Keeping Up With Generative AI in the Law

The pace of generative AI development (and hype) over the past year has been intense, and difficult even for us experienced librarians, masters of information that we are, to follow. Not only is there a constant stream of new products, but also new academic papers, blog posts, newsletters, and more, from people evaluating, experimenting with, and critiquing those products. With that in mind, Rebecca Fordon shares her favorites, as well as recommendations from her co-bloggers.

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Subjects: AI, Education, KM, Legal Education, Legal Research, Legal Technology, Librarian Resources, Social Media, Technology Trends

Pete Recommends – Weekly highlights on cyber security issues, September 30, 2023

Privacy and cybersecurity issues impact every aspect of our lives – home, work, travel, education, finance, health and medical records – to name but a few. On a weekly basis Pete Weiss highlights articles and information that focus on the increasingly complex and wide ranging ways technology is used to compromise and diminish our privacy and online security, often without our situational awareness. Four highlights from this week: Hundreds of millions of individuals’ personally identifiable information” is impacted by the privacy weaknesses, according to the Government Accountability Office; Report: Insider Cybersecurity Threats Have Jumped 40% in 4 Years; iOS 17: iPhone Users Report Worrying Privacy Settings Change After Update; and China Cyber Threat Overview and Advisories.

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Subjects: Cybercrime, Cybersecurity, E-Commerce, Government Resources, Privacy, Technology Trends

Taylor Swift and the end of the Hollywood writers strike – a tale of two media narratives

Professor Aarushi Bhandari was taken aback when she learned that not a single student had heard that the Writers Guild of America had reached a deal with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers, or AMPTP, after a nearly 150-day strike. This historic deal includes significant raises, improvements in health care and pension support, and – unique to our times – protections against the use of artificial intelligence to write screenplays. Across online media platforms, the WGA announcement on Sept. 24, 2023, ended up buried under headlines and posts about the celebrity duo of Taylor Swift and Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce. To Bhandari, this disconnect felt like a microcosm of the entire online media ecosystem.

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Subjects: Communications, Internet Trends, KM, News Resources, Social Media

The Truth About Hallucinations in Legal Research AI: How to Avoid Them and Trust Your Sources

Hallucinations in generative AI are not a new topic. If you watch the news at all (or read the front page of the New York Times), you’ve heard of the two New York attorneys who used ChatGPT to create fake cases entire cases and then submitted them to the court. After that case, which resulted in a media frenzy and (somewhat mild) court sanctions, many attorneys are wary of using generative AI for legal research. But vendors are working to limit hallucinations and increase trust. And some legal tasks are less affected by hallucinations. Law Librarian and attorney Rebecca Fordon guides us to an understanding of how and why hallucinations occur and how we can effectively evaluate new products and identify lower-risk uses.

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Subjects: AI, Education, KM, Legal Education, Legal Research, Legal Research Training, Search Engines, Technology Trends

The Generations War comes to the law firm

The Greek philosopher Heraclitus taught “Change is the only constant in Life.” It is not rhetorical to state that we are living in a time of seismic change. Jordan Furlong frames the challenges and opportunities as It’s not about who’s right, Boomers or Millennials. It’s about the most profound change to the fabric of the legal profession in 40 years, and how we’re going to get through it.

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Subjects: Uncategorized

Gliding, not searching: Here’s how to reset your view of ChatGPT to steer it to better results

Human factors engineer James Intriligator makes a clear and important distinction for researchers: that unlike a search engine, with static and stored results, ChatGPT never copies, retrieves or looks up information from anywhere. Rather, it generates every word anew. You send it a prompt, and based on its machine-learning training on massive amounts of text, it creates an original answer. Most importantly, each chat retains context during a conversation, meaning that questions asked and answers provided earlier in the conversation will inform responses it generates later. The answers, therefore, are malleable, and the user needs to participate in an iterative process to shape them into something useful.

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Subjects: AI, KM, Search Engines, Search Strategies

Pete Recommends – Weekly highlights on cyber security issues, September 23, 2023

Privacy and cybersecurity issues impact every aspect of our lives – home, work, travel, education, finance, health and medical records – to name but a few. On a weekly basis Pete Weiss highlights articles and information that focus on the increasingly complex and wide ranging ways technology is used to compromise and diminish our privacy and online security, often without our situational awareness. Four highlights from this week: New Privacy Badger Prevents Google From Mangling More of Your Links and Invading Your Privacy; Microsoft AI team accidentally leaks 38TB of private company data; California legislature passes ‘Delete Act’ to protect consumer data; and Starlink lost over 200 satellites in two months.

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Subjects: AI, Cryptocurrency, Cybercrime, Cyberlaw Legislation, Cybersecurity, Government Resources, Legal Research, Privacy, Public Records, Search Engines, Social Media

Artificial Intelligence Tools and Tips

Jim Calloway, Director of the Oklahoma Bar Association’s Management Assistance Program and Julie Bays, OBA Practice Management Advisor, aiding attorneys in using technology and other tools to efficiently manage their offices, recommend that now is a good time to experiment with specific AI-powered tools and suggest the best techniques for using them.

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Subjects: AI, Communications, Continuing Legal Education, KM, Legal Profession, Legal Research, Legal Technology, Technology Trends

LLMs Do Not Obviate the Need for UX

Legaltech Hub’s Nicola Shaver discusses why it is time to level-set about advanced AI: it can’t do everything. Or perhaps more practically, a large language model can’t replace all of the other technology you already have. One of the main reasons for this is the importance of an interface and a built-out user experience (UX) that offers a journey through the system that is aligned with the way users actually work. There are other reasons a large language model (LLM) won’t replace all of your technology (one of which being advanced AI is simply unnecessary to do all things), but this article will focus on UX.

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Subjects: AI, Case Management, KM, Law Firm Marketing, Legal Technology, Search Engines

Google Chrome just rolled out a new way to track you and serve ads. Here’s what you need to know

Late last week, Google announced something called the Privacy Sandbox has been rolled out to a “majority” of Chrome users, and will reach 100% of users in the coming months. But what is it, exactly? The new suite of features represents a fundamental shift in how Chrome will track user data for the benefit of advertisers. Erica Mealy explains that Instead of third-party cookies, Chrome can now tap directly into your browsing history to gather information on advertising “topics.” Understanding how it works – and whether you want to opt in or out – is important, since Chrome remains the most widely used browser in the world, with a 63% market share as of May 2023.

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Subjects: Privacy, Search Engines
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