- law dawg
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Since several of you have been talking about it off and on in the comments, we thought we would dedicate a post to the topic of AI. Are you using it? Has it changed the way you practice law? Are you avoiding it? How are you billing for using it? What is your AI of choice? Have you see a proliferation of AI output from your clients and opposing counsel? Where do you think this is going? What will become of all the new attorneys who haven’t done things the hard way their whole career? Any daily must-reads to keep up on everything AI?
I have a pro se right now, whom I suspect is being represented by a paralegal using AI. They are really fucking over the pro se.
AI is, on net, going to increase the amount of work that we have in three ways: (1) we will clean up more messes created by people using AI, unguided by a lawyer, for various legal issues; (2) the efficiency increases the pace of litigation and volume of paperwork in a given case; and (3) AI makes some previously economically unfeasible cases viable (but this is the one I am most skeptical of).
I do not think AI increases actual efficiency towards resolution. Someone once called metrics in major league baseball “an arms race to nowhere.” In other words, when everybody is doing it, it creates no edge or advantage, just another layer of mandatory bureaucracy so that one is not left behind. The older luddite lawyers who refuse to fully utilize AI will be fun to dunk on until they retire, but that won’t last very long
Understand that AI is not (yet) truly intelligent. People are hired to pose questions and report back with corrections which programmers then try to resolve into a better more accurate answer to a question posed by a user. This is in addition to the auto collection of material from what is available on the internet. It is in a sense, a very complex high-speed database. Helpful to think of it as a step up from Alexa.
Your competence in framing a neutral question directly affects the output/answer that you receive.
I have seen that to some extent; the AI model wants to please the user giving you an answer that it thinks you want to hear. That means that it can detect bias in your question.
Even well worded questions can result in faulty answers. Use AI for general understanding. Then do you own research.
Dare I even say this to young attorneys today? Shepardize.
AI is research, boomer.
AI is a glorified database search. the quality of the prompt/challenge/reprompt/challenge determine the quality of your results.
GO KNIGHTS GO!
Anyone buy tickets today? I know it’s the Stanley Cup Finals, but damn, they’re asking for a lot of money!
I got some for game 6. We’ll see if it gets that far.
Westlaw copilot is actually pretty good. It can give me a multi-page memo on a new (to me) issue with different arguments and counterarguments.
RIP to the baby lawyers who would need several hours to research and draft something like this.
Yeah. Cocounsel is solid. All I have to do is confirm that the citations say what they claim to say.
i have used the new AI on westlaw. it was helpful and gathering information at a faster pace. probably shaved off 45-60mins of research time. but thats about all i was comfortable on relying it for. and of course it was on a topic i was already familiar with and made sure cites were real cases
I need a referral for an attorney that does civil appeals. The issue on appeal will be a single legal issue and much of the briefing was done in the trial court. The appeal should be relatively straight foward. The client is paying out of pocket so I am hoping to find someone less expensive than the typical go to appellate attorneys. Thanks in advance.
Wes Smith is solid and reasonable. No hesitation using him whatsoever.
Tom Stewart. Learned the trade from Micah Echols (the best).
The best what? Not better than Dan, Joel, Abe Smith, Bob Eisnerberg, etc.
I have been billing AI-assisted research at full rate since the tools became competent enough to use, which was earlier than most of you apparently noticed. The FLEXCOM discussion on this a couple of years back was unambiguous: the judgment is the work, not the keystrokes. Charge accordingly. What I find loathsome is the practitioner who uses AI to cut his hours and then passes the discount to the client – that is, candidly, a failure of professional self-respect. The new attorneys who haven’t done things the hard way are not my concern. They will either learn to charge properly or they will not last.
I’m not understanding the statements “bill[] AI-assisted research at full rate” and “I . . . loath[] . . . the practitioner who uses AI to cut his hours and then passes the discount to the client”. Are you saying that if you spend 0.5 doing AI-assisted research that would have taken you 1.2 without AI assistance, you bill out 0.5 or 1.2?
I have used one called Paxton. It is specifically for the lawyers. I check every citation it has given me and so far everything has been accurate and it hasn’t made up anything. It is also very good at analyzing contracts. Its nifty to effectively have a second set of eyes to point out contradictions or potential issues in something I have written or something I am reviewing that I may have missed.
Does anybody know what happened with the Katie Goldberg disciplinary hearing. It is upon appeal to NvScotus. The appendix with the findings and decision is not accessible.
Assume she got a suspension. Was it 2 years or 5. This is the “Capper case”. Sounded like they had a solid case. Is she looking at disbarment. Does anyone have an idea?
1 year stayed suspension, no?
Only one year stayed suspension on Katie Goldberg. Thought they had a cold case against her on using cappers and then lying about it.
what does on year stayed suspension even mean?
You get a suspension on your record. You get to keep practicing law.
that seems pretty tame. and goldberg is fighting that? at least she keeps her practice.
Why would you ever appeal? Because she thinks the Bar screwed something up, the Panel screwed something up, or she thinks she’s likely to get a better result from the Court. If you think you have an excellent shot at not being suspended at all, that’s a better result than a stayed suspension.
I don’t think she is necessarily fighting it. My understanding is the NSC has to approve the discipline and the case gets submitted to them as-is if nobody files a brief. As hard as the Bar came for her (and I don’t know much of anything about the evidence) they might well be the ones who will object. I think she has Bailey Kennedy representing her, and I am sure they are giving very sound advice.
I have used AI Co-Counsel through Westlaw and it has helped find good law, although I always look up the cases and sometimes the characterization is not accurate. I have used it to draft the framework of points and authorities for routine things like a motion to amend and motion for judgement debtor exam which I then tune up. Our firm is getting Legora, which is supposed to be very powerful i.e. look at 1000 documents for due dilliegence in a merger and summarize all the things you want it to look for – in minutes such as the lease obligations and terms over a portfolio of properties. Take up to 1000 documents and draft a deposition outline for a particular witness meeting the objectives you set – in minutes. It can also take a red line and “respond aggressively” on behalf of the party you represent. This is from demos, not real use yet. The AI legal industry predicts 10 percent efficiency gain in one year, 33 in 2 and 70 in 3. Clients are going to expect it to be used and to benefit from efficiencies. In terms of baby lawyers, some predict that instead of being phased out, they will end up more capable sooner because by the time they take their first depo, they will have been through a simulation of that depo 100 times if they want to. (That won’t stop Big Law from using a 1000/hr associate to draft signature blocks though.) The legal world will still need a human to make a connection to a human where negotiation and persuasion matter, at least for the foreseeable future. One day in court or trial is still one day. I am in my 60s and all in, taking every training I can get, and securing one of the first Legora licenses that my firm has obtained.
I am both excited and concerned about products like Legora. I love the idea of dumping a bunch of raw discovery into a system that will make sense of it but my experience has been disappointing so far. One clear lesson I’ve learned is that the legal tech salespeople talk a big game but their promised efficiency games don’t work out in practice. You’d think they’d be more concerned about deceptive practices lawsuits given their target customer base is attorneys.
It seems like their strategy has been to advertise the product they think they’ll have six months or a year down the line so they can lock in customers and get venture capital investments. AI is improving at a rapid clip but not fast enough for the promises to become reality. In the meantime I can get more done with Claude Code or Codex at $20 per month than I could dropping hundreds or thousands per month on customized legal solutions.
You have to be very careful if privileged or confidential information goes into a generic AI system and ends up on a cloud somewhere, where it is vulnerable to hacking. Might be that Claude and Codex have systems that protect that, but I just raise it as a concern. The systems being marketed to firms are custodial. Agree you can’t get out too far over your skis on this, but if you sit in the lodge all you’ll have soon is a cold cup of skinned over hot chocolate made from that powder stuff that no one likes.
What’s the latest with colleen brown’s appointment? We have an eta?
https://nvcourts.gov/aoc/committees_and_commissions/judicial_selection/news/commission_on_judicial_selection_nominates_finalist_for_eighth_judicial_district_position
Anybody seen Michael Nixon around lately? Realized I haven’t had a case with him in a couple years and saw that he wasn’t at Ladah anymore.
Think he started his own firm.
Just opened an office, I believe
I have never seen so many Orders to Show Cause for want of prosecution (and counsel failing to appear for OSCs) as I see in these Republic Services lien cases. Judge Mendoza today threatened to start dismissing the cases for lack of prosecution.
Don’t threaten. Just do it!
What are the “Republic Services” lien cases? I assume the garbage company against homeowners and renters but is there some article about this?
That’s basically it. Republic Services can assert a lien against property when garbage bills are in arrears.
And fun fact, those liens have superpriority over pretty much everything else.
There is one law firm that brings all of them and routinely fails to show up for court.
I haven’t been impressed with Cocounsel. Maybe I’m expecting too much, but it unable to draft affirmative defenses or a motion to dismiss. It just gave me general arguments.