We all need to collectively move on in our thinking to get alternative fee arrangements working in the right way.

— Sunny Mann, global chair of Baker McKenzie, in comments given during a recent appearance on Bloomberg Law’s On The Merits podcast, concerning the future of the billable hour, and the way billing may change thanks to the rise of AI.

Staci Zaretsky is the managing editor of Above the Law, where she’s worked since 2011. She’d love to hear from you, so please feel free to email her with any tips, questions, comments, or critiques. You can follow her on Bluesky, X/Twitter, and Threads, or connect with her on LinkedIn.

The post Biglaw May Want To Break Up With The Billable Hour Thanks To AI appeared first on Above the Law.

Perhaps the fact that the conference has been around for 119 years had something to do with this. The first AALL conference took place, by my estimation, in 1907. One can only imagine what law offices and law schools were like and what law librarians did back then.

To say these folks have seen a lot over the past 119 years would be an understatement. Information and knowledge management, which is what law librarians do (along with a lot of lawyer hand holding, by the way), have undergone monumental changes since then. Lawyers in 1907 still had to read cases, but how the law librarians got those cases to them bears no resemblance to today.

A Different Kind of Keynote

That breadth of understanding and experience perhaps led AALL to offer a somewhat more philosophical and nuanced keynote. It was given not by a celebrity who had no connection with law. A celebrity sitting in a white chair being interviewed by the head of the organization or a C-suite person whose company sponsored the keynote. You know the type of keynote. One designed to make a splash and entertain more than impart knowledge.

No, the AALL opening keynote was designed to get the audience to think about what they do and the challenges the legal profession faces. It was given by Micah Smith, a U.S. District Judge in Hawaii. Judge Smith grew up in public housing. He managed to work his way to Harvard. He clerked for Justice Souter. He worked in legal aid. He served as a U.S. Attorney. All before becoming a federal court judge. This guy didn’t get where he is by being a glad hander or self-aggrandizer. And he gave as well-prepared a keynote as I have ever heard, and I’ve heard a lot.

Aloha Leadership

The title of his keynote was “How Connection Creates Leadership–Power, People and Purpose.” OK, walking in I wondered whether this was going to be one of those touchy-feely talks that were more for the presenter to hear themselves talk than for the audience. Or it was going to be one of those where each table was assigned some cute little games to play? (I already had my escape plan if so.)

Instead, Judge Smith’s talk went to the heart of real power and influence. His view was that real power and influence were not taken or bestowed; they are earned. They are earned because people truly follow a leader they know cares about them. Leaders who wield their power not out of self-interest but out of an interest in others. Judge Smith called this Aloha leadership stemming from the Hawaiian word which means hello, goodbye, and love, all at the same time.

In keeping with this, Judge Smith didn’t just get up and tell war stories. He came prepared with ideas and the study of what he views as effective leadership. He had clearly done his homework. And it was clear that he did so because he cared about his audience and wanted to leave a lasting impact, not just collect a paycheck because of who he was.

A Simple Example

He opened with an example: in every group of people who travel together, there is always one person who takes charge of the arrangements and makes the recommendations that others listen to. Why? It’s because the group trusts that person and knows from experience they will make choices that are in the interests of most of the group.

And that relationship, said Judge Smith, creates the kind of power that facilitates impact. But it doesn’t come without its challenges, particularly for legal, where it’s all about getting ahead, snaring that corner office, and dominance.

The Challenge of Legal with Aloha

He talked about these challenges. He mentioned the paradox that as leaders obtain power, they often forget how they got there. They begin to exercise power out of self-interest, entitlement, status, and overconfidence. He believes this is a particular issue for judges who have the obligation to uphold the rule of law and maintain order in the courtroom. As a result, they often fall subject to what Judge Smith called “robe-itis.” I call it robe fever, same thing.

I have seen it particularly among federal judges (sorry, Judge Smith) who are appointed for life. They become short-tempered and mean-spirited toward those who appear before them. They place wicked deadlines and requirements on people because they can, and it serves their docket and schedule.

And we are starting to now see it among judges who are quick to sanction lawyers who fall victim to the AI hallucinations without considering things like the magnitude of the harm a particular hallucination brings. Or the pressures lawyers are under from all sides.

These judges forget that the court system is not there to serve them but to serve the public to resolve disputes. They forget, as Judge Smith put it, that every decision they make affects and changes someone, perhaps forever.

Judge Smith also admitted that serving with what he called an Aloha philosophy is harder on some professions than others. Litigators, for example, are fueled and rewarded by winning. It’s the old notion that winning isn’t everything, it’s the only thing.

Lord knows I have seen enough of these. You know the type: they object to everything. They file motion after motion on matters that make little difference. They play games. They file lengthy motions on Friday afternoon right before a holiday. I even had one toward the end of my career who not only filed a motion on Christmas Eve, but he also served it via fax only, knowing that would delay my seeing it.

But It Can Be Done

On the other hand, I have seen the opposite. Judges who understood their role and place in the world. Who cared about people and the lawyers and litigants who appeared before them. I never had the opportunity to appear before Justice Souter but I trust Judge Smith when he says he was one of those judges. And I would relish the opportunity to appear before Judge Smith because I could tell from his preparation and manner, he is one of those judges as well.

And some of the most successful trial lawyers I know tried and litigated their cases with humility and empathy instead of being assholes. I’m a member of an invitation-only group of excellent trial lawyers who are just like that.

I know from experience it is possible to succeed in the courtroom this way. Why? Because these lawyers command the kind of power Judge Smith talked about. People listen to them because they trust them, just like they trust the leader of the travel group Judge Smith talked about.

A2J and GenAI

Of course, Judge Smith didn’t leave the podium without talking about two critical issues facing the legal profession: access to justice (A2J) and GenAI. And his ideas, based upon leading with Aloha, were not only insightful but practical.

Judge Smith recognized that we can’t solve the A2J problem by throwing more lawyers at it, which many believe. He recognized that the hourly rates needed to make a dent in the A2J problem are too high for those who don’t have access.  And just as realistically, lawyers can’t afford to charge the rates that those needing access can pay. The economics don’t work out.

Instead, said Judge Smith, we have to think more broadly about the problem and the humans on both sides of it.

And when it comes to GenAI, Judge Smith didn’t start by complaining about lazy lawyers not checking cites like many. Instead, he talked empathetically about the need to assess the appropriate uses of GenAI and those that aren’t, given the real world lawyers and judges live in. He talked about the need for guidance on how both lawyers and unrepresented people use GenAI to mitigate dangers. And he talked about the unique role law librarians could play in providing that kind of education.

What We All Walked Out With

Judge Smith challenged the law librarians in the room to lead with Aloha. He told them they are uniquely positioned to wield influence because their job is not to win but to help others. He is right about that. Sometimes being unheralded, as many law librarians are, facilitates the opportunity for lasting impact.

But his message is much broader. In an age where so many are politicized and where social media that promotes hate and distrust dominates, I hope there is room for the kind of leadership he described. Those who have power not obtained by force or status are the ones I trust the most because I know they aren’t motivated by self-interest.

People like Judge Smith. Thanks, AALL, for not cramming another celebrity keynote who just wants to impress down our throats.

Stephen Embry is a lawyer, speaker, blogger, and writer. He publishes TechLaw Crossroads, a blog devoted to the examination of the tension between technology, the law, and the practice of law.

The post AALL 2026: An Aloha Keynote For Lasting Impact, Not Glitz appeared first on Above the Law.

Legal teams everywhere are facing the same issues: contracts stored in too many places, limited visibility into risk, slow review cycles, and critical business terms that are buried or out of sync.

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The post 3 Contract Intelligence Use Cases Every Legal Team Should Know appeared first on Above the Law.

Now that the final whistle has blown, that prediction proved to be less of a theory than an observation.

For most fans, the World Cup was exactly what it should have been. Extraordinary soccer. Dramatic moments. Packed stadiums. New stars. Unforgettable atmospheres stretching from Mexico City to Toronto to New York and beyond.

What most people never saw was the legal machinery that allowed all of it to happen.

That may be the greatest compliment lawyers involved in the tournament could receive. When legal planning works, it becomes almost invisible.

Think about what actually occurred over the course of the tournament. Millions of spectators crossed international borders. National teams, broadcasters, sponsors, vendors, and security personnel operated across three countries with different legal systems. Stadiums functioned on tight schedules. Commercial rights were protected. Intellectual property disputes remained largely out of public view. The tournament itself unfolded with remarkably few legal controversies dominating the headlines.

That was never guaranteed.

Hosting a World Cup across three sovereign nations was an unprecedented exercise in legal coordination. Immigration officials, customs agencies, local governments, police departments, transportation authorities, and private organizations all had to work from carefully negotiated frameworks years in the making. Every successful border crossing, every credential issued, every sponsorship activation, and every television broadcast reflected countless legal decisions made long before a ball was kicked.

The tournament also reinforced something lawyers understand well: contracts often matter more than headlines.

Host cities honored commitments negotiated years ago despite changes in political leadership. Commercial partnerships survived the inevitable logistical challenges that accompany an event of this size. Ticketing systems, licensing agreements, media rights, and venue operations all functioned because contractual obligations had anticipated problems before they arose.

Of course, no event involving millions of people is perfect. There were transportation headaches, security concerns, crowd-management issues, and the occasional dispute that attracted public attention. But considering the sheer scale of the tournament, those issues were exceptions rather than defining features.

That should not be mistaken for luck.

It reflected years of planning by lawyers, risk managers, insurers, government officials, and countless professionals whose work rarely appears on highlight reels.

The tournament also offered an interesting reminder about the growing role of private organizations in shaping public life.

FIFA is not a government, yet during the World Cup it exercised enormous influence over everything from branding and commercial rights to venue operations and dispute resolution. Governments willingly accepted many of those conditions because hosting the tournament promised economic benefits, global visibility, and long-term investment.

Whether that balance remains appropriate is a fair question for future host nations. The World Cup once again demonstrated that mega-events increasingly rely on agreements in which private organizations exercise significant authority over public spaces and public resources. That reality deserves thoughtful public discussion before the next host signs on the dotted line.

Perhaps the biggest lesson, though, is one lawyers have known all along.

People often think of the law as something that reacts to crises. In reality, its greatest success is preventing them. The best legal work rarely produces headlines because its purpose is to keep problems from becoming headlines in the first place.

The 2026 FIFA World Cup succeeded because millions of moving parts operated within carefully constructed legal frameworks that most fans never noticed. That invisibility was not accidental. It was the product of years of negotiation, drafting, coordination, and risk management carried out by professionals whose names will never appear next to the tournament’s greatest goals.

As lawyers, we sometimes joke that nobody appreciates good legal work until something goes wrong.

The 2026 World Cup reminded us that sometimes the opposite is true. When everything goes right, that’s often the strongest evidence that the legal work was exceptional.

Michael J. Epstein, a Harvard Law School graduate, is a trial lawyer and managing partner of The Epstein Law Firm, P.A., a law firm based in New Jersey.

The post What The 2026 FIFA World Cup Taught Us About Global Events appeared first on Above the Law.

Last November, after a conservative British newspaper published an internal memo accusing the British Broadcasting Corporation of splicing together two sections of Trump’s January 6 speech to imply that he’d exhorted his supporters to violently attack the Capitol, Trump ran the same play. His current defamation lawyer, Alejandro Brito, fired off a nastygram demanding a retraction, an apology, and “appropriate compensation.”

The BBC duly apologized and retracted the segment. It did not, however, cut him a check — something which would have been a bigger scandal for the taxpayer-funded broadcaster than the original screw-up. Instead it hired Charles Tobin, one of the best media lawyers in America, and spent the past seven months kicking Trump in the bollocks.

Turns out, when you file a $10 billion defamation suit, you have to participate in discovery! Who knew!

Always be trolling

Trump’s complaint, filed in the Southern District of Florida, suffers from a fatal flaw: The offending program never aired in the US, wasn’t available on the American cable channel BritBox, and wouldn’t play on BBC.com from a US IP address. The plaintiffs’ current theories are: 1) Maybe it actually was available in America??? or 2) Floridians’ use of VPNs spiked in January of 2025, and so someone in Florida must have watched it there.

(Sure, Florida’s age-verification law for adult content took effect January 1, 2025. But doesn’t it seem more likely that people were using VPNs to fap to Auntie Beeb than boring, old porn?)

In January, the BBC moved to stay merits discovery until its motion to dismiss for lack of personal jurisdiction was resolved. Judge Roy Altman, who was initially quite solicitous of the guy who appointed him, denied the motion. BBC then did what any competent lawyer could have predicted: First, it subpoenaed every person and entity that was anywhere near Trump in January of 2021 for evidence that he actually did intend for his followers to violently attack the Capitol. Then it demanded Trump hand over his financial records to prove that there was no “massive economic damage to his brand value and significant damage and injury to his future financial prospects.”

As of a July 6, nearly four months after being served requests and with a protective order in place since April, Trump had produced zero documents to the BBC. In that time, the BBC produced over 5,200 documents spanning roughly 47,500 pages in response to 503 discovery requests. Trump’s counsel promised update dates in May, then June, then blew past both, before finally proposing an initial production for July 20 — one day before the discovery hearing on Tuesday. His Requests for Admission responses gave the same boilerplate objection to 114 of 152 requests, including refusing to admit or deny whether he’d spoken with Rudy Giuliani, Steve Bannon, Roger Stone, or John Eastman in the 24 hours before his speech on the Ellipse.

Along the way, Trump’s team managed to squander its home court advantage. First Brito failed to respond to the BBC’s motion to dismiss, prompting Judge Altman (who uses the royal “we”) to ask “(1) whether we should consider the Motion to Dismiss unopposed and (2) why we shouldn’t sanction the Plaintiff’s counsel for their apparent disregard of court deadlines.” Then Brito refused to confer with opposing counsel, eliciting a furious response from Magistrate Judge Enjoliqué A. Lett:

While counsel are free to disagree with the relief and basis on which the opposing party may seek said relief, they are not permitted to disregard the Court’s orders and procedures.

Brito followed this up with an unsuccessful campaign to get Judge Lett thrown off the case.

At some point, it appears to have occurred to the plaintiff that it was probably a bad idea to pit an eight-lawyer boutique firm against the megafirm Ballard Spahr and a defendant who wasn’t about to roll over and write a check.

Call in the cavalry

On July 14, DOJ filed a “statement of interest” in the case, objecting to the BBC’s subpoenas as overbroad, burdensome, and duplicative of documents already in the public record. Bizarrely, the government objects to subpoenas sent to purely private parties — Sidney Powell, Roger Stone, Donald Trump Jr., the RNC, WinRed — in addition to the twelve federal agencies. As the BBC notes, it’s more than a little ironic for the DOJ to complained about a subpoena for Don Jr. when his Secret Service detail has thus far blocked BBC from serving him at all.

Procedurally, though, the government’s attempt to bigfoot into this case is even weirder. Every federal agency has Touhy regulations (named for the 1951 Supreme Court case United States ex rel. Touhy v. Ragen), dictating how employees should respond to litigation demands. The agencies are, of course, entitled to challenge those subpoenas individually. But they can’t just pile together as a Trojan Horse to insert themselves into a civil suit as a means for the Justice Department to ride to Trump’s rescue.

Meanwhile in Washington, there’s another discovery fight underway with respect to evidence from Special Counsel Jack Smith’s election interference case against Trump.

Back in May, the BBC petitioned Chief Judge James Boasberg in DC to unseal the 2022 rulings in which then-Chief Judge Beryl Howell rejected Trump’s executive privilege claims with respect to fourteen witnesses. The BBC would like to subpoena many of those same “Stop the Steal” goons, and they hope to head off any argument over executive privilege. They reason that, if Trump already lost those same privilege fights in DC, he shouldn’t get to relitigate them anew in Florida.

DOJ’s opposition makes a great fuss about the New York Times’s failed effort to unseal those same records last year.

“Journalists represented by the same counsel as Petitioners here argued for full access to these rulings, yet this Court ruled that the government’s redactions were proper because the redacted information was secret grand jury information protected by Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 6(e),” they snark, adding that the BBC hasn’t shown the “particularized need” required to unlock grand jury materials.

And perhaps that’s right as a matter of law. But it’s pretty nervy to file a “statement of interest” that never mentions executive privilege, even though Trump’s use of his office to block the subpoenas is clearly going to be the biggest discovery issue in this case. As the BBC pointed out, the DOJ’s supposedly neutral concern about non-party burden conveniently skips the part where the plaintiff himself controls all the non-parties! Trump wants it both ways: privilege as a sword to block discovery in Florida, and the record of him losing that same privilege fight in DC kept out of view.

All of this has more than a faint whiff of déjà vu. In 2020, then-AG Bill Barr swooped in to substitute the government as defendant in E. Jean Carroll’s original defamation suit against Trump. Multiple courts rejected the claim that he was acting within the scope of his presidential duties when he said that Carroll was too unattractive to assault, but the DOJ is still making that case to the Supreme Court.

More recently Trump sued the IRS for the wrongful disclosure of his tax returns in 2020, and then “settled” for immunity for all prior tax crimes plus a $1.8 slush fund for his supporters — despite the fact that the case was categorically barred by the statute of limitations. Judge Kathleen Williams blasted the government for effecting a fraud on the court by pretending that there were two adverse parties, rather than Trump “suing” an agency he controlled as a means of conferring legitimacy on a ploy to loot the treasury and secure a get-out-of-jail-free card for himself. Judge Williams referred Brito to the Florida bar for possible discipline and banned Daniel Epstein, who is also entered on the BBC case, from appearing pro hac in the Southern District of Florida for a year.

You should leave now

At this point, any rational litigant would quietly slink away. This case is jurisdictionally DOA, doomed on the merits, and runs the very real risk of getting the president’s lawyers sanctioned again. And on top of all that, the BBC is making it clear that it will make this incredibly expensive and unpleasant — not just for Trump and his lawyers, but for all of his “Stop the Steal” buddies, too.

Instead, the president is trying to get the Justice Department to ride in and save him like the French fleet showing up outside Yorktown. But Donald Trump is no George Washington, and the DOJ’s not going to save him from British.

Washington won the war. Trump can’t win a discovery hearing.

Liz Dye produces the Law and Chaos Substack and podcast. You can subscribe by clicking the logo:

The post Trump Bit Off More Than He Could Chew Suing BBC, So DOJ Will Chew It For Him appeared first on Above the Law.

* Litigation funders getting squeezed on both sides. Some states have attempted to ban their work, and elsewhere investors are putting money behind law firms directly rather than work with a funder. [Bloomberg Law News]

* ACLU gearing up to take on state surveillance tactics, which are much more Orwellian than you might think. [WIRED]

* Woman who began law school at 47 now heads an all-woman law firm. [People]

* Hawaii Supreme Court rejects effort to graft U.S. Supreme Court due process musings onto a state constitutional issue… and then launches a wide-ranging critique of SCOTUS running roughshod over constitutional law generally. [Slate]

* Trump calls on federal judges to rewrite science textbook to better match his administration’s priorities. [Reuters]

* James Comey advises Todd Blanche to “bone up on the rules.” Todd Blanche then presumably started trying to figure out if “bone up” can be prosecuted as a violent threat. [NBC News]

* Judge’s lawyer says his client is still fit for the bench despite record of… problematic comments. [ABA Journal]

The post Morning Docket: 07.20.26 appeared first on Above the Law.

U.S. Attorney’s Fifty-Four Minutes Of Fame: Roger Rogoff was sworn in as U.S. Attorney and fired by the administration fifty-four minutes later, cleared out for the same first-assistant shell game that keeps rendering indictments worthless.

Crystal-Balling The Next Rankings Circus: Pepperdine’s Paul Caron ran the ABA numbers to project the 2027 U.S. News law school rankings, and the suspense is whether Yale — knocked out of the top spot for the first time ever this year — can claw its way back.

Unitary Executive Theory Steps On A Rake: After successfully getting the Supreme Court to bless the idea that Donald Trump controls everything the government does — except the Fed — a federal judge cited that right back to him over his attempt to sue the federal government to give himself a sweeping release and his cronies a slush fund.

Always Be Charging: The Department of Justice has told all 93 U.S. Attorney’s offices that every line prosecutor must keep at least 25 open matters at all times.

No Honor Among Capitulators: The DOJ hit all nine Biglaw firms that bought their way out of Trump’s executive orders with subpoenas and deposition notices, demanding their communications with Boris Epshteyn and dragging in the very firm leaders who signed the $940 million in deals to avoid this in the first place.

Welcome To The Gaslight District: Legal scholars reviewing Kathryn Ruemmler’s closed-door House Oversight testimony about her relationship with Jeffrey Epstein called it “classic gaslighting.”

Speaking Of Gaslighting: Amy Coney Barrett, who once told the public to “read the opinion” before judging the Court, informed Congress that it is inappropriate to expect the justices to actually explain their shadow-docket opinions.

Recuse Me While The Whole Bench Bails: Lawsuit to block Judge Gregory Van Tatenhove from becoming dean of Kentucky Law over faculty objections kicked upstairs after every judge acknowledged a conflict in a case against their colleague.

The post Bad News Out Of Biglaw — See Generally appeared first on Above the Law.

House Oversight Caught With Their Pants Down: Alan “Underpants” Dershowitz cancels Monday Epstein interview at the last minute.

Holding The Powerful… Not Accountable At All: Amid mounting court findings of DOJ misrepresentations, a federal court in Michigan calls out the government for an AI hallucination designed to keep a man locked up. No sanctions.

Trump’s Called In An FBI Forensics Team: The Reflecting Pool saga takes [more] of an absurdist turn.

It’s Getting Hot In Here: So stop your billables! Hogan Lovells Cadwalader lawyers get to work remotely thanks to a broken A/C.

The post DOJ Remains Dullest Tools In The Shed — See Also appeared first on Above the Law.

According to SurePoint’s new 2026 Law School Hiring Report, what percentage of law firm offices no longer participate in on-campus interviewing (OCI)?

Hint: With the push to secure 2L summer jobs creeping into the first year of law school, OCI is becoming antiquated.

See the answer on the next page.

The post The Death Watch For Biglaw On-Campus Interviews Has Begun appeared first on Above the Law.

How Is Voice Search Changing the Law Firm Marketing Landscape?

The accuracy with which digital programs interpret voice input has increased dramatically since the first talk-to-text programs had us all laughing (and cringing) over their often eyebrow-raising outcomes. Developing alongside the gradual adoption of voice-controlled “smart” devices for household use, this improvement in accuracy has allowed users to develop greater confidence in using voice controls for tools beyond telling Alexa to play music, or asking Siri to list local restaurants.

The Technology Conditions the Behavior

Without getting too far “into the weeds” with the topic, it is important to note that the increasing ubiquity of devices that operate by voice command as a matter of course, without the errors that often plagued early voice control models, has had effects on user’s expectations and therefore on their behavior. Academics who study the intersection of culture and technology call the idea that the availability of a technology directly precipitates the emergence of specific cultural norms technological determinism. Most scholars seem to agree that the reality is usually more complicated, but you don’t have to believe in a one-to-one correlation between any given invention and the specific set of cultural norms that develop around its use to see that most people do adapt their behaviors, to at least some degree, in response to the tools they recognize as available, and the capabilities of those tools that have proven reliable.

How Voice Search Reshapes User Behavior

One area in which we can see the availability of tools structuring search behavior is in the syntax of voice searches compared to typed queries. As several voices in the search engine marketing space have pointed out, the queries users initiate by voice tend to be phrased as questions in ordinary spoken conversation. This “natural language” format differs significantly from the grammatical structure of many typed searches with which we have all become familiar.

Implications for Law Firm Digital Marketing Strategy

The bad news, for law firms looking to capitalize on the growing popularity of voice search to make sure they appear in front of the potential clients looking for related services, is that you likely will not be able to simply use your existing SEO content, built around the long-tail keywords typed into Google, to effectively leverage the capabilities of voice search in your law firm’s digital marketing strategy. The good news is that the content you create to optimize for voice search will likely be more “readable” compared to conventional SEO content, and therefore easier for individuals who visit your law firm website after finding it through voice search to understand.

Often there has been a tension between creating content that is easy for prospective clients to find vs. creating content that will “convert” search appearance into calls or bookings once it’s found. That tension subsides considerably in content optimized for voice search.

Real Change vs. Hype

If you have been reading content about how voice search and LLM answer engines are about to destroy your law firm’s SEO (search engine optimization), or maybe about how they are already destroying it, it’s time to take a deep breath and assess the facts. Just putting the information already available into perspective can go a long way toward helping you develop an updated search engine marketing strategy that is based on data, not hype.

Fact No. 1: Voice Search Is Absolutely a Different Ballgame Compared to Conventional SEO

Conventional SEO puts a lot of emphasis on identifying “long-tail” keywords, testing them, and then developing a content strategy that creates articles around those keywords and places those articles on web pages optimized for “crawlability” by search engines. The keywords themselves come from the actual searches run by users of conventional search engines (predominantly but not exclusively Google). Often they have a syntax that looks like what it is: a string of nouns somebody hoped would be related to the kind of thing they were looking for. That rarely, if ever, sounds “out loud” like any way most of us would think to structure a sentence if we were participating in a real conversation with someone we expected to understand.

Fact No. 2: Keywords Aren’t Going Anywhere

While “long-tail” keywords, the ones that look something like child custody Arizona divorce, may not show up the same way in voice search as they do in conventional typed searches, people are still running searches that contain most of the same components. They’re just strung together in a different way, with prepositions and indefinite articles: child custody in an Arizona divorce. They may also show up in whole-sentence questions: What determines child custody in an Arizona divorce? or Who gets child custody in an Arizona divorce?

Fact No. 3: The Way We Identify and Use Keywords Will Probably Change

The paradox created by these developments is that voice search optimization needs to account both for the individual search terms and for multiple questions people might ask with them. Pulling a long-tail keyword like child custody Arizona divorce makes it easy to see several different ways of combining the core components:

• Child custody
• Custody
• Divorce
• Arizona
• Arizona divorce
• Arizona child custody

What this means for voice search content creation is that law firms and digital marketing professionals will need to create content that incorporates many different combinations of shorter keywords. If you can use this content creation as an opportunity to also identify and directly answer more of the questions that people are beginning to ask of LLM answer engines, you have a decent chance to improve your ROI by optimizing for AI and voice search at the same time.

To Optimize for Voice Search, Think “Local” and “Contextual”

Chances are, you will want to work with a legal marketing professional to develop a comprehensive strategy for incorporating voice search optimizations within your overall law firm marketing plan. That said, the two elements you will definitely want to steer by are local search (aka local SEO) and contextual keywords. You want to choose for your voice search targeting keywords that people are likely to use in the same contexts where they are likely to prefer voice search over “traditional” typed methods. Many of these contexts are going to also have a local focus. Targeting that overlap effectively can give your law firm an edge over the competition, and put you in position to appear in front of prospective clients who are actively looking for legal services in your practice area and location.

Annette Choti, Esq., has over two decades of legal experience and is the Founder & CEO of Law Quill, a concierge legal marketing agency for law firms.  Annette authored the bestselling book Click Magnet: The Ultimate Guide To Digital Marketing For Law Firms, hosts the popular Legal Marketing Lounge podcast, and founded Click Magnet Academy where she teaches professionals to leverage the powerful LinkedIn platform. As a sought after speaker for Bar Associations, Legal Associations, and Marketing Conferences, Annette provides legal marketing insight along with an entertaining twist. Annette used to do theatre and professional comedy, which is not so different from the legal field if we are all being honest. Annette can be found on LinkedIn or directly through email at Annette@LawQuill.com 

The post Voice Search For Lawyers: Why Your Firm May Already Be Losing Clients appeared first on Above the Law.

He even wanted to make sure it would be open and videotaped. For instance, this appearance with Greta Van Susteren a month ago.

Well, he was called to testify for an in-person, videotaped interview on Monday.

Friends, he is not showing up.

Shocking, I know.

In his defense, all his braggadocio hinted at a live, theatrical event on C-SPAN and the House Oversight Committee and the Monday meeting — while transcribed and taped — didn’t seem like it would be a livestreamed event. He also may have a hang up that Comer called him to appear by letter rather than subpoena. But, not to get all textualist, but “anytime” means “anytime.” He and his lawyers had an opportunity to demand a live hearing — and a subpoena — before booking Monday’s interview. Now he’s walking away in the Friday news dump.

Politico claims the Oversight Committee has reached out to reschedule and that Dershowitz did not reply to the outlet’s request for comment.

Many have cast aspersions that Dershowitz only put on a tough posture hoping the House would never call back, noting that most of his public claims about wanting to testify were accompanied by vague claims that neither side would be happy with his testimony. But we here at Above the Law understand that Dershowitz would never use his media appearances to throw around unspecific — and thus non-actionable — claims that he couldn’t back up about Epstein’s victims! No, we are savvy enough to understand that Dershowitz cannot make it to his Monday meeting with Congress because it’s prime “Martha’s Vineyard hates me” season and those pierogi stands and public libraries aren’t going to become unwitting pawns in his thirsty demands for attention if he has to waste time in D.C.

Maybe he will someday speak to the Committee. But for now his message is: Be like Alan Dershowitz… and keep your (under)pants on.

Alan Dershowitz cancels on House Oversight ahead of planned Epstein interview [Politico]
Alan Dershowitz Cancels Planned Epstein Interview With House Oversight Committee [Meidas Touch]

Earlier: Alan Dershowitz Suing Pierogi Stand For Aggravated ‘No One Likes Me On Martha’s Vineyard’
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Joe Patrice is a senior editor at Above the Law and co-host of Thinking Like A Lawyer. Feel free to email any tips, questions, or comments. Follow him on Twitter or Bluesky if you’re interested in law, politics, and a healthy dose of college sports news.

The post Remember When Alan Dershowitz Begged To Testify About Epstein? Well, Now He’s Not Showing Up appeared first on Above the Law.

Shortly after my post, I came across another study, this time by a vendor, that suggests the same thing albeit from a slightly different angle. The study and report, entitled Legal Workflow Leadership Report was done by BigHand, a legal tech vendor that focuses on the business side of law practice. It drew on the insights from over 800 law firm leaders and legal professionals.

From reading the BigHand report, it’s clear the goal of the study was to help convince law firms to purchase BigHand’s products. As such, I always take these kinds of surveys with a grain of salt. But with the Deloitte Legal findings from the legal department side, the credibility of the BigHand study goes up. And taken together, the pictures aren’t pretty for law firms.

A Scary Consistency

Indeed, some of the BigHand conclusions were spot on since they were so consistent with what Deloitte Legal found when it came to law firms. Says BigHand:

This year’s findings…reveal a growing gap in operational readiness for the AI age. While almost all firms are now using AI across support services in some capacity, far fewer are redesigning workflow, delegation models, roles and skill structures needed to support it effectively.

The survey, of course, focused on support services. These are services on the business side of the law firms and not legal work on the client side on which Deloitte Legal focused. But if law firms are struggling to get it right on the support side which can lower their internal costs, what can they hope to do on the legal work side where AI has the propensity to reduce revenues?

Consider this finding from BigHand: “support team utilization often remains unclear, and firms struggle to measure the true impact of AI on productivity, profitability and client service.” The Deloitte Legal report noted much the same thing: AI compels a change in how legal services are priced and valued but too many law firms have no idea how to make that change. Nor the ability.

Clients Will Vote with Their Feet

The actual findings paint a grim picture for law firms that aren’t willing to change how they deal with and use AI. Ninety-five percent of the firms surveyed already report increased client attrition. Almost half say their clients are wondering why fees have not decreased despite the availability of AI. Forty-two percent say clients are asking for alternative fee arrangements.

And like Deloitte Legal, BigHand concludes client expectations are going up, more work will be brought in-house, and in-house legal is reducing the number of panel counsel. Clients want faster turnaround, more transparency, and higher quality delivery. Firms that don’t meet these increasing desires and expectations will find themselves replaced, often without a word of warning.

The Current Use of Support Staff

BigHand believes that meeting client expectations in the age of AI hinges in large part on support staff management and delegation. It stands to reason: in my experience, you can’t deliver top-notch service at a good price with a piss poor support staff.

Yet almost half of those surveyed say they expect to lose anywhere between 21 to 50% of their support staff in the near future. And they admit this attrition will have a direct impact on billable hours, revenue and, perhaps most importantly, disrupt client relationships. Client relationships that are hard to repair once disrupted. That disruption can bring long-term financial and even survivability consequences.

Despite these expected losses to support staff, only 21% are using what BigHand calls structured workflow technology to better allocate tasks and improve delegation. BigHand puts it bluntly:

Without a clear and empirical understanding of workload, capacity and performance, it is difficult to ensure that the right work is handled by the right resource—and the true impact of AI on productivity and profitability is almost impossible to measure.

Another interesting finding: 43% of those surveyed say additional time is now required to check and verify AI outputs. In other words, because firms have not figured out a way to efficiently and accurately verify outputs, much of the time savings from the use of AI, savings that could be passed along to clients, is offset. Certainly, verification is critical. But BigHand’s point is a good one. A lot of firms have not yet figured out how to do that efficiently.

Finally, only 23% are developing reporting techniques to explain how AI efficiencies are being applied to client work. No wonder only 4% of those surveyed by Deloitte Legal say their firms have shown them any sort of benefits from the use of AI. Frankly, the firms are clueless.

And How Are Firms Dealing with the Attrition?

Short answer: they aren’t. Close to 20% plan increase in salaries to existing staff of less than 5%; less than 40% plan increases only in the 5-10% range. Only 27% think prioritizing how lawyers pass work to support staff is important. Only 64% use technology to track support staff productivity and efficiency. Without data, how in the world can firms determine what staff they really need and how to deploy it, says BigHand. Only 29% have made changes to their support teams to incorporate new skill sets.

And get this one: only 41% have reviewed support staff tasks to determine where automation and AI can deliver the greatest impact.

Why So Dismal?

Why are the numbers so dismal? BigHand doesn’t opine but I will. Based on experience, it’s lawyer hubris, pure and simple. Lawyers look down their noses at what they call the “non-lawyers” working in a firm. Too many still think even if under their breath that only the lawyers can effectively run and manage the firm. That only the equity partners can make business and support staff decisions. After all, say the partners, we own the firm, we run the firm, and you, support staff, work for us. Which means the legal professionals on support staffs are ignored and undervalued.

Unquestionably, strides have been made. Lots of law firms now have COOs and CFOs instead of having the firm run by the partner with the biggest book of business. But old habits die hard, especially with a consensus-based decision model which many firms still have.

So Where Are We?

Ordinarily, I would caution placing too much stock in a vendor’s survey that coincidentally shows law firm needs that vendor products happen to meet. But in this case, where the findings are so consistent with those of Deloitte Legal, the numbers reveal a continuing and alarming “hide your head in the sand” culture. A culture that’s even more concerning since, as between the clients and the lawyers, “the balance of power has shifted,” says BigHand. That’s a trend noted by Deloitte Legal and which I have reported on before.

Bottom line? The ostrich law firms that keep their heads in the sand are going to lose business. Deloitte Legal sees it. BigHand sees it. And after over 30 years in Biglaw, I see it.

Get your head out of the sand.

Stephen Embry is a lawyer, speaker, blogger, and writer. He publishes TechLaw Crossroads, a blog devoted to the examination of the tension between technology, the law, and the practice of law.

The post The BigHand Legal Report: More Trouble For Ostriches appeared first on Above the Law.

Quick recap for anyone just catching up: DOJ hit the nine firms with third-party subpoenas demanding their communications with Trump’s personal lawyer Boris Epshteyn, plus deposition notices for the firm leaders who actually signed those deals — all as a side effect of its legal tussle with the ABA, which sued the administration over the legal-blacklist-by-executive-order campaign.

Bloomberg Law reports that when asked for comment on the subpoenas, an unnamed DOJ spokesperson actually answered:

“We sent the subpoenas to the law firms to reinforce our argument that the ABA should obtain this information from its own members, rather than a close presidential advisor.”

Whoa, doggie. I have some thoughts about that.

Okay, it is genuinely strange that DOJ is narrating its own litigation strategy to a reporter in the middle of a live discovery fight. Attorneys are not exactly known for offering up the “why” behind a subpoena while the ink is still wet… that’s usually the kind of thing you save for a brief, not a press inquiry. Worth remembering, too, that since the nine firms haven’t formally opposed these subpoenas yet, still too worried that fighting back will earn them another executive order for their trouble, the DOJ could have kept this card closer to their chest, at least for the moment.

Also it is worth noting the theory doesn’t hold up on its own terms. Sure, the nine firms that cut deals worth $940 million in pro bono payola may have some responsive documents. But, even if they do, “some” is not “the entire universe.” The ABA isn’t just asking about the firms’ side of nine deals, it’s specifically asking about the White House’s and Epshteyn’s role in orchestrating all of them. The law firms wouldn’t have been cc’d on that.

And isn’t this just conceding the responsiveness of the Epshteyn communications? Those are the exact materials the administration is fighting to keep out of the hands of the ABA! But, by subpoenaing the firms for their Epshteyn communications, the DOJ just admitted that whatever Epshteyn said about the EOs is relevant to the ABA case. Now, admittedly, the administration is making a privilege claim over the materials, as the spokesperson said, “DOJ’s motion to quash [the ABA’s subpoena of materials related to Epshteyn] is consistent with longstanding practice to protect any president’s ability to obtain confidential advice from his closest advisors.” It seems an unforced error to concede responsiveness when they didn’t have to.

So the ABA’s discovery fight just got a gift, courtesy of the department’s own subpoenas, and its own press office.

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Kathryn Rubino is a Senior Editor at Above the Law, host of The Jabot podcast, and co-host of Thinking Like A Lawyer. AtL tipsters are the best, so please connect with her. Feel free to email her with any tips, questions, or comments and follow her on Twitter @Kathryn1 or Bluesky @Kathryn1