missing puzzle piece

On October 30 and 31, 2017 a groundbreaking gathering of technologists, economists, design thinkers, lawyers, regulators, engineers and clients convened at Massachusetts Institute of Technology's (MIT) inaugural MITLegalForum. Subtitled Refactoring Law and Legal Processes for the Digital Age, the event was organized and hosted by Dazza Greenwood, Michael Casey, Sandy Pentland and the MIT Media Lab. Adding to the uniqueness of this event is the fact that no law school exists at MIT.

The dialog was one in a series of critical multi-disciplinary conversations being held in order for the power of artificial intelligence, distributed ledgers, “smart contracts,” interoperability and similar emerging technologies to be realized as fully and beneficially as possible. Those in attendance recognized a fundamental concern which must be addressed: Law is a foundational barrier to the potential these new technologies provide for the advancement of commerce, society and personal rights.

“What about liability?” is the conversation stopper when the potential applications of these powerful technologies are explored and developed. Legal professionals must be engaged in these technologies as they mature from concept to implementation. Until lawyers are equally invested in defining the permissible and desirable boundaries of technology applications, advancing the agenda of human progress will be stalled unnecessarily.

The development of technologies like AI, blockchain, interoperability and many others are racing forward and will not be restrained. However, without the involvement of lawyers, these technology advances may miss the mark of their intended benefits, create unanticipated liabilities and fail to serve the public interest adequately.

Shawnna Hoffman, IBM Watson Legal co-founder and global leader, stated it well in her opening remarks when she appealed to the many areas of expertise needed to bring legal technology together for the best outcomes. She said, “This will require breaking down the silos of our various disciplines.”

Over the two days of the MITLegalForum, the specifics of why and how these disciplines must learn to collaborate became increasingly apparent. For example, as technology races to create a single digital identity for international travelers, how do issues of jurisdiction, authenticity, transparency, security and personal data ownership intersect? No single discipline can answer these questions, but must act in close collaboration with others to resolve this “wicked” issue. Lawyers have been largely absent from the conversation.

Other equally penetrating subjects include the ethics of AI in legal analysis and prediction, how blockchain technologies will impact the nature of work and workplaces, the scope and scale of data driven rule making, ownership of personal data, “do it yourself” smart contracts, law firm integration with its data and technologies, and innumerable others only possible through new technologies.

A stimulating dialog was facilitated by Christophe Pereira, VP and chief corporate counsel at GE Compliance, about how computational law might create predictive models of possible outcomes for planning and implementation of legal compliance strategies. Like hurricane modeling, legal compliance computation could predict probabilities which could approach certainty over time.

Can law become agile and responsive to changing circumstances in real time? Is law's only value to create a static form of permanent guidance for society and commerce?

Clearly, these multi-faceted concerns require significant work on the part of many experts knowledgeable in various subjects of human intelligence and professional service. Until we learn to work across our silos, big hairy problems will remain impenetrable and unresolved.

The inaugural MITLegalForum provided a platform and demonstrated how this vital collaboration must take place. Kudos to those who organized, hosted and participated in this benchmark event. The event, like legal services, was fluid and responsive to the needs of those who participated (both on site and online).

The collective work product of the event was not static, but creative and ongoing. Less talking and more doing was the goal of the exercise. For example, the following collaborative websites capture the work done at the event and the future opportunities which were generated by it. ComputationalLaw, MITLegalForum and its GitHUB repository of documents, papers and presentations, collect the exchanges and recommendations which resulted from the keynote presentations, panels and break out work sessions.

Additionally, new initiatives were created, such as one to promote women's participation in AI and blockchain legal applications. Likewise, how the 80 percent population of unserved and underserved legal clients can be provided appropriate legal services will be a product of lawyers working with technologists, design thinkers and other disciplines. As these initiatives develop, the MITLegalForum will provide additional information to promote the diverse and multi-disciplinary environment in which this important work will continue.

Importantly, the work in robust multi-disciplinary collaboration did not end at MIT on Halloween 2017. Stanford Law School's CodeX program on law and informatics will follow up in January 2018 with an event focused on blockchain applications in law.

Likewise, Vanderbilt Law School's Program on Law and Innovation will host an interactive conference on April 30, 2018 in Nashville. Intentionally programming a dialog between legal educators, practicing lawyers and legal tech developers, the Summit on Law and Innovation will seek to continue this essential work in which solutions for social and economic problems can be addressed best.

It is long past time for the legal community to bring its expertise to the table of collaboration with all the other engineers of human progress. Until we do, the outcomes will be less than satisfactory.

Larry Bridgesmith is an Adjunct Professor and the Program on Law & Innovation Coordinator at Vanderbilt Law School.