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Re:Ask HN: Are there any online lawyer services? by jason_slack on Tuesday January 29, 2019 @10:44AM (#19027198)
Hi Nathan,

Actually, I had been working off and on creating a platform that allows lawyers to file, respond to court documents, etc. The goal was to eliminate the need to show up to court and have opposing council ask for a continuance because they only received the documents "the day before" and hadn't had time to review them. There were other aspects to it. I haven't worked on it in years, but perhaps we could chat sometime if this sounds interesting to you.

Re:Ask HN: Are there any online lawyer services? by gamblor956 on Tuesday January 29, 2019 @12:48PM (#19028281)
If your platform is as described, it has no chance of succeeding. If attorneys have only received the documents the day before a court appearance, changing that to online delivery doesn't address the fundamental problem that the opposing counsel hasn't had sufficient time to review the document dump.

Judges really, really hate it when lawyers do that to opposing counsel, to the point where it is no longer uncommon for them to sanction lawyers for data dumping at the last minute in addition to granting a continuance so that the other side can properly review and respond.

Re:Ask HN: Are there any online lawyer services? by jason_slack on Tuesday January 29, 2019 @09:55PM (#19032227)
And so that is the point. If documents are not exchanged fairly a continuance can be issued without ever getting to court first and wasting the systems time.

If not saying the idea was perfect. I talked to 30 lawyers in different parts of the world to help hash out the idea. Mixed thoughts from them. I think I still have all the notes.

My point here was to Share an idea because I’m not doing this project anymore (way back early 2007) and maybe someone else can execute better etc

Re:Ask HN: Are there any online lawyer services? by gamblor956 on Wednesday January 30, 2019 @01:25PM (#19037716)
And so that is the point. If documents are not exchanged fairly a continuance can be issued without ever getting to court first and wasting the systems time.

Right, and they can already do that without going to court, by filing (or for more modern courts, emailing) a request for continuance to the judge's clerk. This has been a thing for literally decades, which is probably why you got mixed thoughts from the lawyers you talked to.

There are plenty of low-hanging fruit in the legal tech market to go after. This isn't one of them.

Re:Ask HN: Are there any online lawyer services? by jason_slack on Wednesday January 30, 2019 @02:15PM (#19038242)
Right, but this happens automatically based upon time.

The mixed reactions were

1. There isn’t a chance to argue with the judge in an automated system. Maybe extenuating circumstances need to be talked about and this step is cut out by a computer deciding to notify the judge that a continuance should be given due to time.

2. It’s another system to be paid attention to when lawyers desks usually have cases on paper, in folders, in a briefcase. It’s hard to break tradition.

Re:Ask HN: Are there any online lawyer services? by gamblor956 on Wednesday January 30, 2019 @02:54PM (#19038730)
Ah so the fundamental misunderstanding is that you did not understand how the process works and so you proposed a platform that didn't work with existing processes, and so was rejected by essentially everyone you talked to.

Continuances are discretionary. Judges are already quite good about handling extenuating circumstances on their own. AIs can barely understand simple human speech; they are nowhere close to notifying judges about whether continuances are appropriate.

And I'm not sure why you keep pushing this--the problem you've addressed is not a major problem in our court system (or even a minor problem) and the solution isn't worth more investment of time/effort than as an extremely minor feature in a court docketing/filing system.

Re:Ask HN: Are there any online lawyer services? by jason_slack on Wednesday January 30, 2019 @03:06PM (#19038852)
As I clearly stated. I shelved that project. My original post was to offer the work I had done to someone else versus it sitting on a shelf :-).

As a criminal lawyer, you reply like a lawyer. I’ve lost interest in your retorts so I’ll move on.