January 9, 2017
On December 8, 2016, industry-wide stakeholders in the field of legal analytics gathered at ASU’s Beus Center for Law and Society, Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law, for an all-day workshop to discuss the application and impact of analytics on legal practice and outcomes. Nationwide leaders in the area spoke on significant emerging issues and their corresponding presentations are available from the workshop’s website. The workshop officially launched LSI’s new program on legal analytics, building on LSI’s long-standing collaboration with e-discovery expert Michael Arkfeld , to be called the Arkfeld-ASU Program on eDiscovery, Digital Evidence & Legal Analytics. See https://www.law.asu.edu/degree-programs/programs/law-technology/get/ediscovery.
Legal analytics involves the use of data, software and artificial intelligence to gather information to assist with the practice of law. For example, from strategically identifying triable cases in litigation, to the value of undertaking transactions in a particular environment and with regard to specific variables, in transactional law. Unsurprisingly, predictive analytics has also infiltrated the judiciary, assisting defense attorneys by “peeking under judges’ robes” and helping judges with matters such as establishing appropriate sentencing.
The internet and software applications have topsy-turvied 21st century information gathering, which one can do oneself online, through businesses dedicated to such (e.g. Lex Machina, Ravel Law) or via data brokers.
Emerging “big” technology is disruptive and analytics is no exception. The impacts of this domain are many and involve ethics, access, due process, reliability, employment, psychology, procedural shake-ups and, as with most technologies, potential for bad uses. Nonetheless, thanks to legal analytics, the possibility to financially streamline and make legal practice more effective from all angles is extraordinary.
The workshop was sponsored by LSI and Wolters Kluwer.