What happens to doc reviewers when there is no more doc review ?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I work with a lot of doc reviewers and I don't feel like it's that dead end of a job. The good ones do move into other areas.

I agree. People love to rag on them on this site. I know quite a few who have moved jobs. Ones who really know their stuff become e-discovery attorneys who manage the whole process, and they can be really in demand. Not a lot of attorneys want to do it or understand it, but they are absolutely needed. A good one can save you from screwing up discovery in big important cases.

Others move on to become associates, maybe not in Biglaw, but very respectable firms, and from there you move up. I know a former doc reviewer who is a partner at an Amlaw100 (became associate at a small firm, then partner, then firm got acquired by Amlaw 100 firm).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:As a litigator who pays for a combo of TAR and human review, it's really really hard for me to imagine human review will, in my lifetime, be phased out to the point this question will be a serious concern. I think some sect of clients will always be uncomfortable with exclusive TAR of their potentially privileged documents.

This. TAR is okay for a first line review but you will never be able to just upload docs to a TAR platform and then produce what it spits out. Not even close. Computers don't get nuance.

Clients don’t care. Most doc reviewers jobs will be eliminated . What do those people do then ?

Maybe, but a court of law cares. TAR would never fly as final doc production. The legal system protects its own.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:As a litigator who pays for a combo of TAR and human review, it's really really hard for me to imagine human review will, in my lifetime, be phased out to the point this question will be a serious concern. I think some sect of clients will always be uncomfortable with exclusive TAR of their potentially privileged documents.

This. TAR is okay for a first line review but you will never be able to just upload docs to a TAR platform and then produce what it spits out. Not even close. Computers don't get nuance.

Clients don’t care. Most doc reviewers jobs will be eliminated . What do those people do then ?

Well, that's one good thing about being a lawyer, providing you are barred somewhere - you can always hang out your shingle.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I work with a lot of doc reviewers and I don't feel like it's that dead end of a job. The good ones do move into other areas.

I agree. People love to rag on them on this site. I know quite a few who have moved jobs. Ones who really know their stuff become e-discovery attorneys who manage the whole process, and they can be really in demand. Not a lot of attorneys want to do it or understand it, but they are absolutely needed. A good one can save you from screwing up discovery in big important cases.

Others move on to become associates, maybe not in Biglaw, but very respectable firms, and from there you move up. I know a former doc reviewer who is a partner at an Amlaw100 (became associate at a small firm, then partner, then firm got acquired by Amlaw 100 firm).

My SIL was not in doc review, but her practice area, skills, and personality helped her when she wanted to move on to not practicing - she's managing what I'd call the digital aspect of practice at her current firm.

If you are in this field/industry, then understanding what TAR/AI/ML is going to output, where its weaknesses lie, and keeping on top of emerging technology could put you in a decent spot - either in a firm or even in-house in some industries I bet.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I work with a lot of doc reviewers and I don't feel like it's that dead end of a job. The good ones do move into other areas.

I agree. People love to rag on them on this site. I know quite a few who have moved jobs. Ones who really know their stuff become e-discovery attorneys who manage the whole process, and they can be really in demand. Not a lot of attorneys want to do it or understand it, but they are absolutely needed. A good one can save you from screwing up discovery in big important cases.

Others move on to become associates, maybe not in Biglaw, but very respectable firms, and from there you move up. I know a former doc reviewer who is a partner at an Amlaw100 (became associate at a small firm, then partner, then firm got acquired by Amlaw 100 firm).

I don't think people are knocking doc review on its on. It's the posters who, in the past, have started threads claiming that they cannot do anything else, need unemployment, state life is hopeless, etc. I remember a few of those from the past few months. I started in doc review when I came to DC. It paid well bc I did bilingual review. It wasn't something that I considered permanent but I worked on multiple projects to save money until I could do something else. Doc review is a job just like any other, and if you're out there earning your pay check good for you! That said, I don't think that the vast majority of doc reviewers plan to be there long term. Those career folks are the slim minority.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:As a litigator who pays for a combo of TAR and human review, it's really really hard for me to imagine human review will, in my lifetime, be phased out to the point this question will be a serious concern. I think some sect of clients will always be uncomfortable with exclusive TAR of their potentially privileged documents.

This. TAR is okay for a first line review but you will never be able to just upload docs to a TAR platform and then produce what it spits out. Not even close. Computers don't get nuance.

Clients don’t care. Most doc reviewers jobs will be eliminated . What do those people do then ?

IDK who your clients are but my clients care. I even had a client who demanded all doc review be done by us or local counsel—no contract reviewers. They didn’t want their docs floating around with random reviewers. No effing way they were gonna rely on TAR.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:As a litigator who pays for a combo of TAR and human review, it's really really hard for me to imagine human review will, in my lifetime, be phased out to the point this question will be a serious concern. I think some sect of clients will always be uncomfortable with exclusive TAR of their potentially privileged documents.

This. TAR is okay for a first line review but you will never be able to just upload docs to a TAR platform and then produce what it spits out. Not even close. Computers don't get nuance.

Clients don’t care. Most doc reviewers jobs will be eliminated . What do those people do then ?

IDK who your clients are but my clients care. I even had a client who demanded all doc review be done by us or local counsel—no contract reviewers. They didn’t want their docs floating around with random reviewers. No effing way they were gonna rely on TAR.

My clients demand second and third level review by actual humans.

[Anonymous]

^^^ meant to add +1 to the above! I agree!

[Anonymous]

Doc review is the leprosy of the legal profession. If you do it over a year you’ll likely never be taken seriously again so you either have to risk starting your own practice and your odds of failing are very high. In fact so bad are the odds they gave to go back to doc review to support themselves . Or they work for the BVA and don’t develop marketable skills there whole trying to not get fired for not making production . Sure did review is important but you are a leper to the profession

[Anonymous]

Agree TAR sucks so it won’t replace humans for a while. But this is not a job that will exist in DC. The last few insured cases I’ve had massive pushback — they want everything done by contract outfits in Florida or Ohio that charge like $20/hour or something ridiculous. And some of these contractors are using people in India or the carribean who get American bar licenses and are fluent English speakers but work for a fraction of the cost.
I’m also wondering if the increasing use of disappearing communications methods like slack will cut down on docs to be reviewed. Email may have already hit its zenith.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Agree TAR sucks so it won’t replace humans for a while. But this is not a job that will exist in DC. The last few insured cases I’ve had massive pushback — they want everything done by contract outfits in Florida or Ohio that charge like $20/hour or something ridiculous. And some of these contractors are using people in India or the carribean who get American bar licenses and are fluent English speakers but work for a fraction of the cost.
I’m also wondering if the increasing use of disappearing communications methods like slack will cut down on docs to be reviewed. Email may have already hit its zenith.

No, it will just change with things like slack. I have had cases where they demanded production of slack messages. The tech issues with producing slack messages were horrible, but it can be done and companies are going to find that they will need to preserve and produce these kinds of messages too.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Agree TAR sucks so it won’t replace humans for a while. But this is not a job that will exist in DC. The last few insured cases I’ve had massive pushback — they want everything done by contract outfits in Florida or Ohio that charge like $20/hour or something ridiculous. And some of these contractors are using people in India or the carribean who get American bar licenses and are fluent English speakers but work for a fraction of the cost.
I’m also wondering if the increasing use of disappearing communications methods like slack will cut down on docs to be reviewed. Email may have already hit its zenith.

No, it will just change with things like slack. I have had cases where they demanded production of slack messages. The tech issues with producing slack messages were horrible, but it can be done and companies are going to find that they will need to preserve and produce these kinds of messages too.

i work in criminal law and criminal defendants often have their phones imaged and prosecution sees absolutely everything including their porn etc. there are of course privilege issues. You do not tend to sew stuff within apps though . If they did communications within an app that isn’t IM the prosecution probably would never find it .

[Anonymous]

Agree with the above that Slack get requested pretty frequently for production now.

TAR is very rarely used at my DC firm. I don’t see it replacing human review 100% for many decades.