58
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My office is seriously overloaded with binders. Scheduling order says anything over 50 pages (including exhibits) goes in a binder with exhibits tabbed. Then there are the people who do that but don't follow the order or court rules in some other fashion (court rules changed in the last year so filed transcripts have to be one page of text per sheet of paper, not mini-script). So they have to send a SECOND binder. Then when the case settles or the motion gets adjudicated, I toss out the guts but I'm left with a perfectly good binder. And I can't just throw it away, because it's in near-mint condition. So here I am knowing that my county's pension plan is grossly underfunded but at least I have my retirement binders.
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Jul 31, 2019 03:53
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Hieronymous Alloy posted:The main one discussed at the conference was client intake. In the nonprofit legal world a lot of grunt time is spent listening to the legally ignorant complain and figuring out if there is any remedy for their complaints. A lot of that could potentially be automated with sufficiently sophisticated tools. I think screening tools are good and can be helpful, but they are deeply limited. Over the years I’ve worked a lot in systems that have tried to mimic this through a kind of labor arbitrage, where big law pro bonos, non-attorney navigators, and even limited computer tools are used to triage cases before referring to actual non-profit lawyers. It’s better than nothing, but not by much. Typically if someone has a muddy fact pattern at all, I will have to do a whole second screening with them. A good volunteer or non-attorney intake person will err on the side of over-inclusivity, which is good, but means I get a lot of people who I could have identified at the outset as lacking relief. It’s not useless — some people have absolutely no claim and it’s easy to tell. But I would be able to identify that person in 20 minutes or less. And the non-profit is paying me, an attorney from a top law school with five years of experience, $25 per hour, so it’s only gonna cost them like $8 to have me weed that guy out anyway. Less for a good non-attorney staff person.
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Jul 31, 2019 04:45
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Jul 31, 2019 12:18
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Sab0921 posted:Pretty sure a lot of junior level corporate work can be automated - most due diligence, negotiating NDAs, corporate formations and other menial tasks related to the transaction can and should go away.
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Jul 31, 2019 17:50
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MBE felt way easier than it should. Then again, I did just over 2400 practice questions.
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Jul 31, 2019 21:00
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Just got offered a graduate assistanceship position with the school of business. I can be either a TA or research assistant this fall if I accept.
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Jul 31, 2019 21:03
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My Wife: we just had a baby two days ago, so let's not have too much company over too soon, I don't want it to be hectic around here Also My Wife: I like that house let's buy it and move this month
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Jul 31, 2019 23:01
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blarzgh posted:My Wife: we just had a baby two days ago, so let's not have too much company over too soon, I don't want it to be hectic around here Checks out
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Jul 31, 2019 23:09
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blarzgh posted:My Wife: we just had a baby two days ago, so let's not have too much company over too soon, I don't want it to be hectic around here Yeah, my second kid was just born a month ago and my wife has already looked at four houses with our realtor...
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Jul 31, 2019 23:16
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I actually met with an agent on Monday, because she emailed me to ask if I wanted to come to her office and discuss a property I looked at two months ago. She was 40 minutes late, and when she got there, she told me the seller hadn't budged on price and there were no developments. I was pretty pissed off so I said to her if the vendor would come down to $640k, maaaaybe I would consider it but I don't even know if I'd get approved for that loan (probably not), and I'd have to talk to my mortgage broker first but she's overseas for a month, and I still think that's too high a price so probably wouldn't be interested even for that amount. Yesterday she emailed me go say the vendor had accepted my offer of $640k  .
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Jul 31, 2019 23:29
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I got into a yelling match outside the courtroom with a pro se over whom Jesus loved more. My client also demanded to say something three times during the court hearing, and the third time he demanded to say something, I told him to "Fire me so I can get out of here." It was audible. I took the case because another attorney begged me to get her rear end out of the fire for not appearing and getting a default judgment against her client.
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Jul 31, 2019 23:32
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Whitlam posted:I actually met with an agent on Monday, because she emailed me to ask if I wanted to come to her office and discuss a property I looked at two months ago. She was 40 minutes late, and when she got there, she told me the seller hadn't budged on price and there were no developments. Lamo owned
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Jul 31, 2019 23:37
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blarzgh posted:My Wife: we just had a baby two days ago, so let's not have too much company over too soon, I don't want it to be hectic around here Make sure to tell her that she just had a child and isn't thinking rationally.
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Jul 31, 2019 23:59
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GrandmaParty posted:I got into a yelling match outside the courtroom with a pro se over whom Jesus loved more. No good deed goes unpunished. I've had smooth sailing on my cases so far, stipulations and agreements as far as the eye can see. I'm sure after my vacation I'll have a client lose their poo poo on the judge again.
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Aug 1, 2019 00:01
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ActusRhesus posted:Details. Had a probation revocation case where I had previously discussed with the DA that they were happy to defer to what probation would recommend. A few weeks ago I didn't object to a continuance in the day of the revo hearing when the PO was out of town despite being under subpoena because I had spoken with him and he said he would pull the complaint. Fast forward to Tuesday and I have a personal issue and ask a coworker to cover, thinking that the hearing was simply going to be a formality. A new DA is on the case and the guy I asked to cover says they aren't interested In pulling the complaint and instead wanted to revoke and reinstate the terms of his probation. I get a phone call at 4:30 asking wtf is going on and proceed to scour all my prior emails to find where we had specifically agreed in writing to abide by probations recommendation and come up short. My understanding is that my coworker was unable to get a continuance and instead agreed to revoke and reinstate. I don't completely understand why this was the case but it was a suboptimal outcome for the client and a solid "oh gently caress" moment at the end of my internship
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Aug 1, 2019 01:37
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Ani posted:Agree. There's also a lot of transactional stuff that I don't know if you could completely automate, but you could make much more efficient - eg., conforming defined terms across multiple related documents and such takes a lot of junior associate time but could be largely automated away. This stuff has been around for a while. E.g. https://legal.thomsonreuters.com/en/products/drafting-assistant/transactional "Quickly identify, assess, and address potential issues, such as defined-term and cross-reference discrepancies." Used to be a product called "DealProof" that I think got sucked into Thomson Reuters/Westlaw, for example, that would search for all defined terms, flag if there was a defined term that was undefined, flag if there was a defined term that was not used in the document, discrepancies between defined terms, section reference discrepancies, etc. One of the hilarious aspects of billing hourly is that you really don't get a lot of benefit from having things come along that reduce the time it takes you to do things, other than the arms race between law firms to call themselves more efficient (which really isn't much of an arms race). There is a decided disincentive to a profession to innovate, when that innovation simply costs the profession money but where the productivity gains really don't matter due to hourly billing rates. I mean I theoretically suppose that it is these productivity gains that support increasing hourly rates, but I highly doubt that is the real reason for increasing hourly rates.
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Aug 1, 2019 03:43
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Honestly though -- for every law firm that won't adopt programs for efficiency's sake, another firm will. A lot of the firms popping up now are boutique firms that rely on their focus and specialty over just amassing tons of hours to survive. Clients are more value conscience now and they want to see what they're paying for. The tolerance for inefficiency will continue to decrease as time goes on.
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Aug 1, 2019 04:21
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We just charge fixed fee so anything that makes us more efficient is awesome 
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Aug 1, 2019 05:07
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SlyFrog posted:This stuff has been around for a while. E.g. https://legal.thomsonreuters.com/en/products/drafting-assistant/transactional quote:One of the hilarious aspects of billing hourly is that you really don't get a lot of benefit from having things come along that reduce the time it takes you to do things, other than the arms race between law firms to call themselves more efficient (which really isn't much of an arms race). There is a decided disincentive to a profession to innovate, when that innovation simply costs the profession money but where the productivity gains really don't matter due to hourly billing rates. Ani fucked around with this message at 06:38 on Aug 1, 2019 |
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Aug 1, 2019 06:35
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