At the Rhode Center, we do our best to keep abreast of news relevant to our work. What began as an internal newsletter, we are now excited to offer our A2J Briefing more broadly, to you! Nothing formal here, just a collection of stories and developments that we find interesting. If you have a tip on an article, feel free to contact us here. And learn more about our work at https://clp.law.stanford.
Technology
- Legaltech Hub released an interactive map of generative AI legal tech. [3/6/25]
- Two major studies have been released on AI in legal tasks:
- Researchers conducted a randomized controlled trial assessing six legal tasks using a RAG-powered legal AI tool (Vincent AI), an AI reasoning model (OpenAI’s o1-preview), or no AI. LawSites reports. [3/4/25] & [3/5/25]
- The Vals Legal AI Report evaluates and benchmarks AI tools from four vendors: Harvey, CoCounsel (Thomson Reuters), Vincent AI (vLex), and Oliver (Vecflow). Legal Insider reports. [2/27/25]
- A.G.I anyone? Ezra Klein writes for the New York Times. [3/4/25]
- LawSites reports that LexisNexis plans to work closely with OpenAI to integrate OpenAI’s LLMs and APIs across the LexisNexis ecosystem. [2/27/25]
- A piece on Community Justice Workers appears in Work Shift. [2/24/25]
- Margaret Hagan, Executive Director of the Legal Design Lab at Stanford Law School, published a new Medium article on her research into quality standards for AI legal help. [2/20/25]
- A number of RAILS working groups (Responsible AI in Legal Services) have published their efforts, including Use Cases for GenAI in Legal and AI Risk Management Framework: Guidance for Corporate Legal Teams. [Various]
Regulatory Innovation
- Reuters reports on the narrowing of the Utah legal services regulatory sandbox. [3/3/25]
- Ethicist Lucia Pera writes about nonlawyer-owned law firms in FedSoc’s Regulatory Transparency Project blog, arguing that it’s time to rethink ABA Formal Opinion 91-360 (1991). [3/3/15]
- The Arizona Supreme Court has approved KPMG’s application for an ABS license. Multiple outlets reporting: Bloomberg Law; Reuters; Forbes; LawSites. [2/27/25]
- Mother Jones published a piece on the lawyer monopoly and its impact on access to civil legal services. [Feb.25]
- The South Dakota Supreme Court has approved a pilot program for alternative licensure that will allow law students to bypass the bar exam with two years in a public service legal position and successful completion of an ethics test. [2/25/25]
- The ABA Journal’s The Modern Law Library podcast covers Rebecca Haw Allensworth’s new book The Licensing Racket. [2/19/25]
Courts & Rules
- The Virginia State Bar solicited public comments on a proposal that would allow court clerks, self-help staff, librarians, and courthouse navigators to answer questions and assist with selecting and completing court forms. Frontline Justice reports. [3/5/25]
- Harvard’s Access to Justice Lab published research on expungement in several counties in Pennsylvania and Kansas which supports an analysis on which statutory reforms would render the largest number of cases eligible for record clearing. [100 N.D. L. Rev. 11 (2025)]
- The Pew Courts & Communities project team discusses how medical debt that winds up in courts can be difficult to spot. [2/27/25]
- The Working Group on AI and the Courts of the ABA Task Force on Law and AI has published guidelines for the responsible use of AI in judicial settings. The guidelines were released in The Sedona Conference Journal. LawSites reports. [2/26/25]
