ChatGPT won a lawsuit

If you’ve ever thought about moonlighting as a law school professor, this week’s Q&A is for you. Raise the Bar has the inside scoop on what it takes to land an adjunct teaching gig and prep for class, plus some thoughts on how it can impact your legal career. 

If you’re more of a “the world is my classroom” person, we’ve got info on how to raise your profile by sharing your expertise in the community through your bar association’s speakers’ bureau, and details on YouTube’s new podcast rankings.

We’re also taking a look at the different ways you can bill clients for travel time. And if you’re curious why half your LinkedIn feed is suddenly trying to sell you “vertically integrated AI solutions,” you’re going to want to check out the article on venture capital’s obsession with legal tech. 

One swell foop. @lawyerthings_ on Insta rounds up the dumbest things ever said in court. 

Penguins beware. If you break the law in Antarctica, you’ll be prosecuted in Hawaii. Hat tip to Raffi Melkonian (a must follow on Bluesky) for this little bit of trivia. 

Will the players wear wigs now? This British law firm just bought the naming rights to a stadium.

Is the Pope Catholic? Yep, and he's also kind of a lawyer. 

Catch me up. The legal battle between Blake Lively and Justin Baldoni now involves Taylor Swift and Deadpool? 

From the courtroom to the classroom

When Richard Ramones was a kid, he wanted to be a high school history teacher. He ended up going to law school and working on CHS’s corporate compliance and international leadership team instead, but he has also found his way into the classroom at St. Thomas Law School in Minneapolis. Today, he’s educating Raise the Bar about what it takes to be an adjunct professor. -Emily Kelchen

During the day you work as in-house counsel. At night, you teach a class on the role of in-house counsel. Does doing one automatically qualify you to do the other? 

I wish it were that simple. I started thinking seriously about teaching after guest lecturing in a class on the role of in-house counsel taught by Jonathan Broder at Temple. (Jon was the general counsel who hired me for my first in-house role, and has been an amazing mentor ever since.) I loved speaking to Jon’s class, so when I moved to Minnesota and my employer had connections to St. Thomas, I jumped at the opportunity to teach a similar course. 

I met with the associate dean of academic affairs, and with her guidance and support, I drafted a course proposal. A committee at the law school reviewed and approved it, then the real fun began!

That sounds like a lot of work. 
Take the amount of time and effort you believe it may take to prepare to teach a class and double it. The first year everything needed to be created from scratch. Lesson planning and ensuring the right amount of reading materials, drafting in-class hypotheticals and scenarios, preparing lesson notes, drafting written assignments for the class, lining up guest speakers. All that and preparing for and lecturing during class and reviewing and grading assignments throughout the semester took me 10 to 15 hours a week. After that first year, I was able to be more efficient by recycling some materials or improving upon others. I now spend approximately 6 to 10 hours a week on adjunct duties. 

Does your company view your adjunct work as a positive, or have you had to justify the time commitment?
Balancing teaching with work has its challenges, and I would not be able to pursue this professional and personal passion of mine without the support of leadership in our legal and compliance department. In fact some of my students’ favorite guest speakers have been my CHS colleagues!

I also believe teaching has helped me grow into a better business professional and lawyer.  The skills needed to digest and relay complex, legal, business and management concepts to law students are similar to the skills and experience I draw from to provide practical, efficient and business-driven advice to various stakeholders. 

And I have to ask, do you make a lot of money as an adjunct? 
I get a lot of joy and energy from it. And I keep all the “thank you” cards I have received from students—they’re a memento I will appreciate forever.

Monetizing your miles 

If you weren’t in the car, you’d be at your desk working. That’s the justification for billing clients for your travel time (and waiting in court for your case to be called), but how much to bill is up for debate. ABA Formal Opinion 93-379 reminds us to avoid “clearly excessive fees” and to ensure our billing practices reflect actual services rendered, but that isn’t a hard and fast rule. In the article linked below, Attorney Jordan Rothman reviews the pros and cons of various policies for billing travel time that he has used during his career, noting that this is one area where practices vary and there is no one right way of doing things.

Why this matters: Billing for travel time is ethically permissible—but only if it’s reasonable, disclosed and documented. As long as your client knows and agrees to your billing policy, anything goes. Just remember that double billing (e.g., charging one client for travel while simultaneously billing another for a phone call during that drive) is a hard ethical no-go. (Above the Law)

ChatGPT lit the fuse for a legal tech boom

Legal tech is booming, with nearly $1 billion invested in the space so far this year, following a record $2 billion in 2024. This is a big deal according to Zach Posner, cofounder and managing partner of The LegalTech Fund, who says the rest of the VC market is “really sleepy” right now. Posner says the market is reacting to attorneys’ eager embrace of ChatGPT, which made investors realize there’s room for more than a couple companies “built by former lawyers solving problems they knew.”

Why this matters: More investment means more products are on their way. Experts say the next wave of success will go to startups solving very specific legal problems, like software designed just for reviewing real estate leases. It will be interesting to see what practice areas attract the most investment. (Business Insider)

Lawyers make it near top of YouTube’s podcast chart 

Apple and Spotify have released lists of their top podcasts for years. Now YouTube is doing the same, and there are several legal podcasts in the top 100. The highest ranking (as of this writing) is the "Lawyer You Know." During each episode, host Peter Tragos, a personal injury lawyer from Florida, breaks down big cases, often going into way more detail than you would see when these same cases are covered by traditional news media. 

Why this matters: YouTube is the most popular platform for consuming podcasts, so the fact that they are putting out this chart is a big deal. Thanks to YouTube’s view counters, anyone can now easily track what sort of content is drawing people’s attention, and tweak their own podcast episodes in response. (CNBC)

• New federal law criminalizes deepfake porn 
• Police in the Big Easy used facial recognition to track suspects
• ChatGTP wins lawsuit filed after it hallucinated about a radio host
• Sec. Noem wants to get rid of habeas corpus... once she figures out what it is
• The best place to see everything going on in immigration law, all in one place

Step up to the mic

Whether you rely on referrals or Google searches to reach your target audience, joining your local bar association’s speakers bureau can be a surprisingly effective way to boost your visibility. Whether you’re presenting to community groups, business associations or fellow lawyers seeking CLE credit, public speaking can help build your reputation by subtly showcasing your expertise. As an added bonus, many of these engagements are picked up by local media or posted online by the hosting organization, which means you’re not just talking to the room, you’re getting extra exposure and quality links back to your website or social media accounts. 

Why this matters: Nearly every bar association has a speakers bureau, but few attorneys take advantage of this member benefit. We’re linking to the Florida Bar below as an example because you can sign up to speak on a substantive area of law or volunteer to be part of their Benchmarks program that trains lawyers to give talks on basic civics. Check out what Florida’s doing, then look to see if your local bar or Inns of Court has something similar. (The Florida Bar)

Thank you for reading Raise The Bar.

Every Thursday, you'll hear from our team about the most pressing issues facing legal practices today. We'll also try to include some quick-hit reads that touch on interesting cases and precedents being set worldwide. 

Have anything you'd like us to cover? Send an email raisethebar@mynewsletter.co

Raise the Bar is curated and written by Emily Kelchen and edited by Bianca Prieto.