Inn Members Brave Blizzard to Enjoy February Meeting

“THE (LEGAL) FUTURE IS ALREADY HERE – IT’S JUST NOT EVENLY DISTRIBUTED.”

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February 25, 2015 – Despite a sudden and severe snow storm,  Judge Wheeler’s Group came through with a fascinating presentation, which explored how Colorado can help bring together academia, the bench/bar, and clients to help law evolve in a time of rapid technological change.  The Inn had a surprisingly good turnout considering the inclement weather conditions.

The world is changing and fast; can law adjust and evolve to keep up with it?  Our guest speaker was Paul Lippe, who is the founder and CEO of the Legal OnRamp, www.legalonramp.com, spoke about this at the meeting.  Legal OnRamp is a Silicon Valley-based initiative founded in cooperation with Cisco Systems to improve legal quality and efficiency through collaboration, automation and process re-engineering.  Lippe formerly was an executive at the electronic design automation company Synopsys and later was CEO of Stanford SKOLAR, a medical digital library and e-learning company sponsored by Stanford Medical School.  OnRamp Systems Inc.,  offers products and services to businesses to help their legal departments deliver results more efficiently with higher quality and lower cost. OnRamp Systems Inc. sponsors and hosts Legal OnRamp.

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Mr. Lippe gave an overview of several concepts underpinning technological change and how it impacts industry and business practices.  An analogy: while paper driving maps were necessary and used exclusively before, sociey has shifted to GPS and Google Maps, and the old maps are gone.   With this revolutionary shift in mind, Paul asks “what if we had a Google Maps for law?”  Navigating the intricacies of a complex legal undertaking is very complex. And though traditional legal project management methodologies offer some guidance,  Paul aruges that the “map” they provide is quite analogous to the old Rand McNallys: “flat, broad, basic, and though helpful, only so in a rudimentary way.”  Many issues were presented and discussed relating to how and if the law can adjust in the face of inevitable societal and technological change.

Read articles from Paul Lippe here:  http://www.abajournal.com/authors/4767