Will AI automate Legal Work? [Newsletter #50]

Hello, AI enthusiasts from all around the world! Welcome to this week's newsletter for the AI and the Future of Work podcast.

Dealing with legal documents can be intimidating  for anyone. One mistake can be very costly. 

To make matters more challenging, sometimes you can't afford legal help. That's where AI comes in. 

Today's issue tells the fascinating story of how one founder decided to use AI to make the legal world more accessible. The result is one of the fastest-growing AI services currently available.  

Let's dive into this week's highlights! 🚀

🎙️ New Podcast Episode With Scott Stevenson, Spellbook CEO.

One legal bill drained half his company's bank account. So, he took action. 

Scott Stevenson had a small business building musical instruments, and one document almost bankrupted him.

What had he done? Where was the mistake? 

These questions lingered in his head. 

Faced with such frustration, he had to do something. So, he used his skills as a software developer and partnered with Spellbook's cofounder, Daniel Di Maria, a lawyer, to devise a solution. 

He needed to find a way to make legal services more efficient and, more importantly, easier to understand. So, he and Daniel turned to AI for help and created Spellbook, the first generative AI co-pilot for lawyers.  

However, Spellbook wasn't aimed at solving all the problems that can arise in the legal world. Instead, it focused on the tedious and draining aspect of transactional law, a.k.a. contracts and their challenging and critical details.

In no time, the product became an invaluable resource for lawyers, an "electric bicycle" that helps you pedal, but doesn't do all the work.

After the first product's success, Spellbook also created an AI "junior associate" to help remove the drudgery of legal work.

The company has been so successful that it recently raised a $20M Series A from big names such as Inovia Capital, Thomson Reuters Ventures, Moxxie Ventures, and others.

Scott sat down with Dan Turchin, PeopleReign CEO, to discuss how a critical need led him to create his company, and much more:

• 70% of people can't access legal services due to high costs. Spellbook and other legal AI tools aren't just about saving time but also about reducing costs and opening up access to legal services to those missing out on critical help. 

• AI won't replace lawyers. If anything, it's going to make them better. Scott doesn't see Spellbook as a replacement because the legal judgment and critical thinking must come from humans. 

• Now is the best time to become a lawyer, as law students will enter a field with less drudgery and a higher demand for a strategic mindset. 

• Who's responsible for the final legal decision? Scott believes that humans are ultimately in charge of taking what AI gives them and reviewing it. At the same time, Spellbook's objective is to be as reliable as possible. 

• Chaos isn't a bad thing. Scott believes the best AI should be "controlled chaos" instead of rigid, "perfect" AI products that fail to replicate real world experiences—because the real world is imperfect. 

🎧 Our latest conversation with Scott Stevenson inspired this issue. 

Listen to the full AI and the Future of Work podcast episode to hear more about Scott's perspective on automating law and becoming a better lawyer with the help of AI. 

📖 AI Fun Fact Article

AI replacing humans was sci-fi. It's a reality now that AI can do 43% of modern jobs. 

At least, that's what this week's article by HackerNoon states. 

It's understandable if we get slightly anxious when we read these headlines. 

But it's worth asking what the article truly means by this.

HackerNoon divides the discussion into three main sections, starting with which jobs are most at risk. Then, it creates four categories, considering variables such as difficulty and income. 

Other discussions include common traps, like the Turing Test, and how to escape them. 

These three sections thoughtfully discuss the necessary changes to ensure that AI doesn't take away all our jobs. 

They conclude with the thought-provoking question, "Is work, in fact, necessary?”. If AI can truly replace human labor on a large scale in the future, do we need to rethink social structure?"

So, when we come across clickbaity titles that send our hearts racing, it always pays to read the article. That's the first commentary from PeopleReign CEO, Dan Turchin. 

He also believes we should stop hyperventilating about measuring progress by how many jobs AI replaces. 

AI is a credible partner that is perfectly designed to assist humans. After all, AI seems human because it is trained on massive data corpora and matches patterns from smart humans. 

AI only knows what humans know, and how we experience the world changes continuously. 

The core meaning of existing in a civil society requires humans with novel ideas, ambitions, and passions to define how we engage AI—not the other way around. 

So, let's not reduce this amazing technology down to just how many jobs it can automate. 

What do you think? Let us know your thoughts. 

📚 Worth a Read

📣 Share your Thoughts and Leave a Review!

👋 Until Next Time: Stay Curious

That's a Wrap for This Week!

This week's conversation showed us how AI can help us solve pain points that we might not even realize we have yet. Itenables professionals to be more efficient, and it can also make services more accessible to people. 

We hope this conversation inspires you to use AI to solve those pesky problems we often face daily. 

Who knows? You might make the world an easier place for all of us. So, until next time, keep questioning, keep innovating, and we'll see you in the future of work! 🎙️✨

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