deLevie on Legal Technology and Legal Hacking

An interview with software developer and law student Alan deLevie of American University has been posted at LawLytics : Attorneys, Learn To Code (Part II): Interview With A ‘Legal Hacker’ .

Here are excerpts from the interview:

[...] We ended Computer Science Education Week with a conversation with coder-turned-law student Alan deLevie .

[...] As a “Legal Hacker,” deLevie strives to use technology to improve the law, and vice versa.

LawLytics: What do you see as the most important emerging legal tech?

deLevie: [...] anything that adds structure to unstructured text is huge. One example of that is citation extraction, which I think will help form the basis of a lot of intelligent legal systems. Right now, as a law student I can use coding skills to study smarter. I’m building a tool where I can upload my outline with a bunch of case names, and it will returns links to those case names with auto-generated summaries. [...]

What are Legal Hackers?

I co-organize a group called DC Legal Hackers (@DCLegalHackers). The other organizers, Jameson Dempsey and Rebecca Williams , were involved in the New York legal hacking scene at the Brooklyn Law Incubator & Policy Clinic, which is where it all originated. In addition to DC and New York, there are legal hacking groups all over the country.

We like to define a legal hacker as anyone who cares about using technology to improve the law, and vice versa. In this sense, a hacker isn’t someone who gains unauthorized access to anything. It’s a positive mindset where you’re always trying to modify and re-purpose existing systems to your advantage. [...]

What else can learning to code teach attorneys?

Coders are very conscious of how they build and how they work. [...] This focus on process would serve the legal space well. For example, if coders had to pass around a Word doc with Track Changes through attachments [...], they’d [...] propose a move to Dropbox or [...] GitHub or something like that. [...]

For more details, please see the complete interview.

HT @LawLytics

Filed under: Hacking, Interviews, Technology developments, Technology tools Tagged: Alan deLevie, Automating legal course outlines, Automating legal outlines, DC Legal Hackers, Law practice technology, LawLytics, Legal citation extraction, Legal educational technology, Legal hackers, Legal hacking, Legal hacking movement, Legal instructional technology, Legal technology instruction, Legal text processing, Teaching technology in law schools



via Legal Informatics Blog http://legalinformatics.wordpress.com/2013/12/21/delevie-on-legal-technology-and-legal-hacking/

Abstracts of legal informatics papers accepted for ECEG 2014

Abstracts of at least four legal informatics papers are among the list of those accepted for ECEG 2014: European Conference on eGovernment , to be held 12-13 June 2014 in Brasov, Romania:

• The Use of Social Networks to Enhance E-Participation in the Policy Making in Arab Spring Countries


• The Legislature and Citizens Representation – Imperative of e-parliament for African Democratic States


• E-legislation for Citizens – Open Access to Online Legal Information


• Building the Rule of Law in the Virtual Agora

For reasons that aren’t clear, the names of the authors of each abstract have not been disclosed. Instead, all of the authors’ names are listed alphabetically below the complete list of titles of abstracts, such that one can’t identify the authors of each abstract.

If you are the author or co-author of an abstract on a legal informatics topic that has been accepted for ECEG 2014, please notify us in the comments so that we can properly attribute the title of your abstract.

Filed under: Abstracts, Applications, Articles and papers, Conference papers, Conference resources, Policy debates, Policy Materials, Technology developments Tagged: Citizens' participation in policy making, ECEG, ECEG 2014, eparliament, eparliament systems, eparticipation, eparticipation systems, European Conference on eGovernment, Free access to law, Legal informatics conferences, Legislative information systems, Online legislative systems, Open legal data, Public access to legal information, Virtual Agora



via Legal Informatics Blog https://legalinformatics.wordpress.com/2013/12/21/abstracts-of-legal-informatics-papers-accepted-for-eceg-2014/

Phiri: Zimbabwe Legal Information Institute (ZimLII) and Free Access to Law

Josiline Phiri, M.S.L.I.S., of the University of Zimbabwe has published Opportunities and challenges to free access to law in a changing world: a case of Zimbabwe Legal Information Institute (ZimLII) , Journal of Open Access to Law , 1(1) (2013).

Here is the abstract:

The wave of free access to law movement hit Zimbabwe leading to the establishment of the Zimbabwe Legal Information Institute (ZimLII). This was started with the help of African Legal Information Institute (AfricanLII) which sourced funds to kick start the project and then held training workshops to equip the people who will be working with the administrator. There is a steering committee which comprises of academics, lawyers, publishers, information technologists and librarians from various organisations. This board is chaired by the Director of Legal Resources Foundation. This led to the creation of a website and content has been uploaded to populate the site. The website is up and running and an administrator was employed to oversee the day to day running of the website and its maintenance. This paper is an account of the opportunities and challenges that have been faced by the institute. The major challenge was the issue of sustainability in terms of non-availability of funds to continuously support the project. The ZimLII project can be regarded as one of the successful initiatives towards the availability of legal information to the general public since there are plans to make it a one-stop shop for those looking for such information.

Filed under: Articles and papers, Technology developments Tagged: African Legal Information Institute, AfricanLII, Free access to law, JOAL, Josiline Phiri, Journal of Open Access to Law, Public access to legal information, Sustainability of free access to law projects, Sustainability of legal information institutes, Zimbabwe Legal Information Institute, ZimLII



via Legal Informatics Blog http://legalinformatics.wordpress.com/2013/12/21/phiri-zimbabwe-legal-information-institute-zimlii-and-free-access-to-law/

Mangiafico wins first Law Library of Congress legislative data challenge: Markup of U.S. Legislation in Akoma Ntoso

Jim Mangiafico has won the first Law Library of Congress legislative data challenge, Markup of US Legislation in Akoma Ntoso , according to a new post by Tina Gheen.

Mangiafico’s submission is entitled Four U.S. Legislative Documents in Akoma Ntoso .

Tina Gheen writes: “The judges were particularly impressed by the complexity of his application of the metadata section of Akoma Ntoso to the bill text and the submission’s cascading style sheet.”

Here is a summary of the competition from the challenge Website:

The Library of Congress is sponsoring a set of legislative data challenges to advance the development of international data exchange standards for legislative data. These challenges are an initiative to encourage broad participation in the development and application of legislative data standards and to engage new communities in the use of legislative data. Goals of this initiative include:

• Enabling wider accessibility and more efficient exchange of the legislative data of the United States Congress,


• Encouraging the development of open standards that facilitate better integration, analysis, and interpretation of legislative data,


• Fostering the use of open source licensing for implementing legislative data standard.

The Markup of US Legislation in Akoma Ntoso Challenge invites competitors to create representations of selected US bills using the most recent Akoma Ntoso standard. This work will help identify gaps in the Akoma Ntoso framework or US bill text where data cannot be incorporated properly within the existing standard, and propose new domain specific metadata elements or possibly other solutions to overcome these challenges. [...]

The judges of the competition were Kirsten Gullickson of the Office of the Clerk, U.S. House of Representatives; and Professor Dr. Monica Palmirani and Professor Dr. Fabio Vitali , both of the University of Bologna and both co-developers of Akoma Ntoso .

Click here for links to all of the other submissions.

For more details, please see the complete post.

HT @konklone

Filed under: Uncategorized Tagged: AKOMA NTOSO, Fabio Vitali, In Custodia Legis, Jim Mangiafico, Kirsten Gullickson, Law Library of Congress, Legal data standards, Legal informatics competitions, Legal information standards, Legal metadata, Legal metadata standards, Legal structural metadata, Legal XML, Legislative data challenge, Legislative data challenges, Legislative data standards, Legislative information systems, Legislative metadata, Legislative metadata standards, Legislative structural metadata, Library of Congress, Library of Congress legislative data challenge, Library of Congress legislative data challenges, Markup of US Legislation in Akoma Ntoso, Markup of US Legislation in Akoma Ntoso Challenge, Monica Palmirani, Open legislative data standards, Tina Gheen, U.S. congressional bills



via Legal Informatics Blog http://legalinformatics.wordpress.com/2013/12/21/mangiafico-wins-first-law-library-of-congress-legislative-data-challenge-markup-of-u-s-legislation-in-akoma-ntoso/

Attorney Suspended for Lack of Office, And How Not to Be Like Him

Last week, the Supreme Court of Delaware suspended an attorney from practicing law within the state for a two-year period for, among other things, not having a "bona fide office." What? Yep, at FindLaw we do a fine job of...



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via Strategist http://blogs.findlaw.com/strategist/2013/12/attorney-suspended-for-lack-of-office-and-how-not-to-be-like-him.html

Duan: The Impact of the Internet on the Openness of the Justice System in China

Zhuozhen Duan, LL.M., of the University of Hull has published The rise of the internet and its impact on the openness of the justice system in mainland China: improvements and limitations , Journal of Open Access to Law , 1(1) (2013).

Here is the abstract:

The justice system of mainland China is characterised by secrecy to some extent, although it has been gradually reduced. The widespread availability and usage of the internet has brought a dramatic information flow in mainland China, which could be an opportunity for better access to law and the justice system and increased openness. However, the picture is rather mixed, which will be discussed this paper. Any information which might diminish public confidence on the justice system is still likely to be censored by various means, and public access to information on sensitive cases is still strictly controlled, although the difficulty of doing so is increased by the internet. Therefore, this paper concludes that the rise of the internet cannot definitely lead to more openness of and better access to the justice system without a reform of the system itself.

Filed under: Articles and papers, Case studies, Policy debates, Research findings, Technology developments Tagged: Court transparency, Court transparency in China, Influence of technology on judicial transparency, Influence of technology on public attitudes towards courts, Influence of technology on public attitudes towards the judiciary, Influence of the Internet on court transparency, Influence of the Internet on judicial transparency, Influence of the Internet on public attitudes towards courts, Influence of the Internet on public attitudes towards the judiciary, JOAL, Journal of Open Access to Law, Judicial transparency, Judicial transparency in China, Public access to court information, Public access to court information in China, Public access to judicial information, Public access to judicial information in China, Public access to legal information, Public access to legal information in China, Public attitudes towards courts, Public attitudes towards judiciary, Zhuozhen Duan



via Legal Informatics Blog http://legalinformatics.wordpress.com/2013/12/20/duan-the-impact-of-the-internet-on-the-openness-of-the-justice-system-in-china/

5 Kinds of Clients Your Firm Will Want in the New Year

Growing or even maintaining your law firm's business requires clients. And as you know, keeping the pipeline full is an ongoing challenge. Plus, you have to make sure that you get the right clients. You know which clients to avoid....



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via Strategist http://blogs.findlaw.com/strategist/2013/12/5-kinds-of-clients-your-firm-will-want-in-the-new-year.html