The Geek In Review

Brad Blickstein, Principal at the Blickstein Group, a research and advisory firm for both in-house and outside law firms, joins us to talk about legal operation, and his recent experiences at the 2019 CLOC Institute in Las Vegas. As with many great conferences, the programming between 9 AM and 5 PM is good... but the conversations from 5 PM to 9 PM (or 5 AM, this was Vegas), are what makes the gathering really special. We're calling it #CLOCAfterDark.  There's a lot going on in Legal Operations, and the Blickstein Group has put out a Law Department Operations survey for over a decade. He gives some great insights on the relationships between in-house counsel and outside law firms. While there's a big difference between the business operations in a company versus a law firm, the attorneys tend to be cut from the same cloth. Groups like CLOC are positioned perfectly to help lawyers understand the roles they need to play to protect their organizations. Blickstein stresses that Legal Operations is a broad topic, and that CLOC is part of that movement, but is not all there is within the movement. There's a lot going on, and the opportunities are pretty expansive these days.  Information Inspirations Copyright is not something to LOL about. The Houston Independent School District was slapped with a $9.2 Million copyright violation for copying study guides. Even though they cleverly blocked out the warning on the guides that "copying of these materials is strictly prohibited." Be careful out there when it comes to thinking it's okay to copy and distribute materials which have copyright protection. It can cost you millions. AI Sharecroppers. We all know that data is king these days, but not all data can be automatically gathered. At least not effectively. There is an underclass of labors out there who are being used to help gather and identify data needed to power AI programs, known as "human labeling." As the name "sharecropper" might imply, they do a lot of work... but don't make a lot of money.  Algorithm Problems creates Human Liabilities. We rely upon automation, AI, machine learning, and other technology to advance our society, but when those fail, it's not the automation that takes the blame. It's usually the human that is around at the time. MIT Technology Review talks about how we have a 21st Century tech problem that's being adjudicated under 20th Century morals and laws. Smile. You're on the London Metro Facial Recognition Program. The London Metro is using facial recognition to identify criminals. They say that this program has resulted in multiple criminal prosecutions. Watchdog organizations claim that the program has a 90% error rate. Can those two facts exist together? Listen, Subscribe, download Jerry’s music, and Send Us Tweets and Voicemails, Too!! Don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and comment. You can tweet @gebauerm and/or @glambert to reach out. Call us at 713-487-7270 with suggestions. And, thanks to Jerry David DiCicca for the music! view more, including transcript of the interview

In our 40th Episode, Greg and Marlene interview Erin Levine, an attorney and founder/CEO of Hello Divorce, a service that makes divorce more human and accessible by offering legal help and wellness support throughout the process of dissolving a marriage.   Offered in California, Hello Divorce offers access to resources and tools and different service levels, from basic to concierge to a la carte access to independent fixed fee attorneys.  Erin highlights that the legal process can be confusing, dis-empowering and expensive and that Hello Divorce is a necessary guide to help people navigate the system in a way that doesn't destroy them financially and emotionally.  While divorce representation is a consistent legal need, Erin highlights that there are many other parts of the process that are also necessary which don’t require attorney skills.  She leverages various forms of process improvement including outsourcing, automation, smart contracts to make the service application scalable.   Part of what is interesting about the discussion (and there are lots of interesting parts) is that Erin stands the idea of aggressive and hostile divorce action on its head.  While Erin has critics, she maintains the benefit of taking down level of tension and fear between the parties.  In fact, 92% of divorces started with hello Divorce have concluded without having to refer out to full rep attorneys.  (10:17 mark)  Information Inspirations According to  Aliqae Geraci from Cornell and Shannon L. Farrell from University of Minnesota wrote an article entitled “Normalize Negotiations!" we teach librarians a lot about management skills, but we've lacked in teaching them basic skills like salary and promotion negotiation skills. There is a place for the American Library Association (ALA) and the American Association of Law Libraries (AALL) to teach their members these skills.  (4:05 mark)  For the small price of a European vacation for a family of four (AKA expensive), you can own your very own AI  powered robot who cleans your house for you while you sleep… and can remember to bring you your favorite beer, hopefully when you're awake.  (5:59 mark)  From MIT, we get " Every Leader’s Guide to the Ethics of AI." Ep. 31's guest, Vishal Agnihotri suggested we look at this, and it ties in with our last episode on algorithmic governance. As AI becomes more and more integrated into business activities, the authors suggest that we treat it, as well as our employees, customers, and the public, with the respect we all deserve. An "AI Mishap" can destroy a company or its reputation. (side note: AI Mishap is the name of Marlene's new Country Band.)  (6:56 mark)  With all the talk about mental health in the legal industry, the NPR report on Where’s Masculinity headed? is perfectly timed. (8:51 mark)  Listen, Subscribe, download Jerry’s music, and Send Us Tweets and Voicemails, Too!! Don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and comment. You can tweet @gebauerm and/or @glambert to reach out. Call us at 713-487-7270 with suggestions. And, thanks to Jerry David DiCicca for the music!

When you think of algorithmic governance, you may go right to things like predictive law enforcement, or risk assessment of setting bail or prison sentences for those in the criminal justice system. However, algorithms have a much broader application in the legal system, far beyond those criminal justice aspects. Drexel law professor, Hannah Bloch-Wehba walks us through number examples of other areas which algorithm governance  is being used. Broad areas which she labels as "typical poverty law settings" of welfare… medicaid… child protective services for example, and those area are continuing to expand. Court systems, administrative law departments, and other government agencies are relying upon algorithms to help with larger and larger caseloads. Algorithms, in and of themselves, are not inherently bad. In fact, it can be very helpful in streamlining processes and alleviate the burden on different government agencies in how to handle these issues. But is it fairer than what we have now? We don't have a good way of demonstrating that. Professor Bloch-Wehba sees the overall effect of algorithms as creating a newer playing field that is bumpy in different ways than the old one. There's still a human element in algorithms, not just in the creation of the algorithms, but also in the acceptance of algorithmic outcomes by those who are tasked to apply them. Add to this, the "black box" which some algorithms live, and how governments are relying upon private industries to create these processes, and an inability for the government to be able to discuss how they work. Can governments give up their duty to be transparent in the name of algorithmic efficiency? How far will a democratic society tolerate with algorithms which it may not fully understand, or trust? We cover all of these questions and discuss Professor Bloch-Wehba's upcoming Fordham Law Review article, "Access to Algorithms," which will be published later this year. Information Inspirations Archive and Delete are not the same. Garry Vander Voort of LexBlog writes about a disturbing trend he is seeing on apps where you might think you are archiving a magazine or a podcast, but in reality, you're deleting it. He has a few suggestions on how developers can use better descriptors, including some good ol' library terms. Business Intelligence and Data Analytics are not the same. Rob Saccone published and excellent article on Medium a few days ago that is worth reading. We may be looking for unicorns when it comes to having someone who understands the importance of analysis as well as the comprehension of the business model. Saccone has some excellent suggestions of what businesses can do, besides seeking that elusive unicorn. Being a Leader of a Firm and Understanding What is Going on in the Market is not the same. Tom Clay from Altman Weil suggests that all leaders at law firms take 15 minutes a day to focus on the evolution of their practice and firm. Being at CLOC, and Reading #CLOC2019 Tweets are not the same... but, we'll take it! Thanks to Jason Barnwell and others who are keeping us connected this week. (more...)

Jim Hannigan, the Director of Legal Project Management at Coblentz Patch Duffy & Bass LLP and a member of the leadership team and standards committee at SALI Alliance walks us through the importance surround data standards when it comes to legal matters. Creating standards is the first step in allowing those of us in the legal services industry to speak the same language, and create ways of comparing apples to apples when it comes to marketing pitches, prior experience, or matter pricing. Hannigan discusses why SALI was created, the release of the first set of matter standards in January of this year, and what to expect at the LMA P3 Conference next month.  We also discuss the current situation with Wolters Kluwer experiencing a ransomeware attack which shut down most of it's online resource tools. WK has been very open about what happened, and is keeping a public statement page open as they begin to bring services back online. Just another reason to watch out for those phishing emails! Information Inspirations "Legal innovation needs to learn some new tricks." Rae Digby-Morgan at Wilson Fletcher, tells us that you can't just slap "legal" or "law" onto a process and think that it makes it special. In fact, the legal industry may be a bit too much insular and should open up to non-legal experts to come in and advise us on how to improve our processes. She also reminds everyone that process improvement does not equal innovation. The value-add results of process improvements are expected by our clients… and is the floor, not the ceiling. If you want to separate yourself from the competition, being truly innovative will help. How a Google Street View image of your house predicts your risk of a car accident. Standford University and the University of Warsaw in Poland have tested Google's Street View images of individual's houses to determine how likely they will be to file an auto insurance claim. Reportedly, they improved predictability by 2%. Scary! Marlene wonders what are the next factors in determining future actions? If you run 5K's, or donate to non-profits?  Kim Kardashian and Legal Team Help Free 17 Prisoners in 90 Days. Although neither Greg nor Marlene watch KUWTK, or follow Kim on Instragram, they have nothing but good things to say about her work to help free 17 people who were imprisoned and drug related charges. Some serving life sentences. If you're going to have power and fame and a platform, using it for social justice is a great way to use it.  Listen, Subscribe, download Jerry’s music, and Send Us Tweets and Voicemails, Too!! Don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and comment. You can tweet @gebauerm and/or @glambert to reach out. Call us at 713-487-7270 with suggestions. And, thanks to Jerry David DiCicca for the music!

Welcome to a mini-episode of The Geek In Review. Shot on location in Scottsdale, Arizona. Law School Stress??  No Kidding! This week, we continue our discussion on how law students can have a stressful time in the three years they are in law school. We can't change what happens during law school, but we've asked some experts to tell us what they do to help law students reduce stress as they prep for finals, and what they can do to be successful as summer associates in law firms. We finish our series about how law schools are reducing stress by hearing from the following schools: Howard University University of Hawaii University of Houston University of Wisconsin Georgia State University University of Texas We appreciate these schools (and the ones from last week) taking the time to tell us what all they are doing to help students deal with finals. Hey Summer Associates... Listen Up! We also talk with a number of AmLaw 100 firms about what their expectations are for how summer associates can have a successful tour of duty at their firms. Greg and Marlene were at a conference in Scottsdale, Arizona, and they asked a number of their fellow attendees what they do to help summer associates succeed, or what their expectations are for how law schools should prepare them for this work, and what they allow from outside vendors in regards for training as assistance during the Summers' time at the firm.  We will say this to any law students who is listening...make friends with the law librarian. They will help guide you to success. This Episode brought to you by... Greg's iPhone We recorded this entire episode on Greg's iPhone. Thanks to all of the law schools and law firm librarians who took the time to talk with us as we were traveling in the desert. This has been a fun one, and we hope you enjoy listening to it as much as we did recording it. Listen, Subscribe, download Jerry’s music, and Send Us Tweets and Voicemails, Too!! Don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and comment. You can tweet @gebauerm and/or @glambert to reach out. Call the Geek in Review hotline at 713-487-7270, and let us know if you have ideas on topics we should cover in future episodes. As always, thanks to Jerry David DiCicca for his original music.

David Whelan, the Director of Legal Information & the Great Library Society of Ontario, discusses his recent article "The No Legal Research Provider Landscape," and how lawyers, law librarians, and the legal industry looks at legal information services. Do you need to have multiple resources like Westlaw, LexisNexis, Bloomberg or others, or can you get by with just going with one (AKA "Sole Provider.") Do you even really need to go with one of the big services, or can you survive off of the resources provided by the local bar association? Or are there even fewer options for solo small firm environments? David covers  this, plus when things are "good enough" for some lawyers to feel comfortable in their practice. And, how that usually runs counter to law librarians and other practitioners who would never be satisfied with "good enough."  De-Stressing the Law Students During Finals We skip Information Inspirations this week to have a little fun. Anyone who has gone to law school knows that finals time can be stressful. We reached out to a number of law schools to ask them what they do to help students reduce their stress levels during this time. We get some great answers from: The University of Georgia University of San Diego University of Illinois Tulsa University University of Arkansas Little Rock Villanova Richmond Yale Thanks to all of these schools for sharing. There's some great programs going on at all of these schools. We have a few more who left us messages today, and we'll make sure to get those on the next show. If your school is doing something to reduce the stress levels of law students, call us on the Geek in Review hotline at 713-487-7270 and leave us a brief (30 seconds or so) voice memo, and we'll get it on next week's show.  One of the things we learned from Yale's Law Library Director, Teresa Miguel-Sterns, is that New Haven apparently does have excellent pizza. Marlene, with her New Jersey skepticism says that she's going to have to try that out first hand. So look out Connecticut...  Government Action on Legal Information Emily Feltren, Director of Government Relations at the American Association of Law Libraries, gives us a monthly update on what the government is doing in regards to advancing access to legal information. Listen, Subscribe, download Jerry’s music, and Send Us Tweets and Voicemails, Too!! Don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and comment. You can tweet @gebauerm and/or @glambert to reach out. Call the Geek in Review hotline at 713-487-7270, and let us know if you have ideas on topics we should cover in future episodes. As always, thanks to Jerry David DiCicca for his original music.

One of the best things about the legal industry is that there are multiple pathways to success. We are all trained issue spotters, and our guest on this episode identified an issue and founded a new company to fix that issue. Brian Powers is the CEO and co-founder of PactSafe, a high-velocity contract acceptance platform used by such major companies like Angie's List, UpWork, BMC, TIVO, and others to handle large volumes of clickthrough agreements. We talk with Brian about what motivated him to take on this challenge, and how he sought out to change the way businesses approach these types of contacts, and bring efficiency to the market place, and the legal industry through technology and process improvements. Brian is just one more example of those in the legal field who has found an alternative path through identifying inefficiencies, and finding ways to correct them.  Hat tip to Kristin Hodgins for her tweet this week when she saw that someone said that if law firms are going to us AI, we need ways to collect structured data. Hodgins tweet reply was spot on when she said “Guess who are experts at structured data? Librarians. Google didn’t destroy us; it help us by reducing low-value work like rote retrieval from our duties & allowed us to focus on high-order skills. AI will do the same.” Well said! Information Inspirations: We're doing AI Wrong Zach Warren interviewed Brad Blickstein in a law.com article this week about how law firms are looking at AI the wrong way. When it comes to AI and law firms, Blickstein says that “[AI has] become a top-down thing: What are we doing about AI? It’s like asking, what are we doing about databases? It’s a crazy question. The question should be, what problems do we have, how do we solve them, and is AI or some semblance of AI a potential solution for that?”  Brad's company, Blickstein Group, is producing a Legal AI Efficacy report that is due out this summer.  We're Communicating Wrong This will come as a surprise to no one, but there can often be communications issues between executives and technologists. In a Harvard Business Review article, a scenario is set up between executives and data scientists, and we are walked through some examples on how to improve the communications between the two personalities. The article suggests you have a variety of projects and you build a team based on a variety of skill sets (and goes on to list them-data wrangling, data analysis, project management, subject expertise, storytelling, design)- so that the team can focus on what they do well but you have all the skills needed for a strong data science team. (We have a little fun with the data wrangling job.) We're Podcasting Wrong Check out Jared Corriea's latest episode of the Legal Toolkit podcast. Former law librarian, and podcast enthusiast, Tim Baran, has a number of suggestions for those of you who might be considering starting your own podcast. It turns out that Marlene and Greg are violating a few of the suggestions.  more...

Not many people can make the transition from Ph.D. in Genetics and Genomics, and then to the legal analytics field, but Dr. Carla Rydholm is someone who did just that. For nearly the past decade, Dr. Rydholm has been leading the charge of data analytics at Lex Machina. She is charged with not only acquiring the data large amounts of data but also maintaining that data as it is updated. Dr. Rydholm stopped by Greg's Houston office, along with episode 10's guest, Kyle Doviken to tell us about transitioning from pure scientist, to her current role, and what drives her passion for data analytics, and how the data is used to tell the story, and help attorney's understand what's previously happened, and use that as a guide to better understand where they may be headed. It's a very insightful conversation. Marlene WIns an Award! The Private Law Librarians and Information Professionals (PLL-IP) of the American Association of Law Libraries (AALL) is giving Blogger of the Year status to our very own Marlene Gebauer for her outstanding work on this podcast. Congrats Marlene!! Speaking of AALL, there is a new State of the Profession Survey publication that is of great value to any organization that has legal information professionals. You can find out more, and order your copy at the AALL website. Information Inspirations:  Marlene points out a recent article called “The Value of Inconvenient Design.” The author uses a case study of assembling IKEA furniture (with that single allen wrench) and how people place value on things where there is a challenge (friction) in producing the end result, versus having something that is just handed to you. There's a need to solve a problem, in order to earn the reward. She ties this back to the theme in many of our shows centering around design thinking--you have to identify what is actually a problem and work backwards from that. Simply making something easier because we can through improved process or tech may actually de-value the experience and make the people involved more unhappy. There's a lot of mergers, acquisitions, and strategic alliances going on recently in the legal information field. The recent acquisition of Justis by vLex creates a powerful international and foreign law database. The combination of vLex's Colin Lachance, and Justis' Masoud Gerami is sure to be a winning combination. Ed Walter's of Fastcase hinted at more things to come for his legal information service when he talked with us a few weeks ago. Fastcase is collaborating with two expert witness platforms, JurisPro and Courtroom Insight. Fastcase is already punching above its weight class against the big players in the industry. With this latest collaboration, it seems to be punching even harder. Don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and comment. You can tweet @gebauerm and/or @glambert to reach out. Call the Geek in Review hotline at 713-487-7270, and let us know if you have ideas on topics we should cover in future episodes. As always, thanks to Jerry David DiCicca for his original music.

 On this episode of The Geek in Review Podcast, we have a wonderful conversation with Steve Embry of the TechLaw Crossroads blog. Embry walked away from his AmLaw 200 partnership almost a year ago to follow his passion to become a full time legal blogger. He discusses how there is an art to storytelling, and as a lawyer, there are different ways to present those stories. Storytelling is a skill which needs to be honed, whether that is through legal blogging, or through leveraging technology to present your story in a courtroom environment. Embry's passion in this new phase of his life is palatable throughout this interview and even inspires those of us who have been blogging for years to remember why it is we do it.  Information Inspirations: Ernst and Young is poised to swoop in and acquire Thomson Reuters' managed legal services company, Pangea3. Marlene wonders what this means for the future of both the Big 4 entering the legal market, and what the future objectives of Thomson Reuters in the legal industry. There is an art to a quality April Fool's joke. Greg points out that the Artificial Lawyer's "Post-It Note Shortage" story was an instant masterpiece. Marlene is going with a collaboration theme this episode. First up, Legal Design Lab, in partnership with Stanford Codex’s Jameson Dempsey is proposing a Data Commons for Law to advance access to justice, legal tech and legal design. And, secondly, six Big Law firms have recently signed up to Reynen's Court to collaborate and support development and ultimate launch of its service automation platform. When it comes to the concept of "fail fast," Google seems to be taking that to heart... perhaps, far too often. In the first three months of 2019, Google has shutdown, or announce the discontinuation of multiple platforms. Greg is still feeling the pain of Google shutting down Google Reader some six years ago. Many think that Google's constant failure in projects may eventually harm their brand. Listen, Subscribe, download Jerry’s music, and Send Us Tweets and Voicemails, Too!! Don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and comment. You can tweet @gebauerm and/or @glambert to reach out. Call the NEW Geek in Review hotline at 713-487-7270. Thanks to our first caller, Crawford Appleby of Rulings.law. If you have a product you'd like us to see, or a comment on a topic you'd like us to cover, give us a call, tweet, or even comment below. As always, thanks to Jerry David DiCicca for his original music.

On this episode of The Geek In Review, we talk with Joe Lawson, Deputy Director of the Harris County Law Library in Houston, Texas. With Harris County being the third largest county in the United States, there is a large number of attorneys, judges, and citizens who use the law library for various reasons. In 2018, there were over 24,000 filings of self-represented petitioners. That is a lot. Dallas County, by comparison, had 6,000 in the same time period. Lawson believes that there is a duty of the law library to help train lawyers, not to just be more efficient in their personal practices, but to help them have more capacity to help assist pro se litigants. Lawson's calculation is that a 3% increase in capacity, through advancements in technology usage, could help eliminate a majority of the pro se issues in the county.  Back from South By Southwest (SXSW) Greg returned this week from SXSW and a trip to Northern California. Although the music was great, it was the educational sessions which took up most of his time in Austin. Panels on Gen Z, and the art of Storytelling where two of the topics that caught his attention. INFORMATION INSPIRATIONS Washburn Law School in Kansas allows their 3L students to finish their last year of law school actually working in the industry. In their "Third Year Anywhere" program, students receive first-hand experience working with mentor lawyers in one of six different areas. They complete their educational portion of the curriculum through online courses. Is this an outlier in legal education, or a potential trend for other schools to follow? Marlene likes the recent 3 Geeks' post by Shashi Kara. In addition to discussing how not all flops are failures, Shashi also wins the marketing award for putting "sex" in the title of his post. There are failures, and there are lessons learned which make future projects successes. It's important to know the differences. Matt Homann gives presenters ten tips for impressing their audiences. Number one is having a passion about the topic which you are presenting. If you don't feel that passion, neither will those listening to you. That's just the first tip... there are nine more to help you be a better presenter. The subscription based model is infiltrating the legal industry. Marlene has some suggestions on how lawyers and firms can bring value-added services to improve that model, and keep in line with bar rules as well. Bonus II's: Clippy returns... only to be assassinated. The NY Law Institute is having a National Library Week Peep Diorama Contest. Comic book databases leave a lot to be desired. Perhaps Marlene could head up R&D?? Listen, Subscribe, download Jerry’s music, and Send Us Tweets and Voicemails, Too!! Don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and comment. You can tweet @gebauerm and/or @glambert to reach out. Call the NEW Geek in Review hotline at 713-487-7272 and let us know, preferably in English, if you want us to start producing video promotions of upcoming episodes, or if you have an idea for the show. As always, thanks to Jerry David DiCicca for his original music.