courtesy
of
NetDocuments.
In
the
season
of
seemingly
never-ending
user
conferences,
the
NetDocuments
Inspire
conference
took
place
this
week
in
Scottsdale,
Arizona.
NetDocuments
is
one
of
the
leading
document
management
service
providers
and
is
finding
its
way
in
the
AI
landscape.
I
came
to
its
conference
frankly
wondering
whether
its
laser
product
focus
and
credibility
could
sustain
it
long
term
in
the
era
of
consolidation
of
functions
and
offerings.
I
still
don’t
know
the
answer.
The
Opening
Keynote
The
opening
keynote
was
primarily
given
by
Josh
Baxter,
NetDocuments
CEO,
along
with
Dan
Hauck,
its
Chief
Product
Officer.
In
the
era
of
bombastic,
over-the-top
keynotes
by
C-suite
legal
tech
bros
leaping
about
the
stage,
Baxter’s
approach
was
refreshing.
He
was
understated
and
spoke
in
a
calm,
credible
voice.
As
Baxter
put
it
when
I
met
with
him
separately,
“We’re
not
a
rock
band.”
Baxter
reflects
the
company
well.
NetDocuments
has
always
quietly
delivered
a
workman-like
document
management
system.
It
doesn’t
overpromise,
and
it
usually
overdelivers.
I
think
that’s
why
it
is
used
by
so
many
law
firms.
Its
team
can
walk
into
a
room
of
skeptical
lawyers
and
let
the
products
sell
themselves.
Too
often,
legal
tech
vendors
forget
that
at
the
end
of
the
day,
they
are
selling
to
lawyers
who
are
trained
to
be
skeptical
and
can
spot
bullshit
a
mile
away.
An
Apology
Baxter’s
opening
remarks
reflected
this
approach
and
the
company’s
attitude.
He
didn’t
start
by
touting
NetDocuments
successes;
he
started
by
taking
responsibility
for
an
outage
last
week
that
affected
NetDocuments
customers.
You
have
to
understand
how
that
played.
Baxter
was
talking
to
a
room
full
of
mostly
IT
people.
He
understood
that
when
systems
from
outside
vendors
fail,
angry
lawyers
who
know
little
about
technical
issues
flood
IT
personnel
with
demands
to
get
it
up
and
running
immediately.
Who
gets
the
blame
and
takes
the
beating?
The
IT
folks.
I
talked
to
some
of
them
afterwards
about
the
outage
who
confirmed
that
was
exactly
how
it
played
out.
Baxter
put
that
event
up
front
and
didn’t
sugarcoat
it.
The
Announcement
of
AI
Profile
The
product
announcement
portion
of
the
keynote
primarily
focused
on
a
new
tool
called
AI
Profile.
AI
Profile
is
designed
to
run
in
the
background
(it’s
no
coincidence
that
many
of
NetDocuments
tools
run
in
the
background
doing
nuts-and-bolts
work
day
after
day
that
the
user
rarely
notices).
It’s
designed
to
use
metadata
to
automatically
profile
the
critical
information
about
a
document,
so
that
users
can
drill
down
and
get
the
information
they
need.
This
enables
users
to
precisely
search
for
and
find
particular
documents
on
particular
issues.
Ahh
metadata,
I
haven’t
heard
that
term
much
lately.
The
problem
with
metadata
has
always
been
that
inputting
good
metadata
into
any
system
takes
time.
Lawyers
and
legal
professionals
aren’t
and
won’t
spend
the
time
to
input
critical
metadata
about
documents.
When
they
are
done
working
with
a
document,
they’re
done.
And
it
shouldn’t
be
surprising
that
this
is
the
case:
most
NetDocuments
customers
bill
by
the
hour.
Inputting
metadata
isn’t
billable.
The
second
problem?
Lawyers
by
nature
are
independent.
Which
means
10
lawyers
can
produce
the
same
document
and
call
it
10
different
things.
And
they
are
all
convinced
they
are
right.
And
as
one
of
the
placards
outside
the
session
rooms
put
it,
“Lawyers
didn’t
go
to
law
school
to
fill
out
metadata
fields.”
But
it’s
metadata
that
reveal
the
guts
of
a
document:
its
type,
its
unique
characteristics,
and
what
it
does.
So,
it’s
valuable
and
NetDocuments
seems
to
have
found
a
way
to
automate
its
collection.
How
Does
It
Work
and
What
Does
It
Do?
NetDocuments
has
created
a
prebuilt
taxonomy
and
document
attributes
to
profile
various
documents
based
on
working
with
experts
in
legal
taxonomy
and
data
extraction.
(The
taxonomy
can
also
be
customized
to
meet
particular
firm
needs.)
AI
Profile
will
look
at
a
document
and
fill
in
the
information
about
it
based
on
the
prebuilt
profile.
This
can
be
done
quickly
across
millions
of
documents.
Hauck
gave
an
example
of
the
preparation
of
a
cell
phone
tower
lease
agreement
in
Arizona.
With
profiling,
I
can
access
all
the
leases
for
cell
phone
towers
in
Arizona
the
firm
has
done
and
then
access
the
key
unique
clauses.
And
by
having
AI
tools
run
on
profiled
documents,
you
reduce
response
inaccuracies.
In
short,
according
to
Hauck,
“metadata
dramatically
improves
the
search
capabilities
of
AI.
We
are
doing
things
with
semantic
search
and
AI
search
to
be
able
to
carve
out
results
that
are
profoundly
impactful.”
It
overlays
“foundational
GenAI
capabilities
into
NetDocuments.”
But
Isn’t
This
Old
School?
But
Hauck
posed
the
question
that
was
running
through
my
mind,
especially
after
attending
some
recent
user
conferences:
“Isn’t
this
old
school?
Aren’t
there
amazing
tools
that
already
can
handle
unstructured
data?”
Hauck
says,
no,
there
aren’t
a
lot
of
tools
that
can
do
that,
at
least
quickly.
With
AI
Profile,
“You
can
formulate
a
generic
search
and
then
use
complex
metadata
to
look
for
something
specific
like
a
certain
kind
of
agreement
of
a
certain
deal
value.”
You
can
do
things
like
determining
how
many
times
a
lawyer
has
done
a
certain
task,
which
is
valuable
for
things
like
RFPs
and
bringing
the
right
expertise
to
the
table.
Without
profiling,
Hauck
says
AI
tools
can’t
do
that
accurately
and
quickly.
Using
the
filtered
metadata
is
also
important
for
security:
it
would
enable
users
to
find
and
ensure
the
protection
of
documents
containing,
say,
personally
identifiable
information
or
personal
health
records
and
place
those
documents
in
secure
folders.
NetDocuments’
Future
I
don’t
know
if
AI
Profile
will
do
what
Baxter
and
Hauck
say
it
will.
I
don’t
know
if
other
companies
that
offer
AI
tools
that
work
on
internal
and
external
data
can
intrude
on
the
document
management
space
and
take
over
that
function.
I
don’t
know
if
someday
NetDocuments
will
be
acquired
by
a
company
that
offers
AI
tools
for
external
data
to
catch
up
with
competition.
Or
if
NetDocuments
might
become
the
acquirer.
But
what
I
can
tell
you
is
that
tech
companies
that
are
laser
focused
on
one
thing
typically
do
it
well
because
of
that
focus.
NetDocuments
isn’t
trying
to
take
over
the
legal
tech
world.
As
Baxter
put
it,
“We’re
not
going
to
deliver
every
capability
from
the
business
of
law
to
the
practice
of
law.”
What
it
is
doing
is
trying
to
solve
frustration
points
in
document
retention
and
management.
It’s
trying
to
help
lawyers
and
legal
professionals
use
their
documents
and
internal
content
in
new
and
valuable
ways.
Hauck
told
me
NetDocuments
wants
“to
give
them
the
ability
to
access
content
at
the
right
moment
in
the
right
way.
With
AI
capabilities
that
are
built
into
the
experience,”
instead
of
being
the
experience
like
others
seem
to
want
to
do.
Baxter
added,
“We
believe
there
is
still
this
world
where
meeting
users
where
they
are
is
valuable.”
So,
I
can’t
answer
whether
NetDocuments
can
remain
a
player
by
offering
a
document
management
product,
as
comprehensive
as
it
is,
especially
when
we
may
be
approaching
the
era
of
tech
Walmarts.
But
its
credibility
and
history
of
offering
good
products
makes
it
a
valued
and
trusted
partner
to
many
law
firms.
And
that
fact
alone
may
sustain
it
for
the
time
being,
even
as
other
vendors
promise
products
that
can
do
more
across
various
disciplines.
Stephen
Embry
is
a
lawyer,
speaker,
blogger,
and
writer.
He
publishes TechLaw
Crossroads,
a
blog
devoted
to
the
examination
of
the
tension
between
technology,
the
law,
and
the
practice
of
law.