Lifeboat Foundation

What are new practice areas that solo, small, and medium firms should prepare for in their 5 to 10-year plans for the future?

In the search for the next wave of growth, future-focused law firms are learning to embrace the futurist perspective as they evaluate the opportunities arising from cutting-edge technologies such as artificial intelligence (AI). These technologies will enable new organizational structures, services, and business models in the business horizon. Here are three new practice areas that firms might want to prepare for in the coming few years.

1. Evidence and liability issues from autonomous machine “testimony”

A growing array of “smart” objects are enveloping our homes, workplaces, and communities and the volume of legally admissible data from these devices is likely grow at an exponential rate over the next decade. Firms need to start building expertise around the admissibility and verifiability of the data collected. For example, the design trend for voice-activated technology is driving a rash of seemingly sentient technology in the form of digital assistants, smart appliances, and personal medical and wearable devices. Law firms may be asked to represent clients in cases dealing with evidence, witnesses, accidents, or contracts hinging on theoretically immutable digital proof such as time-stamped video and audio recordings. Attorneys may seek to specialize in addressing the data issues related to domains such as digital twins and personas, surveillance capitalism (companies exploiting customer data for commercial gain with and without full approval), and digital privacy rights.

Continue reading “Digital Gold – New Legal Opportunities Emerging from Technology Innovation” »

The future of the legal industry is being reshaped by a number of rapidly advancing technologies and the disruptive ideas they enable. Today’s lawyers are being advised to learn to code, develop an artificial intelligence (AI) application, and outsource discovery to machines. Of the many new technological drivers impacting law firms is the secure information exchange platform known as blockchain. Some see it as a the basis for the reinvention of economies while others simply see it as means of secure and incorruptible information exchange between counterparties. This cloud-based distributed ledger technology provides a source of irrefutable record of every transaction. In legal it is enabling fully automated self-executing “smart” contracts, and has the potential to help attorneys provide new services and create new value for clients and law firms. Blockchain is known as the structure underlying Bitcoin and other digital currencies, but its applications in the legal sector are still evolving. This article provides an overview of the technology, highlights example applications and case studies, and presents a possible timeline of future developments over the next decade or so.

Overview: Blockchain and Bitcoin

Blockchain and Bitcoin have gained notoriety lately as a potential solution to an outdated and burdensome system for managing financial transactions between counterparties. Today most financial transactions between counterparties are settled via financial intermediaries which adds time and cost to the settlement process. Blockchain offers a distributed ledger model whereby the parties settle directly with each other, the transactions are recorded, secure, and immutable, and the counterparty identities remain anonymous. The goal is to enable a simplified and trustworthy financial ecosystem- but these digital peer-to-peer networks, also challenge the authority of institutions (banks, regulators, and governments) and are thus creating disruption.

According to its advocates, the decentralized nature of blockchain and Bitcoin will cause much-needed disruption, with reverberations far beyond the financial realm. There is an element of social revolution in blockchain, thus it is often portrayed as a conduit for challenging the status quo. Though Bitcoin, a digital currency, is an explicitly financial innovation (i.e., for payments, transfer of funds) blockchain is far less specific. Blockchain serves a critical role in the administration of Bitcoin, and that of other digital currencies, but it can actually be used to complete other objectives and track the movement, transfer, and ownership of all sorts of things besides money (examples include luxury goods, education credits, property titles, and patents, to name a few). Though blockchain is structured like a traditional accounting tool—it’s fundamentally a ledger that tracks deposits in and payments out, and maintains a running balance—its uses go far beyond counting coins.

Continue reading “Blockchain, Bitcoin, and Law: A Distributed Disruption” »