The colossus International Legal Technology Association (ILTA) Conference kicked off with an evening reception yesterday at the Gaylord Hotel and Convention Center in National Harbor, Maryland for the 45th time. ILTA is a global, volunteer-led organization that aspires to serve legal professionals and organizations through education, networking, and sharing innovative solutions. ILTA focuses on fostering knowledge and community around the effective use of technology in law practice.
Everything about this Conference is big; in fact it may be the biggest legal tech conference that there is. The Conference is well planned and professional although sometimes borders on being a bit over the top. It’s at a performance level equal to most large non legal tech conferences I attend.
The Numbers
Here’s the numbers as of the opening sessions; the scale is impressive by any measure:
- 4477 total attendees from 30 countries tops last year
- 1977 full member attendees
- 233 booths in the Exhibit Hall with 27 startups represented.
These numbers exceeded all expectations according to Dawn Hudgins, ILTA’s Chief Experience Officer and is the most well attended such conference ILTA has ever had. This year’s theme is a somewhat schmaltzy pirate motif concept. There is even a cheeky video on the ILTA website trumpeting the theme and attempting to link it to the conference offerings in some fashion. Of course, I write about this stuff so forgive for being a little jaded.
The conference certainly dwarfs in size at least the ABA Legal Tech Show of which I have been a part. Only the ALM’s Legal Week comes close in size and scope among legal tech conferences.
The Content
This year’s content will of course focus on AI. Indeed, Doug Austin of eDiscovery Today every year runs the agenda thought his word cloud generator. The word AI appeared 167 times, 100 times more than last year. If you add the words GenAI and artificial intelligence you get 184 total times. On the other hand, the word privacy occurs only 6 times, suggesting we’ve collectively surrendered any hope of privacy. In addition to the AI dominated sessions, there are also sessions on deep fakes, the dark web, data minimization issues and even generational differences. The offerings pretty much run the gambit.
The Vendors
Also, as usual, we can expect numerous product announcements, meetings and demonstrations. There have already been a slew of announcements in advance of the conference as vendors seek to demo their latest wares once the conference kicks in. LexisNexis has announced Protégé General AI, Thomson Reuters announced CoCounsel Legal, and Harvey and Wolters Kluwer announced a licensing agreement. The latter announcement is interesting as Harvey appears to be moving from a stealth provider to big law to more mainstream as I have previously discussed. Indeed, there are Harvey placards and screen presence all over the convention center and it sponsored the opening reception last night. Other vendors plan their announcements at the conference for maximum visibility.
And of course there are the vendor parties that have become standard at most legal tech shows.
The Keynotes and a Book Signing
The conference features three keynotes including one by the author Ryan Campbell entitled What’s Your Pink Cadillac? The Transformational Power of Prioritizing Joy. Lawyers prioritizing joy sounds a little Pollyannaish. Like the keynotes in many conferences, I attend this one is the standard “overcoming adversity“ from someone who has done some extraordinary things while overcoming various seemingly overwhelming challenges.
The second one is from Reena SenGupta, founder of RSGI Limited and well known consultant. It’s entitled Helping the Legal Industry to Create a Sustainable Future. The final one is a recap of the multiple private sessions of the CIOS of Amlaw 100 and 200 firms.
There is also a book signing for the ILTA book, Lessons in Leadership. The book is an anthology of personal leadership stories authored by members of LTA and was released in celebration of ILTA’s 45th anniversary, the collection showcases 18 ILTA members.
The Attendees
While ILTA is open to firms of all sizes, its attendees appear to come from larger law firms. But, like most legal tech conferences, there are few practicing lawyers here. The attendees are typically CIOs, COOs, IT personnel, innovation officers, legal operations professionals and the vendors who market and sell to these folks.
But all too often missing from the group is the lawyers, the actual users of many of the products being offered
But all too often missing from the group is the lawyers, the actual users of many of the products being offered. The lawyers no doubt consider themselves too busy and too important to attend a conference where business development opportunities appear slim. This even though technology and more significantly AI promises to change what they do forever.
The exhibit floor reflects this attendee mix. It’s a floor for selling and demos to fairly knowledgeable people. Often, however the pitches are not to the final decision makers but on those who report to the final decision makers in law firms.
As a result, the pitches often have to be repeated by those with technical knowledge who have heard them with to lawyer decisions makers who don’t have the same level of technical expertise. Something inevitably gets lost in the translation. The result can be the purchase of products that don’t address a pain point, don’t work as expected and enhance lawyer suspicion of technology. But that’s not ILTA’s or the attendee’s fault.
ILTA’s Niche
ILTA has established itself as the conference for large and mid-size law firms. That’s why they shell out the dollars to have their personnel who are not lawyers attend. This disconnect between the people using the technology and the people buying it creates an interesting dynamic that plays out across every booth on the ILTA floor.
ILTA’s Conference is a hands-on conference for those who work with law firms and technology, but the ultimate users remain notably absent.
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