Transcript
Speaker: This episode is sponsored by LexisNexis, supporting information professionals as leaders in AI innovation. Explore resources and tools designed specifically for your role at LexisNexis.com, Backsplash Community, Backsplash Info Pro.
Speaker: Hello, everyone. Welcome to the All In Podcast, Episode 6. And we are super excited for this episode.
Speaker: And the the title of this episode, I think you're going to love it. Content is still king, but the kingdom is changing. And my name is Andre Davison.
Speaker: And I'm Katie Brown. And, you know, Andre just mentioned that it's been a few months since ah we've done some recording and I've already said that I'm a bit giggly today, so I don't know what's going to happen with this afternoon. Andre always mentions that he has to wrangle me a little bit. So today we're going to be starting actually a two part conversation around an idea that actually has been around for a long time. This idea of like content is king and especially in our world, like in the library land. Content is king for us. It was books, then it went online. Now we've got this whole behemoth of this tech side of it as well.
Speaker: So yeah, let's talk a little bit more about content being king, Andre. I'm going hand it off you. Right, yeah, and and I think Katie really set the stage. Content is king in the legal information world, but as we know, past three years, the kingdom is changing.
Speaker: Legal content is evolving to meet the changing needs of today's professionals, expanding beyond traditional research materials to include practical guidance, professional development, emerging technology, and human-centered skills.
Speaker: Yeah, and at the same time that we do have that, we also have the behemoth that is AI that has just sort of it burst on and it reshaped so many things. It reshaped how that content ended up being discovered, how people consumed it how people were using it, gaining access to it.
Speaker: But rather than have another conversation about AI, and again, if you want to hear some conversations about it, go back and listen to some of our earlier podcasts. We have been talking about AI quite a bit. um And we didn't want to focus solely on that and the latest AI tools. We did want to take a step back and we wanted to talk about the content itself.
Speaker: Yes, that's that's great, Katie. and and And the question I'm asking myself right now is what makes legal content valuable today? And then what happens when AI, the behemoth, which I love, reframing it that way, Katie, becomes an increasingly important interface between the user and that content?
Speaker: How do law librarians demonstrate the value of their content investments to stakeholders? And joining us today for the first part of our episode, today we are so excited to have with us Rich Rubin, Vice President of Editorial Content and production at Walters Kluwer. Wow, that's a long title. And Rajiv Arora, Vice President of Product, Portfolio, Innovation, and AI.
Speaker: And I thought I'm director of the Robert Hainsworth Law Library. We all have long titles, but ah I'm just joking with you all. We are super excited to have you today. Welcome, Rich and Rajiv. Thank you.
Speaker: Pleasure to be here. Your title's a lot longer than ours. Great. So let's let's start off with the title of the episode, Content is Still King, but the Kingdom is Changing.
Speaker: And i'll I'll start with ah Rich. When we talk about legal content today, what does that actually mean? And how has your definition of valuable content changed as the needs and expectations of legal professionals have evolved?
Speaker: Yeah, that's ah that's a rich and deep question, but but definitely on point. um you know I've been in the industry about 30 years and it was always in the beginning, contents king, contents king, and sometimes its crown got a little blemished, little rusty over times. But I could say right now, content has many more prongs on its crown and many more jewels. It's needed for so many more things.
Speaker: um It's still obviously the authoritativeness, the currency, the comprehensiveness, the transparency. These are all fundamental on the backbone of the research, ah workflow solutions, what have you. But now that values got extended even more with AI and technology, because with that, we can extract more and more meaning insights and really new new pieces of of ah of information from content that we couldn't do before. And that could get served up in multiple ways.
Speaker: So content, it's not just a building block anymore. It's like a multidimensional building block um towards solutions. And so, you know while fundamentally, you know a lot of the same rigor still goes in you know for my organization, making sure it's right, making sure we have the best experts in the field to really sift through the morass of lots of noise out there. um At the end of the day, you know that content not only directly serves our customers' needs, but it becomes an input to developing many, many more services that could um you know intersect with
Speaker: so many other use cases and needs to really provide so much more value to customers when they need it. Yeah. Rajiv, do you have some things to add to that?
Speaker: Yeah. So I would say now the way I see is content, I'm going to change the word content to something called connected content. I love it.
Speaker: And the the reason I'm saying connected content, because when we think about the legal aspect, before imagine you used to have hundreds of books on your shelves and need to read all the books to make sure that there is a connectivity.
Speaker: And now what you do is that everything you want it to be connected via technology, via AI. So that's point number one. The point number two in today's world is when we talk about content, again, as you said, as a king, it is still a king because if the content is not authoritative,
Speaker: And generally, I always say, in the world of AI, we say it's a probabilistic approach. And imagine a a court case for litigation.
Speaker: And the judge is saying, based on this probabilistic approach, I'm going to have this particular approach. Right. you know what It's not going to apply.
Speaker: So we as content people and especially Rich and his team, they owe something to the society as well that we maintain the authoritativeness and that's in quality of content.
Speaker: And we try to give more content, better content and faster content. that's That's a great answer. I remember when I worked in firms, I used to train all of the incoming fall associates and the laterals who came over. And I told them, my goal is to take whatever, you know, these resources, content we have and move you from interaction to connection. So I love that connected content as well.
Speaker: Yeah, what you all were talking about, too, it makes me think about and I'm interested in are you seeing a change with the content changes with the now having the ability, as you mentioned, this connected and using generative AI in the different ways that people are not only accessing the information, but maybe even the way they're interacting with it? Are you seeing changes there?
Speaker: Yes. So let's you know go back few years back. So if you remember that the way we used to do this, we used to say, OK, I'm reading the things.
Speaker: And then we used to say, OK, let me just bucket my thoughts. And then we say, OK, I'm creating a draft today. And by the way, hey, can you review my draft, what I have done? And can you attach the papers from where you have got these facts together?
Speaker: But if you see today, the world has already changed and people have accepted it and they are running with this change. And the change is that it is so conversational.
Speaker: And you say, oh, this is the 100-page matter. These are my supporting documents. Why don't you make sure that everything is complete? Can you bucket it into these these things and and tell us that you know what all research is needed?
Speaker: And can you do the initial research for me? And can you please ensure that when you do the research, highlight the sections and and the citations which I need to take care of? It's a change.
Speaker: but It's a paradigm change, but remember, that change, we need to educate people who are part of this change. What it means is that as they get more data, they need to have an eye for an authoritative data.
Speaker: And that is my, sometimes I, Rich and I talk, what is our biggest worry is that AI can generate a lot of data But it's very important that we should have a way to differentiate the authoritative data.
Speaker: So the way people are going in the consumption, the interaction, of course, as I said, has changed. but the change comes with its own cost. So they need to learn the new things to accept those changes.
Speaker: right I think that's a really good segue into the next question, Rajiv, really talking about the question of trust. And you know in this environment, and I'll direct this question to you, Rich, what makes authoritative, expert-created content worth investing in?
Speaker: Yeah, I mean, i still don't see a substitute for decades of experience, hands on people who authorities in the field who have seen things come and go before know when we should start to get worried or not because, oh, this will just be another big nothing.
Speaker: um There's something that comes from people who have been out and about and have that real experience under their belt. So, um you know, I kind of think of it like authoritative content um is your compass and your guide, and almost like a machete to cut through a growing jungle of noise. A lot of it, AI generated some of it. OK, a lot of it not so good and a lot of it very disconnected, really, from the core, ah you know, ah authority. Right. that that That's underneath it.
Speaker: um So I really think that um You know, the the expertise and the value of where that's coming from is really power now. um So when it's around investing in expert created content, there's really no substitute.
Speaker: And that's why, you know, when we even back to the first question, content has always been king. That's not going to change. Right. And I think it becomes even more paramount now. And the fact you know that so much is being generated from that content makes its value and its its quality even more important.
Speaker: Yeah. So a few more things to add, actually a different perspective. So first of all, you say what makes authoritative expert curated content worth investing in.
Speaker: So first of all, I would say that we have to increase the investment syndrome and I'll tell you why. Okay. We have, are thinking AI can only help people to read. It can also help our experts to write more authoritative content.
Speaker: And with this AI in place, I would say we should double down on this creation of authoritative content by helping our experts with AI and give them those tools and utilities which they can use to enhance more and more content.
Speaker: That's another perspective too. Why, Jeev, are you in our notes? That that was just the follow-up question i was going to ask you. So I'm going to stop us for a minute right there because we do actually need to stop and do a little quick break to hear from our sponsor.
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Speaker: All right. And Andre, I'm going to pass it back to you for a you were going to ask a question, I think, or? No, I think, I think Rajiv already answered answered that question. i was going ask him, does AI make this authoritative content more value valuable? And I think he already answered that because it can help.
Speaker: create more authoritative content. So ah yeah, Rajiv is in my notes, but i'll I'll pass it back to you, Katie. All right. Well, I know that I was actually thinking as you all were talking ah about the return on investment idea, because when it comes to research in the way we traditionally have tracked usage statistics. And if you think about how, um you know, we're we're looking at it from the point of view of we're entering, you know, going in an X number of clicks with, that's how we justify what we're purchasing. That is not the traditional way that research is being done. You know, I think you demonstrated right now, the whole pattern is changing. We're now going in and we're posing questions and we're prompting and we're asking it to
Speaker: you know we've Depending on the tool we're using, we are going from asking and posing a question to it finding, locating, and drafting if we have an agent tool. So we're not collecting the resources in the same manner. We don't have the same ah justification sometimes for these resources. So what kind of a What recommendations or what are your thoughts on that from a content and a technology point of view and working for a company, right, that that is very invested in us wanting to make use of your resources?
Speaker: See, I'll tell you, this is one domain or one area where everyone is still trying, is facing a challenge. Right. that okay, give me half a million dollar, I'm going to invest on 10 technologies. And after six months, when you say, okay, show me the return on investment, they say, oh, we are still learning.
Speaker: hey Right? then i'll i'll And I'll try to answer it in a I would say in a very simple way. The simple way is... so If I am an expert or a librarian, the first thing is I need to have a transparency on my work.
Speaker: And when I say transparency on my work is I need to know what are the things, what are the steps I really perform during a day? And the second thing is that can I also have trans transparency around the speed with which I do my job? uncle And the third thing is we always judge the quality of AI.
Speaker: We should also have a transparency on the quality of work that we as humans do. And last but not the least, you know, we do talk about hallucinations, but humans are also not a very standardized object.
Speaker: You ask human except the name, everything else, they might have a different answer, you know every time when you ask. So once you have that transparency, they need to work with the technology provider, but how do they tangibly but record these actions and provide it to them so that they have a comparison report?
Speaker: Because if I am a librarian and I can say that for this kind of the research, it takes me one day or 30 minutes. And if I can, at the end of the day, I can find out that this particular type of research on AI took me one minute and the quality with which I never modified it, I just cut, copy, paste it.
Speaker: Plus every time when I'm reporting it up, It's standardized. So the kind of matrix that you're going to be presenting to your management and to yourself, it's going to be super neat and super awesome because you could see a curve.
Speaker: And also not about showcasing the return on investment. A person who is using these new technologies will be a part of the feedback loop where they can make the AI and technology also improve.
Speaker: So these two things go handin hand in hand. I would say it's a fantastic question. but that Yeah, I mean, I'll just pull the thread on that last point. But I think, you know, the value of high quality content will speed things up because you'll go right to that where the buck stops and versus, you know, the 50 other possible places that you could get this information.
Speaker: Right. At the end of the day, you know, attorneys, they don't trust people and that's why we pay them. Right. And so we want to give them that source that they trust as soon as possible so they can avoid having to do all this other research to get to that through some circuitous route.
Speaker: So I think it's that speed and the the bet, the improving precision that we're getting on the answers and the output that will speed up, you know, the person's time. And through that, you get to a nice ah ROI, I think.
Speaker: Yeah. Go ahead, Katie. No, I was just going to say, I love that idea of that. You really, you have to have both the tech and the content together yes to have a truly successful return on investment. And that when you have the conversation with both of the interplay of both of those things, that's when you have a really strong product. That's correct.
Speaker: Right. great And yeah I think across any law library, the law library whether it be in a firm or government or in academia, we want to help our patrons, our customers get to the answer faster and and not erode the trust in that, you know, throughout that process. And that's yeah that's ah really ah fascinating points made by both of you.
Speaker: So we're here at the at the end our five questions, um and we want to have you take out your crystal ball and kind of look into the future.
Speaker: and ah You know, and and and and this is really because things are so rapidly changing. i think we may need to revise this to a year from now. The question is, so I may just say that a year from now, because I think five years from now, we may be light years into the future. This is where we say flying cars, right? Right, right. The Jetsons. yeah But um let's say let's let's say a year from now. what will are into the into the future what will make legal content valuable and what should law like law librarians excuse me be prepared for today
Speaker: Yeah, I mean, i'll I'll start by kind of ah piggybacking a little bit of our last question, um which is really the synthesis of you know folks like Rajiv and his team and then people from my team.
Speaker: And you know we are in some ways connected at the hip and things that we're doing these days, and we're seeing some great results from that, you know that kind of symbiosis between technology and content and kind of bleeding one into the other and cross-pollination.
Speaker: But what I see that doing is my content team is going to become a lot more technical. And his technical team is going to be a lot more of content experts. Right. law degree Let's not get carried away, Rajeev. But really, this is the kind of thing that, you know, if if we can really graph together, which is what we're doing, kind of the the core skills of our teams, right?
Speaker: will really create, you know very much like the Steve Jobs analogy with the bicycle, right? That's really the how you supercharge and make use of technology. It's not leaving technology alone, it's how do you work with it together in harmony?
Speaker: And we're seeing some really great results right now. I see that continuing as we go. And who knows, to your point, you know flying cars, things embedded in our brains, where things will be a year or five years from now,
Speaker: but I know that the services will just get better. um the the The way content gets served up will become more efficient and ah cleaner and crisper. um So how those manifest themselves specifically is hard to say, but those are traits I definitely see happening.
Speaker: And so generally when we say what will make legal content valuable, I think it's that continued partnership and and the kind of the growth into those two spaces together between technology and content.
Speaker: think that Yeah. So the way the AI is coming, the way the content is increasing, one suggestion that I will always give to everyone who's going to be using the legal content, librarians, our legal departments,
Speaker: we need to find out or they have to find out a way where they can get more content and more connected content so that they are able to take better decisions and faster decisions.
Speaker: More important thing is that as they get more content, they need to find a ways to filter also more content. And even more important, which is the key,
Speaker: is in this world of so much content, how to focus on something most meaningful with get to the action. and And that is where technology, humans, everyone needs to work together to figure out how to get rid of non-authoritative content.
Speaker: Find a way to get more content, find a way to get, filter the content and find a way to get focused on what you need. yeah That's great. Mission for life. Well, thank you so much for sharing that and for spending your afternoon with us ah to have some some conversation with us.
Speaker: Yeah. Pleasure. Thank you. No, thank you, Rich and Rajiv. I think one thing that stands out ah to me from this conversation, besides the connective content, I just love that term. I'm going to steal it, Rajiv.
Speaker: got You have to credit it because as as a law librarian, I will definitely cite the source, but ah that process, that ai doesn't make the content conversation less important. It actually makes it even more important. I think that's a through line through our conversation today. You know, I think how we access the information may change. The interface may change. How we interact with the content may change.
Speaker: But authority, context, expertise, trust, and value remain at the center of the conversation. That's Well put.
Speaker: Yep. All right. Well, thank you both. And we really, truly appreciate you going all in with myself and Katie. Yes. Thank you.
Speaker: Well, thank you. Thank you. right. I want to welcome everyone back to the all in podcast. I am Katie Brown. And I am her partner, PIP.
Speaker: My performance improvement plan. Also the Katie Wrangler. The Katie Wrangler, exactly. I'm Andre Davison, and we are continuing our conversation around a simple idea.
Speaker: Content is still king, but the kingdom is changing. Yeah, so we started this conversation, we had a part one, and in that we kind of explored how technology and AI are changing the relationship between the legal professionals and the content that they're using. And now we're excited to start talking about part two, and we want to broaden the conversation a bit, right, Andre? Right, yeah, because what's changing isn't simply how people access content,
Speaker: What we want to consider valuable legal content, what is it changing to? We know legal professionals still need authoritative research materials, practical guidance, but they also need resources that help them navigate technology, become better leaders, communicators, develop professionally, and strengthen strengthened excuse me some of the very human skills that become increasingly important in an AI-driven profession.
Speaker: Yeah, so that kind of makes you wonder what does that mean for legal publishers, right? What does that mean for us as librarians having to decide what resources are we going to provide, what is valuable to whoever we're purchasing things for? you know, me in an academic setting, you being in a county, ah people that are in FIRM, that really does change maybe what we're looking for. ah and also who's providing those resources to us. And so I'm very excited to share that we have two folks who are going to be joining us today for this conversation. So we have Kara O'Brien, who is the Chief Content Officer at Practicing...
Speaker: law institute or as i always refer to it pli um and alexa robertson vice president of pli press and head of publishing so kara and alexa welcome to the all in podcast we're very excited to have you here with us and i'm gonna actually start us out with the same question that we did start with our part one group which is content is still king, but the kingdom is changing. And so when you think about legal content today, what falls within the definition and how has what legal professionals need from publishers changed?
Speaker: What do you think? It is definitely the question of the moment. at least yeah When we talk about content today, we're really talking about so much more than legal information. Legal professionals certainly still will need trusted guidance on the law.
Speaker: But they also need help developing the broader capabilities to succeed throughout their careers, which as we've seen are rapidly changing. um Leadership, communication, business development, wellness, navigating change um are all really, really important pieces of content as well. And in that sense, content is expertise that's kind of delivered in a format that helps someone to succeed at their job in a changing landscape.
Speaker: And from my seat where I oversee all of PLI's content, which includes publishing and programs, I increasingly think about it as expertise that can flow across platforms and across formats rather than being confined to a single treatise or a single CLE program, which is how we all tend to grow up in this business.
Speaker: At PLI today, we really have developed a culture of innovation and we look to develop different formats that meet our users' needs, um whether they need a short, quick answer or to a deep dive into ah the legal topic. And that can include things like accredited books and podcasts and short form videos and periodical articles, checklists, interactive learning.
Speaker: So we're really trying to meet. our users where they are on a variety of topics that don't just hew closely to traditional legal practice areas. um We've dealt into different types of books than we've done traditionally in the past. We have Unprecedented, which is by John Leonard, who is a noted legal expert on the future of AI and the law. um Breaking Ground by Deborah Throne has business development. So some of those topics that we've added to our catalog that are a little different than what we've done in the past, but also maintain the rigor and and the expertise that what people would expect from the other products. So I would say content is still king, um but its role has expanded. the The kingdom has expanded and it should still inform legal professionals, but it should help them.
Speaker: become more effective lawyers and leaders and colleagues. i i Sorry, Katie, I want to jump in because yeah go ahead Kara said something.
Speaker: It's one of my favorite sayings. It's it's meet people where they are, but not take them where they need to be. It's empower them where they want to go. And I love how you describe that you're doing that at PLI.
Speaker: Katie, did you want to add anything? No, i I was just going to add on to that idea of the wide variety. um We were chatting a little bit before we got on the pod, which we tend to do. um And I was mentioning how we use, we have PLI at at the Charleston School of Law. And a piece of that is because of we do upper level writing requirements with the ABA. They have these requirements where all the students have to write these papers. And it's the wide variety of content. That's part of the reason why is because We have students that do write about things, everything from mental health to generative AI to cybersecurity. I mean, we've got all of it and there's lots and lots of content and on there. So, you know, that is one of those things where I would say, you know, what you were talking about, having all the different aspects of it with the, you know, when we talk about that wide variety and the different the different resources that are going to be available. um
Speaker: i just, I really like that idea. Yeah. And and you know me and my research nature, I was connecting with Alexa, and then I just took a look at her LinkedIn profile. and I did not realize she was a law librarian first. And she's also been at PLI for a number of years. And as a follow-up to that question we asked, Alexa, how do you think the evolution of you know this content and the way we access it affect the kind of books, topics, and authors you look for.
Speaker: Oh, that's an interesting question. I'm not sure at this point it that were great i'm not sure that we're looking at the delivery mechanism as changing the content. I think we're still looking at the content to serve the professionals, knowing that the technology is just going to continue to enable ah customers, people to be able to find things where they are, find things easier. i am...
Speaker: Yeah, no, that's that's good. and And that kind of leads me into this next question that I wanted to um <unk> start with you and then have Kara chime in How is ai changing the way you think about creating, publishing, and delivering content?
Speaker: um For the publishing and delivering content, I think AI is changing the framework for everyone. i think people we're finding probably have always wanted to search the way they think. um You know, um AI is replacing the old processes where you had to um learn the reference interview, convert the question into a Boolean search, and then sift through a set of results. I don't think anybody said this is what I want to do This is...
Speaker: you know, the the nature of the evolution of of technology. um And I think one of the things we're seeing is that it's moving as as we develop content, people are able to engage with it in different ways. Instead of going to the database and saying, help me to find information, they're able to say, help me understand the answer. And I think this does create an opportunity to make the legal expertise more accessible.
Speaker: more useful and i know andre and katie you have spoken in the past on this podcast about for example how ai is lowering the barrier to entry overall and that especially benefits things like access to justice and just getting information into people's hands ah look yeah Alexa, you're talking my my language now. I think so. And I think that was one of the benefits of of introducing PLI ah to our patron base. and I know you know I had used it a lot in law firms and you know with the COE and the continuing legal education and all the rich content you have, but being able to take that information and um
Speaker: ah make it plain. I think that's where the force multiplier is for AI to simplify the information for people who want to ingest. And so that's an excellent point you make. Kara, did you want to add to that?
Speaker: Yeah, I was just going to comment going back to what Alexa said about you people want to search the way they think and just maybe almost like a more natural way of finding information than the way we many of us have learned. And they increasingly want resources that help them a quickly understand an issue. And that could be in, like we were discussing, illegal services space. It can be in a you know high pressure, big law firm. It all comes down to the same thing. You want answers that resources to help you understand the issue, put it in context, determine what to do next. and have some level of confidence that you're doing the right thing and that you're basing your decisions on sound, relational information. Um, and that's trusted guidance and that's, that's really kind of the basis of, of quality content. It's trusted expertise.
Speaker: How do you balance um that desire for sort of that immediacy and sort of that the that piece of getting to the information, right? We love that the content is there. We love that the technology and and and being able to get to that information quickly is is helpful for us now. um But, you know, how do we balance that that, that immediacy with making sure that it's authoritative? What are your kind of thoughts on on that, either one of you?
Speaker: Yeah. to jump either way we We both have good answers. Excellent. I love it. All the good answers. I think the answer to that question in some ways is evolving because this technology came on the scene so quickly. So I think we're learning as we go.
Speaker: Whoever thought of hallucinations with legal research, you know, ah you know even just what, five years ago. um so So I think one of the things we're seeing is, yeah, there's tools that are helping us see it answers very quickly, um very confident sounding, creating cases that sound very legitimate. um But we need it to be accurate, accurate we need it to be current, we need it to be verified. So I think that's one of the balances that individuals have to take on. You know, you want to get an answer quickly. i should say individuals and legal publishers also have a responsibility here.
Speaker: you know, as we're developing these tools, we can go ahead and, you know, work with them to give you answers, do everything we can to make sure it's as accurate as possible, but also give you the tools to verify it. I think everything needs an attribution so that, you know, whatever attorney or law student or whoever's working with it um can, I guess you could say, trust and verify. Yeah, and i'll just add to that that, you know, the The basis of PLIs, organization for nearly 100 years has really been the experts that we work with um and in keeping our content really grounded and that expertise um while also making it easy for people to find. You know you may not want to sit and sort through
Speaker: you know, hours and hours of content, um, to find your answer. And that's the balance we have to find is, is keeping that expertise that we're grounded in, but making it as easy for people to find what they're looking for. um and that's really what we're striving to do all the time. Cause we, we know that's, that's where everything is headed. Um, so I, I think that it's like kind of the middle ground sometimes if it's too easy and there's too much information, then AI has spit out, um it can slow you down because you sit there sorting through what what it's trying to say. um so it's it's finding that middle ground of providing the expertise, but in a way that people can easily consume it.
Speaker: Yeah, that's that's definitely having that balance. You want to get to the answer. I think Alexa mentioned that as fast as possible, but you know that's the trust factor as well, that you want to be able to trust the information that you're getting and finding that balance is a slippery slope and can be sometimes, but especially when you have the rich content that you all provide as well.
Speaker: So going to change up i'm going to take off my podcaster hat and I'm going to put on my law library director hat for this question. it and And when we're advocating for resources, the first question we often get is how much are people using it and then how much it costs, of course, which is an important question. But a resource that makes an attorney become a better leader, understand emerging technology, avoid a mistake, make a better decision, can current create tremendous value that isn't necessarily captured by a usage statistic.
Speaker: ah So for you, from your perspective, and ah I'll start with Kara on this, how should law librarians demonstrate return on investment and broader value of content to our stakeholders?
Speaker: That's a great question. um And I think there's a lot of ways to measure and report it, but we feel like the strongest measure is really the impact of of the content. um Did a student or an attorney find that reliable answer more quickly? Did the resource help someone identify or reduce a risk?
Speaker: um And that makes the library's contribution tangible. Use statistics are still very important. and We all understand that the data kind of rules, but I think the impact shouldn't be underestimated either.
Speaker: Yeah, I love that answer. um I say i love having data statistics. I'm a data geek, but if I can't tell a story around that data, then it's useless because our stakeholders you know don't want to us to get all granular with the clicks and things like that. They want to know the impact that it's making. So that's that's ah really on point.
Speaker: Alexa, did you want to add to that? Yeah, um everything Kara said. um And one of the reasons I think it's so important to pair the metrics with the outcome-based measures um is because as these tools and as technology continues to evolve, I think the discovery methods, I should say, continue to evolve. Those become more and more important because Activity alone isn't always what we're looking for. Like one of the biggest values for these tools is the fact that they're gonna make things more efficient. They're gonna deliver things quicker. So if you're just looking at the amount of time you spend in a tool, the amount of searches that you did, you may be losing sight of the value that those tools are are meant to provide.
Speaker: Yeah, one of the things that I will say, and I, again, just jumping in here that I personally know that is of value to my student population is the fact that things are so current, like they're constantly being updated. And that is a really valuable resource um for someone who still has print, right? Right.
Speaker: a lot of academics we still have print right law firms may not have as much print but we do and and i see ah andre's pointing to himself y'all don't see this but he's quite he's got the two thumbs pointing back at himself right now and in the county libraries they still got some print there um but yeah so we still got print on the shelf so when you know you've got something that's a 2026 publication that's really valuable to your students um especially when you're You know, I teach a lot of tech classes. So when they're looking at these tech resources and they're 2026 and they're going to write a paper on that topic, that's really a valuable tool for them. So I know, you know, we're thinking about return on investment. That is one of the things that if people are you know looking at my budget and they were going to say, hey, why are we paying for this? That's one of the things I know I would also mention. It's just when you know you've got a current resource, that's a really valuable tool, too.
Speaker: Absolutely. Yeah, that's ah pretty awesome. i I like to think of it, especially in relationship to a i I went to an AI conference and they they introduced that. It's called the Humane Approach. So it's H-U-M, capital A, capital I, Uh, and you start with people and then you have the process, uh, and then the technology and then the outcome. So I think you just kind of, kind of went through that stage. You talk about the people, how they use the content, what they use, use it for the value. Mm-hmm.
Speaker: process, of course, is their use case as well. as The technology combined with the content is the innovation and then the outcome. And that's that's where not only are they able to tell their story, but we're able to tell their story for them. So I think that's really powerful. And I love the way y'all treat that as well.
Speaker: All right. So I'm sad to say our time has quickly come to the end. I really enjoyed our conversation, but we always have our last question that we ask and we learned in part one, really just because of the nature of this conversation, we can't say five years. Because who knows what is going to happen with content in five years? Normally we're like, hey, let's project five years. We can't do that here. So we're going to ask you in one year from now,
Speaker: What will make legal content valuable and what should law librarians be prepared for? So I'm going to say looking down the road a bit because that keeps it nice and vague. But I agree five years is way too, way too long. So looking down the road a bit, the most valuable legal content will come from trust and sources. It will be continuously updated, as you pointed out.
Speaker: It will be AI consumable and it will connect across formats and platforms. Organizations that can combine that expert authorship, strong editorial processes and AI powered delivery will really be the best position. um As we mentioned earlier, information is becoming very abundant, but trust can be a bit scarce when there's just so much information and sometimes people don't know. Well, oftentimes people don't know where it's coming from. So, um
Speaker: that trusted basis of the information, i think will be will be the true core of the value. Great. Yeah, and i I think as we're looking down the road, um it is um helpful to view you know AI and all technology in the context of earlier technological shifts. um And this is especially for law librarians, because when the internet emerged, some people predicted that immediate access to information would make publishers and librarians much less necessary instead. We became that much more necessary um because it was overwhelming to have that much content. And I do think that we're seeing a similar shift, but you know with important differences. So while the internet may have changed how people found information, AI is changing how the information is synthesized and presented.
Speaker: And AI is kind of cool because it's able to repackage information, ah enable some sort of almost derivative product that's tailored to the user's specific needs or the user's specific questions. So I think law librarians are going to be essential to the future, just as they've always helped legal professionals navigate the transition from print to online, they're going to continue to help navigate the transition to AI and whatever other technologies we see. And I think this means continuing to utilize all the skills developed um and just keep engaging with the technologies as they emerge, because technology is going to change how expertise is delivered, but it's not going to remove the need for expertise.
Speaker: spoken from a true law librarian. And you all, I know that you listening cannot see this, but Andre literally did a happy dance. Yes, I did. During the answers to that question. There's a happy dance going on. Yeah. No, I think, you know, of course, this conversation and I'm going to age myself, but working in law libraries for 30 plus years and I've seen that shift. When I first started, the Internet was just coming around and you've seen these different things.
Speaker: paradigm shifts in legal information and low librarianship but we think we keep reinventing ourselves and we become more valuable and important um as as you know and and you know we're the adapters of technology and We're the the people who introduced the technology and the again how to interact with the content, what content should you be interacting with, and the value of the content. think we've touched on all of those aspects in our conversation today. day so
Speaker: So, Chiara, it's a pleasure meeting you. I have not i've met people all across the PLI spectrum. It's my first time meeting you. So it's great to meet you, Alexa. It's always great her to see you so well. I tend to go to my Amazon voice, Alexa, anytime I see you. No, we really appreciate you joining us today.
Speaker: Thank you. It's nice to meet you both too. Agreed. It's so nice sometimes, you know, yeah to, to meet some, some folks behind emails and such. it' So it's lovely. That will still be important in the future. yes I know. I feel like email will never go away. Yeah. And talking about their human. never i think that's I'm glad you say that but because I think that's one thing we want to make the relationship aspect in this AI age is definitely, and i know a lot of people use the term human in the loop when they're talking about AI, but i I like to say human at the helm. of it and that involves us you know having these conversations as well on how we interact with content so absolutely and that leads us back to yeah we've had two great conversations and we've heard lots of really important things we've had conversations about the future of legal content and how it isn't just you know simply about whether something is print or digital or ai powered um
Speaker: Yeah. like No, I think that's a a great point, Katie. I think it's about where the content is trusted, useful, contextual, accessible, and ultimately helps someone do something better.
Speaker: And that's where, and I think we just touched on that, where law librarians continue to have an incredibly important role. Yeah, we're not simply connecting people with the information. you know, we really are helping our organizations understand which information deserves their trust, um how it can be used effectively, and why quality content continues actually to have the most value.
Speaker: Yeah, I think the technology as we see on a day-to-day basis will continue to change. The way people search and learn will continue to change. Our definition of content itself will probably continue to change.
Speaker: Which brings us right back to where we started, meaning... Content is still king. But the kingdom is changing.
Speaker: Thank you all for listening to the double A double l all in podcast. Thank you again, Kara and Alexa. Have a great one. Thank you. Bye everyone.
Speaker: Thank you.
