ABA Legal Technology Resource Center Helping Lawyers Solve the Technology Puzzle

The Future is Now

This article first appeared in Law Technology News, published at http://www.lawtechnews.com/r5/showkiosk.asp?listing_id=414657

By David Whelan, Director, ABA Legal Technology Resource Center

The legal profession has experienced dramatic change in the past 10 years. In 1993, about 90,000 people used the Internet - less than a tenth of the entire legal profession in 2003. The CIA's world fact book estimates there are over 604 million Internet users around the world now. Many of the technologies available 10 years ago are honed and lawyers are using technologies now that were only just emerging in the late 1990s.

Wireless networks are a good example of the future of legal technology starting to emerge, where large law firms are renovating space, and solo and small practitioners are trying to network in the most effective and flexible manner possible. As lawyers use the ubiquitous networks that are available in their homes, while traveling, and while in the court and office, they will increasingly adopt wireless as a simple, all-purpose complement to the many wired networks available.

Courts are using XML for the exchange of documents with lawyers and to enable electronic filing and information sharing. The increased support of XML by common word processors used by the legal profession, and the development of additional nonproprietary portable document format utilities, is enabling lawyers to engage in a level of electronic interaction with the courts that has been impossible up to now. The profession’s word processor choice has shifted and lawyers have supplemented their document creation with other tools, like spreadsheets and presentation graphics.

Technology has benefited lawyers in all sized firms. It has leveled the playing field, however, for many sole practitioners and small firm lawyers. Lawyers in any firm can now have access to many of the same resources, including education, legal research, and communications, that used to be limited to the largest firms. Online databases and aggressive, transactional pricing enable lawyers to forego intermediaries for research. E-mail and video conferencing extend the reach of lawyers beyond the traditional scope of a law firm practice.

Lawyers share information differently now, and technology has enabled sharing that will continue to transform how lawyers practice. Shared calendars streamlined law firm staffing, online extranets and brief banks allow clients and lawyers to escape from the cycle of useless voicemails. Digital encryption is now providing secure methods of sending asynchronous communications, like e-mails, and to actually work synchronously across encrypted "tunnels", using virtual private networks.

Will we have radio frequency IDs on briefs for filing, ad hoc wireless collaboration in courtrooms, and fully integrated law office systems in all law firms in 10 years? There’s no way to know but surely the next ten years will offer as dramatic changes as the last.

David Whelan is director of the Legal Technology Resource Center for the American Bar Association.