Many legal professionals subscribe to current awareness materials to stay informed of news and updates in their practice areas and improve their delivery of legal services. These good intentions, however, may clutter desks and offices and fill the trunks of cars waiting to be read. Although there are numerous current awareness materials, there is limited time to review them.

Attorney Kevin Mitchell, founder and CEO of ModioLegal, knows that keeping up with the law is a valuable activity but it comes at a high opportunity cost if it takes away from the billable hour or perhaps other hours spent on the business of law or developing and maintaining client relationships. ModioLegal reduces the opportunity cost of reviewing current awareness materials by making that same content available in a human-narrated audio format that can be accessed from a smartphone while the listener is engaged in other activities that may beg for distraction, such as exercising or commuting.

ModioLegal is a website with an integrated jPlayer to play back current awareness materials to legal professionals. The website is designed to “combine the best attributes of print with the convenience of audio,” said Mitchell. The audio format has the same content as print, word-for-word narrations, with the same article specific topic selectivity you expect from the table of contents to a brief or book. See Figure 1.