[FrankenPC]

You haven't heard of Law 2.0. The slow rise to financial dominance is coming to an end for the big Amlaw firms. A disruption event is on the horizon where lawyers will need to be replaced with technology/law expert hybrids who will program the legal systems which will act autonomously with as little intervention as possible. Hands on law will eventually become a thing of the past. I've been working in legal for 25 years on the IT side. I've seen it go from ALL paper to 'paper on demand'. Nearly everything is digital with ETL warehousing acting as the data conductor. The clients are fed up with $1000 an hour corporate lawyers and want another cheaper and faster solution.

[ABCLAW]

I believe every lawyer has seen the gutting of the newly called associate class - we all know what automation is doing.

While databaseing case facts, contracts, documents, laws, jurisprudence, etc. has escalated in recent years, fundamentally a law firm is not providing those as key services - they are ancillary profit centers. One hires a contract manager to manage contracts, not a top-flight firm.

The value proposition of a law practice is dependable competence in a wide spectrum of related sub-fields. As those profit centers are commoditized and margins fall, firms will merely shift pricing, technology and talent sourcing strategy, not fall apart, because in many cases, the amount of people with competence in those fields is countably limited. Most top flight firms will be fairly straightforward with you if you ask: they don't compete on price. They compete for clients on quality of service and prestige.

The fantasy that law will act autonomously with little intervention is charming and sensible to non-practitioners. The rules are the rules, after all, what could go possibly go wrong? In practice, the answer is often 'everything'.

[libertymcateer]

I agree.

Also, saying that I haven't heard of Law 2.0 is like asserting a particular developer hasn't heard of Web 2.0. It's... a strange accusation, to say the least. And one that distinguishes you as an outsider.

[sjtgraham]

It's easy to want something you can't have and wanting it a lot doesn't make it any more likely to become reality.

[LandoCalrissian]

Is this some crazy manifesto, or do you actually believe this?

[libertymcateer]

It sounds like a tech-crunch article on legaltech run through a markov chain.

[libertymcateer]

I genuinely cannot tell if you are trolling.

[elastic_church]

Where is this happening

As an individual if I want a lawyer for anything right now, I am most likely going to wind up with a complete technophobe who is barely computer literate enough to copy and paste the boilerplate legal document they make for me.

[Consultant32452]

For 99% of the things I want a lawyer to do right now I'll fill out a form on LegalZoom and never see a human. Someone wrote a chatbot that helps people in NYC walk through the process of fighting their traffic citations. Automation is coming for sure.

[sanswork]

Unless something goes wrong then you'll probably regret your canned contract for not dealing with the specifics of your needs.

Canned contracts are great and a wonderful money saver until they are needed. It's just lucky that most contracts individuals are involved in are never needed.