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For the past few decades, the traditional law library has been transformed by the digitization of statutes, regulations, and commentary. Law Librarians and KM professionals have become the curators of an ever-expanding universe of commercial, dynamic data sources including company profiles, competitor profiles, experience data, insights into judges, experts, and arbitrators, deal data, dockets, and…

 Today Thomson Reuters announced the launch of HighQ Contract Analysis. The produce speeds contract review and analysis with machine learning technology. to answer the specific questions legal professionals want to address – in an easy-to-read report.

According to the press release, HighQ Contract Analysis  leverages machine learning and pre-trained models “to help attorneys increase efficiency, reduce risk, and accelerate the contract-review process for transaction due …
Continue Reading Thomson Reuters Launches AI-Powered HighQ Contract Analysis

In a prior post  I reported  survey results on products to be purchased in 2020 and 2021… which included a fairly broad spectrum of products. Major vendors Lexis, Westlaw, Bloomberg and Wolters Kluwer were evenly represented at the top of the list. There were dozens of additional products identified by one or two responders. Today I am reporting on responses to the survey results on cancellations which presents a dramatic contrast. One product stood alone  as the most likely to be cancelled. That product is Lex

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Continue Reading The Dewey B Strategic 2020-21 Hits and Misses Survey – The Product Most Likely to be Cancelled is — Lex Machina

The 2020-2021 Dewey B Strategic Hits and Misses survey asked responders to identify products purchased in 2020 or to be purchased in 2021. Despite the financial concerns triggered by the pandemic, law firm librarians continued to consider new products. Some new products such as Westlaw Edge and Lexis + are often driven by an impeding contract renewal. Other product selections are  driven by  practice demands as well as a desire to remain competitive by introducing innovative solutions and enhance productivity.

The Top Products Four was the magic number this year. Each of the top vote getters were identified by 4 responders as new purchases. …
Continue Reading The Dewey B Strategic 2020-21 Hits and Misses Survey: What Research, KM/Workflow and Analytics Products are Readers Buying?

Respond to the  2020-21 What’s Hot and What’s Not Survey here. Although the world was shut down by the pandemic, our friends in legal tech continued their pursuit of innovation and market share.  Most of us had a sense of whiplash and disbelief when the world came to a virtual halt in March 2020. Law librarians who had built digital libraries over the years offered their attorneys a fairly seamless transition to their work from home desktop. Within weeks most legal publishers had developed a special COVID offering. These ranged from free alerts, to primary sources and workflow toolkits. Despite all of these efforts law librarians and knowledge managers faced a gap in COVID coverage. Almost overnight a “gray literature” emerged which major legal publishers were not …
Continue Reading What’s Hot and What’s Not? Welcome to the Dewey B Strategic 2020-2021 Hits and Misses Survey

Today LexisNexis is announcing the launch of Lexis+ Litigation Analytics. Litigation Analytics does two things. It integrates analytics into the research and practical guidance  workflow.  Lexis+  now offers “enhanced analytics” from Lex Machina as well as state level analytics derived from CourtLink for the states that Lex Machina does not currently cover.
Karl Harris, C.E.O. of Lex Machina a offered me a demonstration of Lexis + Litigation Analytics.. Harris placed analytics within the context of the new workflow which was introduced with Lexis+.  Lexis+ includes a persistent navigation bar which today adds litigation analytics to the 3 original  pillars of,  Lexis + : workflow: research, practical guidance and brief analysis. The Lexis + home page  is designed around an inviting query “What would you like to research today”  hovering over a large search box.  Analytics are still fairly new to the average  lawyer’s toolkit and I think it is wise to remind lawyers about analytics throughout Lexis+ workflow experience..
Harris explained that the core goals of the Lexis+ enhancement was based on customer feedback which highlighted the importance of   accuracy confidence and efficiency in analytics products. In addition they wanted to  deliver an integrated product experience in what Lexis refers to as the Lexis+ ecosystem.

 Lexis+ Litigation Analytics offers the following types of insights:

  • Judge and court analytics: Contextualize understanding of federal district and state courts and judges.
  • Courts & Judges Comparator Quick Tool: Compare judge behavior and courtroom trends over time in federal district court.
  • Attorney and law firm analytics: Assess the experience of attorneys and law firms in federal district and state courts.
  • Counsel Comparator Quick Tool: Compare law firm and attorney performance based on actual results in federal district court.

Bifurcated Data: Enhanced Analytics and “everything else”

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Continue Reading Lexis Adds Lex Machina and CourtLink Analytics to the Lexis+ Ecosystem

Legal publishers Casemaker and Fastcase are announcing a merger of their two companies. According to the press release ” The two companies will combine their teams and technologies to innovate research, analytics, and workflow offerings that empower lawyers with powerful digital solutions for their clients.”

I spoke with Ed Walters CEO of Fastcase yesterday. He…

Today American Lawyer Media and LexisNexis announced the extension of their strategic alliance with a new content agreement. According to the press release, the agreement “lays the groundwork for expanding the integration of ALM content within LexisNexis legal research solutions.”

LexisNexis and ALM,  have an an exclusive agreement since 2011,  which made ALM’s iconic content including The American Lawyer, Corporate Counsel, The National Law Journal, Legaltech News, New York Law Journal and other specialty publications available through the Lexis+ and Lexis® legal research solutions and Nexis® Newsdesk. This extension ensures that current news from ALM will continue to be available to LexisNexis customers.

Breaking News: I also received an exclusive statement from Richard Caruso, General Manager, Global Legal News, ALM, stating that “Lexis no longer has an exclusive to our content archive, allowing us to open up licensing opportunities with other Legal research providers;  we are planning on announcing a new agreement very soon.”

What this means for Lexis and ALM subscribers:

  • Subscribers can now have a license with ALM that is not tied to their LexisNexis contract.
  • ALM will be handling their own sales and not relying on LexisNexis sale reps to manage their customer relationships.
  • ALM will soon be announcing that ALM content will be available though a second Legal research platform.

Market Impact This will offer some relief ALM 100 law firms who are  are rebelling against LexisNexis’ increasingly aggressive tying …
Continue Reading Breaking News: ALM Ends Exclusive Relationship with LexisNexis While Extending LexisNexis Alliance

We all knew that law libraries were shrinking. No one suspected that they would be totally “done in” by a virus. Law libraries have been “going digital” for at least 20 years, but few firms tossed out their last “pocket part” update. But as firms plan their post-pandemic re-openings, retaining a collection of shared books is frankly a biohazard. Should librarians develop systems for sanitizing and quarantining books? In today’s digital world -– is it even worth the trouble? 

Does anyone really want to take on the backlog of updating books that are nine months out of date next January when lawyers begin returning to offices?

For the past two decades, many law librarians have been assessing products and developing in-house solutions to support virtual library resources.  

There is no universal solution. The law firms which have the foresight to invest in strategic information professionals are most likely  to have had substantial digital libraries in place last March when COVID-19 brought the world to a screeching halt. Many firms are running parallel digital and print libraries because they are supporting both the last of the “baby boomer partners” and the “born digital” generation of lawyers. COVID-19 has been an unprecedented tipping point which exposes the importance of completing or starting a digital library transition plan.  

  12 Building Blocks Of A Digital Library  

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Continue Reading 12 Tips For Building Your Digital Law Library In The Age Of COVID-19