Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:People may want to reconsider law school in general...especially if you are a college freshman or HS senior today.
From an article on how Generative AI will transform law:
This first wave we are already beginning to see now, with widespread AI adoption and experimentation occurring in corporate legal departments and law firms of all sizes. Over the next one-to-three years, the legal industry will increasingly gain access to trusted Gen AI tools from both large technology companies and legal technology providers, letting legal departments and law firms move from pure experimentation to putting AI plans into action. Especially at the beginning, this work will be focused on back-office functions and support staff. Law firms and their clients will begin considering how they can optimize their labor costs, reducing numbers of new associate hires and non-fee-earning staff.
The focus on non-billable work will not last for long, however, particularly as Gen AI technology advances to perform more complex tasks. Looking three-to-five years out, we begin to see changes to the legal business model emerge. AI will allow legal work to be done more efficiently, and corporate legal departments will put increasing pressure on law firms and outside providers to deliver work faster. As less time is spent on legal tasks, the billable hour will no longer be the most cost-effective way to capture value, prompting firms to reimagine their billing models to better share in efficiency savings and capture the value that’s added through advanced technology.
In response, large law firms will seek to capture more revenue by deploying staff, including juniors, to higher value work. They may also use their new law or internal innovations teams to standardize repeatable work that might otherwise be unprofitable. Meanwhile, small- and midsize law firms will be able to use Gen AI to grow their practice without needing to hire more staff. Regardless of size, however, the point is that change is a must: The law firms that don’t adapt will not be able to keep up with the efficiencies gained by their peers.
Finally, extending the time horizon out five-to-ten years leads to greater automation of legal services — and, in some cases, partial or full disintermediation of the legal professional through AI. With Gen AI technology capable of tackling even more complex tasks, AI will be a primary driver of day-to-day legal tasks, with legal practitioners acting as supervisors and strategists. The result is a complete overhaul of not only how legal services are completed and billed, but also the mix of players in the legal arena that are most needed.
This may be true but at the end of the day, AI cannot analyze and synthesize information the way a lawyer can. It is just looking at things depending on what you feed into it.
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