Authors:Hon. C. Scott Maravilla Abstract: Artificial Intelligence (AI) is changing our society and bringing the legal profession with it. The use of Generative AI (GenAI) in legal proceedings has received negative publicity from high profile mishaps in court filings. In one case, attorneys used the publicly available online GenAI tool, ChatGPT, to write a legal brief in which ChatGPT proceeded to make up its own citations. Following this, among other instances of the misuse of GenAI, courts have begun to require disclosures and limit the use of GenAI technology. These prohibitions, however, are the result of a fundamental misunderstanding of the appropriate use of GenAI technology. ChatGPT’s algorithm is not designed for use in legal research and writing. Westlaw Precision and Lexis+ AI, however, are examples of AI tools that are designed for legal research, including citations to actual cases. These tools provide a means of quickening legal research and writing that will lead to reduced costs. While the use of GenAI by self-represented (pro se) litigants may constitute unauthorized practice of law in some jurisdictions, currently available tools, like ChatGPT and Google Bard, are not intended for legal use. Limited scope representation and ghostwriting, however, will allow attorneys to provide legal services at a reduced cost to middle and lower income individuals using GenAI tools. Limited scope representation and ghostwriting allow attorneys to file court documents without making formal notices of appearance. In other words, an attorney provides their services for discrete tasks as opposed to formally representing a client in an entire legal matter. Limited scope representation has been ethically sanctioned by the ABA and many state jurisdictions as a means for access to justice. This Article will discuss how (1) the ethics opinions allowing limited scope representation and legal outsourcing provide the basis for enhanced use of AI technology, (2) publicly available online GenAI chatbots like ChatGPT and Google Bard, not programmed for legal research and writing, are causing problems in the courts, and (3) tailored GenAI for legal drafting, research, and writing will lead to more corporatization and access to justice for not only lower and moderate-income litigants but overall affordable legal services. PubDate: Wed, 19 Jun 2024 18:10:50 PDT
Authors:Reid M. Koski Abstract: The ability to easily recreate another’s face or voice and digitally superimpose it on one’s own has led to a surge in face and voice swapping using deepfakes and deep voices. This technology uses artificial intelligence to create digital replicas with hyperreal accuracy. These digital replicas challenge the underlying premise of the transformative use test that courts use to determine whether a right of publicity infringement merits First Amendment protection. This Note finds a win-win scenario where a stricter test combined with a likeness licensing repository may both allow for public figures to monetize their likeness and provide digital replica creators legal protections over their works. PubDate: Wed, 19 Jun 2024 18:10:50 PDT
Authors:Drew Simshaw Abstract: Transcript of the Keynote Address given at the 29th Annual Georgia State University Law Review Symposium on March 22, 2024. This transcript has been edited for readability and clarity. PubDate: Wed, 19 Jun 2024 18:10:50 PDT
Authors:Samuel Hoy Brown VII Abstract: The United States of America is at a crossroads. The foundational promises of the American dream—life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness—have been thrust into public pessimism as the nation’s most economically vulnerable populations find themselves outsiders in their own communities, unable to access the legal tools and services required to resolve even the most rudimentary of legal disputes. In the wake of groundbreaking studies by the Institute for the Advancement of the American Legal System and the American Bar Association’s Commission on the Future of Legal Services, the need for alternative legal service providers is more prevalent than ever. The recent advent of legal technology tools powered by generative artificial intelligence has the potential to provide low-cost legal services for those who need it the most. This Article explores a litany of actors in the civil legal services marketplace that are harnessing the power of generative artificial intelligence to help bridge the gap for the most vulnerable. In addition, this Article contributes to a new area of legal scholarship advocating for a nationwide “Regulatory Sandbox,” allowing for lawyers, policymakers, entrepreneurs, and innovators to boldly envision a world where alternative legal services can empower our nation’s most vulnerable populations to gain broader access to the legal system and, ultimately, solutions to their legal ailments. Policymakers, stakeholders, and readers alike can view this Article not as a legal treatise, but as an informative and easily digestible call to action that seeks to solve the access to justice gap in the United States. PubDate: Wed, 19 Jun 2024 18:10:49 PDT
Authors:Hon. John G. Browning Abstract: In the summer of 2023, the misuse of ChatGPT by two New York attorneys who filed briefs citing fabricated cases made national headlines. This cautionary tale quickly had company, as incidents of other lawyers whose use of artificial intelligence (AI) went horribly wrong filtered in from around the country, including incidents in Texas, Georgia, Colorado, and California. But it was not just errant legal research that was to blame: the cases involved everything from a faulty criminal habeas brief to flawed, mass-generated eviction pleadings by a landlord’s law firm to a high-profile white collar criminal case, in which the convicted defendant blamed his lawyer’s use of generative AI in writing his closing argument. This Article, and its accompanying presentation, begins by discussing these cases as a way of illuminating the multiple areas of ethical risk presented by the use of generative AI. From breaches of the duty of technology competence and the duty of confidentiality, to the duties of supervision and use of independent professional judgment, a lawyer’s use of generative AI can implicate multiple dimensions of ethical concern. Part of the problem, as this Article discusses, is that use of AI tools has spread at a faster pace than lawyers’ grasp of the risks involved with the technology. For example, in the recent Wolters Kluwer Future Ready Lawyer Report, while seventy-four percent of attorneys surveyed expect generative AI to be integrated into their practices within the next year, a significantly lower percentage of lawyers actually understand AI tools. This Article then looks at the responses of stakeholders in the legal profession to generative AI. For example, multiple state and national bar associations have appointed taskforces to study AI and make recommendations regarding its use. In addition, in states like Florida and California, ethics bodies have issued advisory opinions or recommendations on regulating use of AI, tackling such unanswered questions as whether a lawyer must obtain the client’s informed consent in order to use generative AI in the client’s representation. Attorneys are also having to confront AI policies adopted by various law firms and the legal malpractice carriers that insure them. A final response considered by this Article analyzes the extent to which measures such as these disclosure policies are a proportional reaction to the examples of lawyer misuse of generative AI, or whether they are an overreaction—a “solution in search of a problem.” With the landscape of potentially reportable generative AI applications constantly expanding to include most search engines and word-processing applications, one must ask the question: can the traditionally risk averse, technologically backward legal profession adapt' This Article, and its accompanying presentation, hopes to address this and other questions posed by attorney use of generative AI. PubDate: Wed, 19 Jun 2024 18:10:49 PDT
Authors:Patrick Parsons Abstract: This Introduction discusses the issues and questions the legal profession must grapple with at the onset of the AI revolution. PubDate: Wed, 19 Jun 2024 18:10:48 PDT
Authors:Rachel Beithon et al. Abstract: The rapid advancement of artificial intelligence (AI) presents a transformative moment for the legal profession. This Article examines the increasing likelihood of AI reshaping the legal practice, highlights the critical issue of bias, and describes how a multisystem approach to AI can assist in mitigating issues of bias and ultimate fairness. This issue is especially crucial when incorporating AI in automating judicial decision-making. An open, multisystem approach serves as a strategy in mitigating potential biases embedded in AI systems. This Article posits that the thoughtful integration of AI, underpinned by a commitment to diversified systems, will ultimately lead to more equitable and effective legal outcomes. This approach does not replace the human element in law but rather augments and extends it, ensuring that AI serves as a tool for enhancing the end objectives of the legal profession. PubDate: Wed, 19 Jun 2024 18:10:48 PDT
Authors:Todd P. Stephenson Abstract: This Comment explores the extension of interest rate exportation to nonbank entities through the valid-when-made doctrine and its subsequent legal challenge in the 2022 court case California v. OCC. PubDate: Sat, 25 May 2024 21:56:01 PDT
Authors:Samuel E. Marticke Abstract: This Note discusses the information fiduciary model, proposed by Jack Balkin, where fiduciary duties would be imposed on data collectors and analyzes how such a model could come to pass in the United States. PubDate: Sat, 25 May 2024 21:55:56 PDT
Authors:John Evan Laughter Abstract: This Note examines Georgia’s application of harmless error review to constitutional errors and proposes a new standard to remedy deficiencies. PubDate: Sat, 25 May 2024 21:55:51 PDT
Authors:Rachel Gadra Rankin Abstract: This Note analyzes the contractual shortening of the ADEA’s filing period, contrasting it with Title VII’s requirements and advocating for legislative or judicial clarification. PubDate: Sat, 25 May 2024 21:55:46 PDT
Authors:Julia Whitehead et al. Abstract: This Article examines how the young federal government responded to infectious diseases to ascertain the limits of federal powers and analyzes how federal powers were used in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. PubDate: Sat, 25 May 2024 21:55:42 PDT
Authors:Michael L. Smith Abstract: This Article analyzes the presence of zombie provisions in the United States Constitution and state constitutions and the danger that these provisions may influence the interpretation of still-living constitutional provisions. PubDate: Sat, 25 May 2024 21:55:36 PDT
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