OPINION
Tuesday, November 23, 2015 9
Tomorrow’s Lawyers
Law and Technology
justin amaral › contributor
T
he legal market is in an unprecedented
state of flux. Over the next two decades, the
way in which lawyers work will change radically. Entirely new ways of delivering legal
services will emerge, new providers will enter the
market, and the workings of our courts will be transformed. Unless they adapt, many traditional legal
businesses will fail. On the other hand, a whole set of
fresh opportunities will present themselves to entrepreneurial and creative young lawyers.
Richard Susskind, Tomorrow’s Lawyer: An
Introduction to Your Future
Amid the doom and gloom of the articling crisis
and decreasing access to justice, there is a silver lining:
Tomorrow’s Lawyers. Tomorrow’s Lawyers are carving out new lucrative careers in the legal market, by
combining expertise in law with technology and
interdisciplinary
skills such as process analysis and
project management. Using tools
like automated
document assembly, online dispute resolution, and AI-based problem solving, Tomorrow’s Lawyers have the potential
to deliver better legal services at a lower price and
faster than ever before. How do I know this? Last year
I had the pleasure of enrolling in the inaugural Legal
Information Technology seminar, taught by three of
Tomorrow’s Lawyers: Monica Goyal, Darin Thompson,
and James Williams. If you’re not enrolled in this
year’s Legal IT seminar, but want to learn more about
Tomorrow’s Lawyers, you’ll have your chance during
Osgoode’s 2016 Career Week. Students will have an
opportunity to meet some of Tomorrow’s Lawyers and
explore the world of Law and Technology during an
interactive session taking place on February 4th.
While “legal technology” may sound like an oxymoron, I’m convinced that all of us, no matter what
we choose to do with our JDs, will be impacted by
“disruptive technologies.” Unlike “sustaining technologies,” which support and enhance the way that
a business or a market currently operates, “disruptive technologies” challenge and change the way a
business or market is run. An example of a disruptive
technology is Online Legal Guidance. Online Legal
Guidance systems provide legal information and stepby-step instructions on common legal processes like
bringing an action in small claims court. These systems might even connect clients with a lawyer that
will provide legal advice over the Internet. The traditional model of legal service delivery has few creative
options for unrepresented litigants or self-represented
litigants besides
trying to connect
potential
clients with full
legal representation. Conversely,
technologies like
Online Legal Guidance systems disrupt the way the
legal market operates by providing legal support services to unrepresented and self-represented litigants,
acknowledging that not everyone can afford legal representation, nor does everyone want to be represented
by a lawyer.
One example of a Canadian Online Legal Guidance
system is My Legal Briefcase, founded by Monica
Goyal. My Legal Briefcase is an online tool that streamlines the legal process and offers a convenient, affordable, and timely solution to small business owners’
“. . .disruptive legal technology
does not necessarily involve
lawyers.”
ê Photo credit: thetrialwarrior.files.wordpress.com
small claims needs. At Osgoode’s 2016 Career Week,
students will have the opportunity to speak with professionals like Monica about delivering legal services
using disruptive technologies and students will be
given the chance to brainstorm ideas for future innovations in legal technology.
If you’re still not convinced that the words “law”
and “technology” belong in the same sentence, consider the following three examples:
In 2010, eBay handled 60 million disputes through
their in-house online dispute resolution process for
buyers and sellers.
Under European Union rules, airlines must pay
compensation of €250-€600 ($350-$860 CDN) for
cancelled or heavily delayed flights in or out of an
EU airport, or where a passenger is denied boarding
because of overbooking. However, airlines were routinely turning down legitimate claims in the hope
that consumers would simply give up and go away. In
2013, Bott & Co capitalized on this dilemma by offering to take up claims on a contingency fee basis (the
firm keeps 27% of the money it recoups plus a €25 ($35
CDN) application fee). The firm developed software
akin to Turbo Tax (a “flight claim checker”) to automatically process tens of thousands of claims. To date,
the firm has claimed over €14.1m ($20m CDN) in compensation from the airlines for 54,000 clients.
In 2016 British Columbia will be the first province in Canada to operate an online tribunal. The Civil
Resolution Tribunal will be available for use twentyfour hours a day, seven days a week, from a computer
or mobile device connected to the internet. The CRT
will likely be mandatory for all small claims and condominium disputes by 2017.
What these three examples demonstrate is that
disruptive technology can play an important role in
addressing large-scale, widespread issues of access to
justice. At the same time, delivering these services can
be quite lucrative for the service provider. However,
what these examples also demonstrate is that disruptive legal technology does not