What did you do throughout the knowledge wars, child?
That’s roughly how somebody within the far-flung future will discuss authorized know-how in 2025. Or we’ll all be pushed extinct by SkyNet. One or the opposite.
As generative AI continues its march into the authorized workflow, the flurry of press releases more and more give attention to knowledge entry. On the threat of oversimplifying the market, advancements in the underlying algorithms are going to stagnate and suppliers have already introduced their funding in constructing higher guardrails so the subsequent logical leap for the know-how is pairing it with higher knowledge. And in order that’s the present scramble.
Harvey is an AI platform designed for authorized professionals, LexisNexis is an enormous repository of knowledge and years of categorization and curation… they fight crime!
In all seriousness, some time again, Harvey wanted to build a legal research solution and LexisNexis worked on an AI solution. Now they’re becoming a member of forces.
Inside Harvey, clients can ask LexisNexis Protégé™ to obtain complete, trusted AI solutions grounded within the LexisNexis assortment of U.S. case regulation and statutes, validated via Shepard’s® Citations. Harvey customers can ask complicated authorized questions in pure language and obtain citation-supported solutions from main sources of regulation, refine their queries via follow-up questions, and seamlessly proceed their analysis. Solutions are generated utilizing LexisNexis fine-tuned fashions inside a proprietary infrastructure that anchors responses in authorized content material, metadata, and case regulation relationships, powered by Shepard’s® Information Graph and Level of Legislation Graph know-how.
Now Harvey customers have the information and LexisNexis can ship its product via a platform delivering AI to attorneys throughout use circumstances.
Why isn’t this simply an acquisition like when Thomson Reuters purchased Casetext? Unclear. The numerous tentacled LexisNexis company octopus has cash in Harvey so it wouldn’t be loopy to carry all of it beneath one roof. And regardless of the alliance speak, it appears as if this can ultimately create redundancies. Artificial Lawyer asked that question outright and was advised by LexisNexis North America, UK, and Eire CEO Sean Fitzpatrick, “Who is aware of the place this can go?”
Fairly certain the reply is a few sort of merger.
The deal additionally features a tease for some workflows getting the robo-treatment:
Harvey and LexisNexis may even develop refined authorized workflows constructed on the newest generative AI know-how. These co-developed workflows will initially embrace:
- Movement to Dismiss Workflow: Generates high-quality Movement to Dismiss arguments and associated consumer communications with authorized analysis content material from LexisNexis
- Movement for Abstract Judgment Workflow: Automates key steps in drafting a Movement for Abstract Judgment with supporting authorized analysis content material from LexisNexis
And oh sure, motions! As a result of this courageous new world contains — await it — AI-generated “Movement to Dismiss” and “Movement for Abstract Judgment” workflows. So the 2 most overused filings within the historical past of American jurisprudence at the moment are getting the robo-treatment.
I stay anxious about of the automated workflow as an idea. Crunching a file right into a usable assertion of information can save time and generative AI can even carry out the top-level reasoning to draft analysis queries primarily based on the case supplies. However whereas AI generally is a power multiplier alongside each step of the way in which, placing collectively a short looks as if greater than the sum of its elements. Authorized analysis is a morass of linguistic subtlety, precedent, and jurisdictional nuance. Even with Shepard’s duct-taped to its brow, an LLM is one semantic landmine away from confidently pulling the great case whereas overlooking the good one.
As an unrelated-but-maybe-related apart, in Bob Ambrogi’s LawSites coverage of this announcement, Harvey CEO Winston Weinberg stated, “Attorneys have trusted LexisNexis for hundreds of years, so this alliance permits us to offer our clients with knowledge sources they know and rely on whereas collaborating with on AI techniques that make day by day life for our joint clients considerably simpler.”
LexisNexis was based in 1970.
When he says “for hundreds of years,” does he imply the twentieth and the twenty first? As a result of, one, I’m not cool with that. And two, it feels just like the type of “technically true however fallacious as a result of it misses the nuance” response that worries me about the entire generative AI workflow expertise.
The extra suppliers attempt to put the whole lawyering course of on greased rails, the much less I belief the people to carry out the mandatory work to verify the work product is the most effective it may be. It’s one factor to “do authorized analysis” and consider the output and one other to “do all of the steps directly” and consider that output.
It’s exhausting to explain, however I approached analysis in a different way within the advocate function than within the arbitrator/mediator function. After I would obtain briefs from the events and inspect them, my analysis was at all times already contextualized by their completed work product. I needed to affirmatively divorce myself from that context to ensure I bought to the precise reply. Clearly this product continues to be in growth and would possibly take pains to stop individuals from doing this, however the hype round these types of workflow brokers creeps towards “it can do all of the steps to provide you one thing completed that you may simply inspect,” however when the output arrives wanting completed, there’s a little bit of a psychological barrier to tearing it again all the way down to the studs to verify it’s proper.
Good attorneys will change how they method the job to verify the attract of an automatic workflow doesn’t uninteresting their skilled judgment. I’m simply unsure I belief attorneys sufficient.
