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Today’s legal educators aim at a moving target. Education invariably prepares students for a future that is different from the present. But fundamental change in the legal profession today occurs at an unusually rapid pace. Dynamism within the legal landscape is notable in itself. Law is traditionally conceived of as a slow moving, incremental, and conservative profession. Regulation, such as the regulatory structure that superintends legal services, typically attenuates the rate of industry change. Yet the characterization of a stable, slow moving professional business models is no longer accurate within law. Instead, this is a period in which creation and destruction occur at a brisk clip.
One way to understand shorter periodicity of change in the legal business is that law, like other information industries, is experiencing a digital disruption. As detailed in a 2010 Silicon Flatirons Report, entitled Law 2.0: Intelligent Architecture for Transactional Law (2010) (herein, “Law 2.0”), law is undergoing a transition similar to the shifts seen in journalism, music, video, and other information industries. Many traditional law firm business models are under stress due to this digital transition and other causes. Relationships between company clients and traditional legal service providers are shifting toward new billing models. As corporate counsel and tech-savvy legal vendors seek to reduce legal costs and increase efficiency, new opportunities open for novel technology solutions and non-traditional service providers.