As
Legalweek
kicked
off
its
furious
four-day
legal
tech
bonanza,
legal
AI
darling
Harvey
festooned
the
annual
awards
gathering
with
black
balloons
emblazoned
with
the
Harvey
logo.
I
didn’t
go
to
the
awards,
but
I
heard
that
attendees
were
asked
to
pop
these
balloons
to
find
one
containing
a
prize.
If
I
were
a
legal
AI
wrapper
with
a
valuation
somewhere
around
the
GDP
of
Liechtenstein,
I’m
not
sure
I’d
invite
the
optics
of
a
literal
AI
bubble
pop.
Indeed,
I
might
steer
away
from
the
imagery
of
empty
inflation
altogether.
But
I
guess
they
need
to
find
some
way
to
spend
all
that
money
they’ve
raised
and
I
guess
it’s
going
straight
into
that
Party
City
balloon
budget.
It’s
symbolism
that
a
novelist
might
dismiss
as
too
heavy
handed.
Luckily,
reality
doesn’t
have
to
worry
about
literary
critics.
Harvey
is
certainly
riding
high.
As
is
its
chief
rival
Legora,
which
raised
another
$550
million
this
week.
But
we’re
barely
more
than
a
month
removed
from
Anthropic
crashing
the
legal
tech
industry
by
vibecoding
a
“Legal”
plugin
that
scans
Wikipedia.
Anthropic’s
new
tool
didn’t
turn
out
to
be
ready
for
primetime,
but
as
a
warning
shot,
it
put
the
legal
sector
on
notice
that
the
big
AI
players
can
swoop
in
and
drink
this
milkshake
whenever
they
decide
to
get
serious
about
it.
Something’s
got
to
give,
right?
One
theory
I’d
overlooked,
but
that
might
make
sense
of
it
all,
is
that
investors
might
be
betting
that
these
companies
will
get
sucked
up
by
OpenAI
or
Anthropic
once
they
cash
in
at
the
stock
market.
Under
this
logic,
money
keeps
flowing
into
these
companies
because
investors
see
it
as
backdoor
access
to
the
big
player
gravy
train.
An
intriguing
possibility…
because
if
and
when
one
of
the
leading
AI
manufacturers
wants
to
get
into
the
legal
market,
incumbent
clients
could
prove
key.
But
is
it
billions
upon
billions
of
dollars
key?
A
decade
ago,
Legalweek
—
then
called
Legaltech
NY
—
was
derisively
called
“eDiscovery
week”
because
document
review
drowned
out
most
other
legal
tech
applications.
In
2026,
it’s
undeniably
“AI
week”
(and
there’s
a
word
cloud
to
prove
it).
Though
after
an
intense
week
of
AI
talk,
there
aren’t
really
any
answers.
The
literal
bubble
may
have
popped,
but
the
figurative
one
still
grows
tantalizingly
larger
by
the
day,
raising
questions
up
and
down
the
market.
Many
of
my
interviews
talked
like
betters
gearing
up
for
March
Madness,
except
instead
of
points
scored,
the
over/under
line
was
set
at
how
many
of
the
vendors
in
the
exhibit
hall
won’t
exist
in
24
months.
Whether
a
product
of
consolidation
or
losing
out,
most
people
envision
the
majority
of
the
exhibit
hall
roster
will
be
the
answer
to
a
trivia
question
a
couple
years
from
now.
But
what
about
the
foundation
of
this
market?
Whenever
I
would
ask
about
the
fact
that
that
hundreds
of
billions
of
dollars
in
value
seem
to
be
entirely
supported
by
a
closed
loop
of
IOUs
between
NVIDIA,
Oracle,
Microsoft,
etc.
not
unlike
a
6th
grade
science
textbook
explaining
the
water
cycle,
the
standard
response
was
a
nervous
chuckle.
And
that’s
with
no
one
even
mentioning
that
the
federal
government
has
declared
a
holy
war
against
Anthropic
and
claims
—
dubiously,
but
nonetheless
—
that
any
company
dealing
with
the
government
has
to
cut
ties
with
arguably
the
best
model
out
there.
On
that
note,
more
providers
openly
talked
about
using
smaller
language
models,
citing
cost
and
improved
precision
to
the
task
at
hand.
But
one
was
willing
to
come
right
out
and
say
“to
control
our
own
destiny.”
Even
if
the
provider
wasn’t
touting
small
models,
the
days
of
“we
have
an
exclusive
relationship
with
[insert
AI
big
dog
here]”
are
gone.
Two
years
ago,
that
was
the
flex,
but
now
it
reads
as
a
liability.
Everyone
plays
the
field…
or
at
least
wants
customers
to
know
they
are
capable
of
playing
the
field.
Because
whatever
happens
with
the
top
level
of
the
industry,
the
lawyers
are
starting
to
get
too
dependent
upon
AI
for
it
to
disappear.
In
the
latest
installment
of
the
General
Counsel
Report
from
Relativity
and
FTI,
GenAI
adoption
among
corporate
legal
departments
jumped
from
44
percent
to
87
percent
in
a
single
year.
That’s
a
Blackberry-level
adoption
rate.
But
Blackberry
isn’t
around
anymore,
even
if
emailing
associates
with
urgent
requests
at
4
a.m.
remains.
In
this
way,
Legalweek
was
a
tale
of
two
AI
conferences.
Half
the
conversation
excitedly
speculated
about
agent
swarms
or
the
promise
of
vibecoding,
while
the
other
half
more
or
less
took
all
the
bleeding-edge
stuff
as
beyond
their
control,
instead
talking
about
what
makes
for
a
working
legal
application.
It’s
a
bit
of
a
Braveheart
outlook:
“they
may
take
our
specific
workflow
tasks,
but
they
will
never
take…
our
DATA
MOAT!”
Or
whatever
it
is.
The
catalog
of
vetted
research,
or
the
informed
data
structuring,
or
just
the
human
intelligence
oversight
—
there’s
something
they
claim
imbues
the
model
with
the
soul
of
a
lawyer.
Or
whatever
the
equivalent
of
“a
soul”
is
for
a
lawyer.
Joe
Patrice is
a
senior
editor
at
Above
the
Law
and
co-host
of
Thinking
Like
A
Lawyer.
Feel
free
to email
any
tips,
questions,
or
comments.
Follow
him
on Twitter or
Bluesky
if
you’re
interested
in
law,
politics,
and
a
healthy
dose
of
college
sports
news.
Joe
also
serves
as
a
Managing
Director
at
RPN
Executive
Search.