ABA Journal: Legal Rebels

The ABA Journal Legal Rebels Podcast features men and women who are remaking the legal profession and highlights the pioneers who are changing the way law is practiced and setting the standards that will guide the profession in the future.

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51
Reinventing the staid field of legal academic w...
Legal academic publishing isn't synonymous with innovation. The mere mention of it can, for some, bring up repressed memories of the most banal and stuffy aspects of law school. But the Massachusetts Institute of Technology wants to change that. In...
27 min
52
How one lawyer built a practice by defending a ...
Leaving BigLaw to start his own firm in 2011, Tor Ekeland quickly learned that his legal education was insufficient for the task at hand. To Ekeland, the edited cases law students spend three years reading don’t help graduates prepare for practice,...
31 min
53
Diversity in the legal tech community
The year 2017 was hailed as the "Year of Women in Legal Tech" based on a few high-profile acquisitions and hires. Kristen Sonday, the co-founder of Paladin, a pro bono management platform, however, took a look around and noticed that there were few...
31 min
54
Criminal justice experts hope tech can more eas...
In the United States, an estimated 70 million people have a criminal record. Being tagged with this scarlet letter can affect a person’s ability to find employment, housing and even potential relationships. Meanwhile, the expansion of freedom of...
29 min
55
Exploring new frontiers in research for the leg...
In the latest episode of the Legal Rebels Podcast, ABA Journal Legal Affairs Writer Jason Tashea talks to legal tech blogger Bob Ambrogi and Andrew Arruda, CEO of artificial intelligence company Ross Intelligence, about what new...
34 min
56
How experiential learning became the norm
Ten years ago, Rodney Smolla was featured as a Legal Rebel for leading an innovative plan at Washington and Lee University School of Law to eliminate traditional third-year coursework and replace it with experiential learning. Many law schools opened...
17 min
57
What's your brand? Max Miller has some thoughts
It's good to be seen as a "thought leader," but don't call yourself that in marketing materials, says lawyer, professor and small business owner Max Miller. "It should be evident," Miller told the ABA Journal's Stephanie Francis Ward in this episode...
26 min
58
Avvo founder Mark Britton unwinds as he thinks ...
Mark Britton, who founded and sold the online attorney ratings site Avvo, is taking a break. This helps with creativity but does cause him some discomfort. After his years of making money from attorneys on his site, he has some business development...
28 min
59
David Van Zandt has made a career out of touchi...
When David Van Zandt became dean of what is now Northwestern University's Pritzker School of Law in 1995, he faced a steep learning curve, he tells the ABA Journal's Jason Tashea. But he had a good sense of the demands on recent graduates and lawyers....
27 min
60
Nonprofit law pioneer applauds 'low bono' growth
Before they were buzzwords, Luz Herrera was a pioneer in the world of "low bono" practice, nonprofit law firms and legal incubators. In this episode of the ABA Journal's Legal Rebels Podcast, Herrera speaks with Angela Morris about how a low-bono...
18 min
61
Jeff Carr continues his fight against billable ...
Jeff Carr has been on a 40-year path of improving lawyer efficiency and effectiveness. "There's an old saying that if you pay for service by the hour, you buy hours and not service," he says. "And I still believe that very much." In this episode of...
31 min
62
Leading advocate for diversity in legal industr...
In the 10 years since Emery K. Harlan, co-founder of the National Association of Minority & Women Owned Law Firms, was featured as an ABA Journal Legal Rebel, he says little has changed for diversity in the profession. "I think it's stayed about...
22 min
63
Beating the drum for change
When Ralph Baxter joined the inaugural class of Legal Rebels in 2009, he was the CEO and chairman of Orrick Herrington & Sutcliffe. Just a year into the biggest recession since the Great Depression, he caught the ABA Journal’s attention through...
29 min
64
Young lawyers can be technophobes too
Many lawyers are reluctant to new adopt legal technology, says Monica Goyal, who developed platforms including My Legal Briefcase, which helps parties in the Canadian small claims courts, and Aluvion Law, which uses automation to cut legal services...
18 min
65
Make room for chatbots at your firm, LawDroid f...
Chatbots have a place in a law office because they can handle busy work that eats up precious time in a lawyer’s day, says LawDroid founder Tom Martin in this episode of the ABA Journal’s Legal Rebels Podcast. By wiping out such mundane tasks, it...
17 min
66
Could 80 percent of cases be resolved through o...
Perhaps in five to seven years, as Colin Rule sees it, half of U.S. citizens who file court cases will have access to online dispute resolution software walking them step by step through their matters, resolving up to 80 percent of cases. Rule, a...
23 min
67
Legal writing pro is helping teach AI to draft ...
Ken Adams has brought his contract expertise to LegalSifter, a Pittsburgh artificial intelligence startup. The 2009 Legal Rebel and author of “A Manual of Style for Contract Drafting” sat down to discuss his new venture with the ABA Journal’s...
17 min
68
Legal services innovator moves on to app develo...
It’s too easy for attorneys to be aware that something isn’t perfect in their practices and accept the situation instead of pushing back. So says longtime legal innovator Nicole Bradick. “What it’s all about is identifying something not...
10 min
69
Entrepreneur Amy Porter’s theme is finding what...
When Amy Porter founded the online payment platform AffiniPay, she drew on her experience as a college athlete—cheerleading while majoring in merchandising at the University of Texas at Austin—which led to work as a sales representative with...
14 min
70
Tech is not the only answer to legal aid issues...
Since the late 1990s, Joyce Raby has spent a career bringing technology to legal aid. While a booster and believer in technology’s potential to improve America’s legal system, her experience is tempering. “We’ve been saying for a very long...
32 min
71
From paper to digital documents, Judge Andrew P...
As electronic data became more prevalent in the 1990s, Judge Andrew Peck, an ABA Journal Legal Rebels Trailblazer, wrote a line that would be quoted by judges and lawyers for generations to come. “It is black-letter law that computerized data is...
20 min
72
Outgoing Adobe GC witnessed changes that digiti...
Mike Dillon has seen a lot change over his career as general counsel to some of the nation’s largest technology companies. Working for Silver Spring Networks, Sun Microsystems and, most recently, Adobe Systems, he witnessed firsthand how...
23 min
73
Longtime legal tech leader Richard Granat finds...
Richard Granat–the creator of MyLawyer.com, SmartLegalForms and the People’s Law Library of Maryland–has joined Intraspexion, a new artificial-intelligence software company, as a strategic adviser. At 75, Richard Granat does not fit the...
23 min
74
Mary Juetten hopes legal software can help impr...
What will be a big legal trend for 2018? Mary E. Juetten is putting her hopes on legal technology improving access-to-justice problems.
6 min
75
Robert Litt has been out front on online threat...
Robert Litt has confronted cybersecurity and encryption issues for two presidential administrations. With Russian interference in the 2016 election as a backdrop, Litt, an ABA Journal Legal Rebels Trailblazer, says the U.S. has been facing online...
29 min