LawTechCamp London 2012, the law and technology "UnConference" that MSU College of Law organized with England's University of Westminster Law School, the College of Law, the ReInvent Law laboratory, and MyLegalBriefcase, aimed very high, hoping to draw in not just legal professionals and law students but all those interested in how technology might be brought to bear effectively on problems such as legal issues facing startups and access to justice. From the reviews it looks like it hit its mark:
- In 17 years as a legal journalist, I have attended a lot of conferences. An awful lot of conferences. … I cannot remember the last time there was such palpable excitement in the air at an event. Neil Rose, Editor, Legal Futures, The Next Big Thing, 7/3/12
- Law Tech Camp London which took place on Friday 29th June at the CBI Conference Centre in London was genuinely different from other legal technology events. It was different from the ones that pop up every year. It was different from the biggest and most profitable ones. It was different from the ones that claim to predict the future. It was the UK’s first legal ‘Unconference’ and everyone is talking about it. Joanne Goodman, Unconference! Beat poetry and quantitative analysis--we are all futurists now
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I attended two conferences on innovation in the legal sector last week. One, hosted by Fox Williams, discussed a survey on the future uses of ABSs, as predicted by 100 commercial law firms. The second, LawTech Camp London 2012, focused on technology as drivers of innovation in the legal market. Geographically, the two events took place within three miles of each other. In terms of mind-sets, with one or two notable exceptions, they were a million miles apart. ...
A final point of comparison between the Fox Williams and LawTech events were their respective takeaways. At the Fox Williams meeting, I was given a glossy, paper-based summary of the report’s findings, and a collection of marketing literature. At the LawTech event, I took away a twitter feed, a blog of speakers delivered in real time by @legalaware, a memorable YouTube video, delivered online by Miami-based legal academic, Michael Bossone – and a headful of new ideas. Richard Parnham, A Tale of Two Conferences, Legal Market Musings
Bravo to MSU Law, and especially to professors Renee Knake and Dan Katz.