Law Technology Now

Northwestern’s Jim Speta speaks with fellow law professor and host Dan Rodriguez about the suit against Facebook filed by the Federal Trade Commission and 48 state attorneys general.

Speta, an internet law expert and interim dean of the law school, gives an overview of the case, and delves into the history of the FTC and Department of Justice that enables both entities to enforce antitrust laws. Speta and Rodriguez discuss whether ...

Getting a job at a large firm and becoming a partner is vastly different than it was even in the 1990s. Where there once was a school-to-firm process and pipeline, Harvard Law’s David Wilkins tells host Ralph Baxter that hiring is dominated by lateral moves and recruiting of proven talent. Where young associates were given a long lead time to show their potential, metrics begin year one. And where achieving partnership was once aki...

Research Prof. Maura Grossman has long studied the effectiveness of machine learning and its implications for the delivery of legal services. She learned early on that machines were better than lawyers at many tasks, especially in the ediscovery process. But she recognized right away that to adopt and implement new technologies, lawyers needed to see proof that the new tools worked.

In this episode, host Dan Linna talks to Grossman...

When the Utah Supreme Court started studying the access to justice gap, justices and bar leaders were alarmed to learn that 93% of those using adult courts in the state’s largest jurisdiction were showing up without legal assistance. Let that sink in: 93% were coming to court without a lawyer. It’s a figure host Ralph Baxter’s guests say is common across North America.

With news still fresh of Utah’s groundbreaking order creating a...

Legal tech in the U.S. is pressing forward with data privacy playing catch up. In Europe, the trend is largely reversed. Host Dan Rodriguez and his guest, German lawyer and consultant Markus Hartung, talk through each approach’s pros and cons and address legal innovation’s status on both sides of the Atlantic.

Hartung explains how, with good reason, Europeans are skeptical of embracing big data even with the promise of greater effi...

From early on, host Ralph Baxter knew co-founders Ian Nelson and Chris Wedgeworth were onto something when they developed a legal training model with proven educational techniques pioneered by Coursera, Khan Academy, and Duolingo.

In this episode, Baxter talks to Nelson about the development of Hotshot and its practical uses by law schools and law firms. Since its early pilots more than eight years ago, Hotshot has developed a libr...

Even before the global pandemic, Michigan courts were moving more quickly than many others to modernize. Michigan Chief Justice Bridget Mary McCormack talks with host Dan Linna about accelerating the state’s plans to offer online hearings, online dispute resolution, and to continue efforts to establish e-filing statewide.

Not everything is going smoothly, but McCormack notes some judges are almost current on their dockets. And impo...

Host Dan Rodriguez welcomes Jeff Kelly to discuss his experience with complex litigation and why he chose it as his professional focus. Jeff explains how his practice has been impacted by COVID-19 and what skills he’s refined and utilized to resolve problems arising from this pandemic. He also shares ways he leverages all 24 hours in his day in order to catch up to his more senior colleagues as well as finding and leveraging legal ...

Law Technology Now welcomes Gillian Hadfield to the show to talk with host Ralph Baxter about the idea of reinventing the law. She starts off by explaining how she became interested in changing the way law works through personal experience and then touches on access to our justice system and how it doesn’t give the ordinary person the legal resources they need. Gillian discusses how reinventing the law will necessitate thinking big...

What’s going on in the legal industry during COVID-19? Host Dan Rodriguez welcomes returning guest Mark Cohen of LegalMosaic to talk about the changes the pandemic has brought to the legal industry. They discuss how the traditionally tech-averse legal community has begun adopting new tools, such as Zoom, and how, for young lawyers and law students, learning business skills beyond the traditional scope of legal practice can be valua...

Tune into this episode with Dan Linna and Catherine Krow as they discuss her company Digitory Legal, a cost analytics platform that brings data-driven pricing and cost prediction to law, and also explains why data is important for litigators to understand. Catherine breaks down how to predict costs, review data correctly, and acquire it for her practice. She also explains what law firms should do to provide the best quality value a...

In this Law Technology Now episode with host Ralph Baxter, Ralph welcomes Heidi Gardner to talk about her research into collaboration and her work furthering the concept of Smart Collaboration. Heidi defines the meaning of Smart Collaboration, and gives her thoughts on the impacts COVID-19 is having on collaboration throughout the industry. She also discusses her time at Harvard Law School, how she developed a passion for studying ...

Law Technology Now host Dan Linna welcomes Laura Nirider to the show to talk about her wrongful conviction work with a focus on social media. Laura discusses her work as Co-director at Northwestern’s ‘Center on Wrongful Convictions’, her regulator appearances on ‘Making a Murderer’ with Steven Drizin, and how vital it is to use social media to get more people discussing justice and the rule of law. They also talk about how law scho...

How should law firms react during these turbulent times? Law Technology Now host Ralph Baxter sits down with Mitch Zuklie, CEO of Orrick, to discuss how attorneys can lead and manage their law firms during a pandemic. Mitch explains how it’s important to pay attention to how you respond internally as well as the impact your clients will face while delivering services to them that are relevant to the crisis. He suggests law firms sh...

Margaret Hagan joins host Ralph Baxter in this episode of Law Technology Now to talk about what design is doing for the legal industry and what it is like being the lab director at the Stanford's Legal Design Lab. They discuss how Margaret got involved with the Stanford Law School's Center on the Legal Profession, her free online book ‘Law By Design’ and its uses cartoons, and how design can apply to legal professionals. Sh...

Have you ever considered creating a legal technology application for your practice? Law Technology Now host Dan Linna sits down with Marc Lauritsen and Quinten Steenhuis to talk about evaluating legal tech applications and their article ‘Substantive Legal Software Quality: A Gathering Storm.’ They discuss what prompted them to write their article, how we can assess the quality of legal applications, and how to create a baseline by ...

On January 1, 2020, the California Consumer Privacy Act of 2018, informally known as the CCPA, went into effect. Considered one of the most significant pieces of privacy legislation in the United States, many questions exist as to how this law will affect businesses and consumers within California and beyond. Law Technology Now host Dan Rodriguez speaks with attorneys James Snyder and Timothy Blood about this impactful new legislat...

As a leading tech company, Google has, through its services and products, well earned its reputation as an innovator. But how does that extend beyond tech and into its legal department. Ralph Baxter sits down with Mary O’Carroll, Google’s director of Legal Operations, to discuss her work with Google, the factors leading to more corporations bringing on legal operations positions, and, through her presidency at CLOC, how Mary and he...

On December 13, 2019, Fastcase and Ross Intelligence, two innovative and leading companies in the legal research space, announced a new partnership. By sharing their respective technology tools and data, these two companies are aiming to facilitate rapid innovation to better serve their customers. On his first episode as co-host of Law Technology Now, Dan Rodriguez sits down with Fastcase’s Ed Walters and Ross Intelligence’s Andrew...