As the legal technology world descends upon the Midtown Hilton next week for Legaltech NY — or Legalweek or Lawmegeddon or whatever we’re calling it these days — we’re looking forward to seeing the newest technological offerings hoping to supercharge the efficiency of the legal profession. As a practicing attorney, I confess I never really thought about much more than an avenue to conduct legal research and something capable of recording my time. But covering these events opened my eyes to a whole world of innovation I’d never imagined. Yet, for all that, it’s impossible to tout a legal tech conference without mentioning the seedy underside of legal technology — the cesspool of corruption every conference attendee is forced to walk through at least once before the event ends.
I’m referring, of course, to the ubiquitous Enron document set that eDiscovery vendors bombard you with in every demo. Look, it’s certainly convenient. It’s a case all their potential customers understand and everyone knows one or two cute searches to run and then knowingly chuckle that Enron named some SPV “Jar Jar Binks Blows” or something. And as someone evaluating the product, there’s a benefit in running demos on a shared data set to compare the results across offerings.
But it’s time to put a stop to Lorem Ipsum Dolor Sit Ken Lay. It’s not fun anymore. We need another wild public scandal to breathe new life into the grind of demonstration after demonstration. I want to thrill at the new high of state-of-the-art machine learning algorithms unveiling some other testament to corporate malfeasance built on hubris and $30 martinis. It’s time for the world to give our legal technology vendors something else to bring to the exhibit hall.
Please America, help an industry out.
And don’t get me started on Judge Koh docket and judicial analytics.
Joe Patrice is a senior editor at Above the Law and co-host of Thinking Like A Lawyer. Feel free to email any tips, questions, or comments. Follow him on Twitter if you’re interested in law, politics, and a healthy dose of college sports news. Joe also serves as a Managing Director at RPN Executive Search.
