THOUGHTS ON THE AI-NATIVE PRACTICE OF LAW

Servient Blog

Articles on AI Adoption, Trust, eDiscovery, and Legal Research for the Modern Legal Practice

Case Law

A Producing Party Cannot Wait for the Other Side to Draft Its Search Terms

A producing party must run a reasonable search whether or not its opponent proposes search terms first, the Southern District of New York holds.

Case Law

A Litigation Hold Is Only the Start: Sanctions for Lost Teams Messages and Surveillance Video

An Indiana court sanctioned a rehab facility under Rule 37(e)(1) for losing Teams messages and surveillance video despite a prompt litigation hold.

Case Law

An ESI Protocol Cannot Contract Around Rule 34

A Western District of Washington court held that an agreed ESI protocol's custodian list cannot shrink a party's Rule 34 duty to collect relevant documents.

Case Law

Refusing to Run a Hit Report Cost a Producing Party the Argument That It Had Nothing

The Delaware Court of Chancery held that a producing party who withdrew its offer of a hit report cannot lean on the untested claim that it had nothing.

Case Law

A Request That Named No Format Got Rule 34's Default

A District of Rhode Island magistrate refused to order an itemized index of a production and applied Rule 34's default form of production instead.

Case Law

The Preservation Request That Was Too Precise to Help

A pro se plaintiff's spoliation motion fails: the prison preserved exactly the ten-minute video window he asked for, and the incident fell just outside it.

Case Law

Slipsheets Do Not Satisfy a Family-Integrity Clause

An ESI protocol requiring parent-child relationships to be preserved does not let a producer slipsheet out attachments it deems non-responsive.

Case Law

A Rule 502(d) Order Is Not There for the Asking

Judge Bates refused a Rule 502(d) no-waiver order over the plaintiffs' objection and ordered a tiered hyperlink procedure into the ESI protocol.

Case Law

Fabricated Documents, Undone by Their Metadata, Cost a Supplier Its $840 Million Case Against Amazon

A Vietnamese supplier's $840M case against Amazon was dismissed with prejudice after metadata exposed its purchase orders as print-to-PDF fabrications.

Case Law

Broad ESI Duties, Measured Sanctions

An E.D. Pa. magistrate judge ordered ESI from personal devices and departed employees produced, yet declined case-ending sanctions despite the factors.

Case Law

Rule 37(e) Prejudice Has No Fixed Burden of Proof, the Tenth Circuit Holds

The Tenth Circuit held that Rule 37(e) fixes the burden of proving prejudice from lost ESI on no one, leaving courts discretion to allocate it.

Case Law

The FTC Gets a Look Inside Uber's TAR Training Set

A California magistrate judge ordered Uber to produce a random 300-document sample of its TAR training set, putting the coding calls behind AI review to the test.

Case Law

A Court Backs Keyword Culling Before GenAI Review and Turns Away an AI Audit

A California magistrate judge denied motions to bar keyword culling before GenAI review and to audit its metrics, an early map for defending AI review.

AI Strategy & Adoption

How AI is Bringing Back the Dictaphone Era of Law Practice

AI agents are taking on more of the production. The attorney's role concentrates around initial guidance, review, and verification. Voice fits that work.

AI Trust & Accuracy

When AI Hallucinations Hide Inside Real Citations

A Sixth Circuit decision shows AI hallucinations can hide inside genuine citations. What this means for reasonable diligence under Rule 11.

AI Trust & Accuracy

Confident, Plausible, and Completely Wrong - A Case Study in Why Legal AI Must be Grounded

Case study that delivers a wake up call for the importance of AI being grounded in law for use in legal.

AI Strategy & Adoption

What Legal Can Learn About AI From Enterprise IT

By looking at success from other industries legal can learn adoptive strategies for AI implementation.

AI Strategy & Adoption

From Criticism to Competency: How Attorneys Are Rethinking AI Use

Attorneys are rethinking their peer judgement of the use of AI.

AI Strategy & Adoption

Will 2026 be the Year Law Firms Build True Generative AI Modernization?

Will law firms adopt AI with the same commitment as other professional service firms?

eDiscovery

Why Legal Technology Leaders Are Rediscovering eDiscovery in the Age of AI

Legal technology leaders are now placing renewed interest in eDiscovery solutions because of Generative AI applications.

AI Strategy & Adoption

From Shadow AI to Business Strategy: The Importance of Guiding Your Firm's AI Adoption

Shadow AI represents both risk and opportunity. Unmanaged AI adoption can lead to ethical violations.

eDiscovery

How Generative AI Will Reshape eDiscovery From the Ground Up

Generative AI offers more than just a substitute for transitional classifiers.

AI Trust & Accuracy

Setting Realistic Standards for AI in Legal Practice

Thoughtful metrics are key to fairly evaluating AI in legal practice.

AI Trust & Accuracy

Redefining "Reasonable" Legal Fees in the AI Era

The increasing use of generative AI in legal practice leads to questions about efficiency gains and legal fees.

AI Strategy & Adoption

GenAI in Legal Tech: Field Notes from Legalweek and ABA Techshow

Insights into how Generative AI continues to reshape the legal technology landscape.

eDiscovery

Spring 2025 Release of AI Canvas: The AI Easy Button

The Spring 2025 Legal AI Canvas release prioritizes better usability for lawyers.

AI Strategy & Adoption

The Value of Single Pane of Glass Technology For Legal AI

Understanding SPOG: The Value of Single Pane of Glass Technology to Legal.

AI Trust & Accuracy

Why Legal-Specific AI Makes Validation Efficient, Not Burdensome

AI tools specifically designed for the legal industry can resolve the efficiency paradox.

Legal Research

Good Law in the Age of AI: How Citation Systems Established in the 1800s Remain Fundamental to AI-Powered Legal Research

Discover how century-old citator tools impact AI legal research.

AI Strategy & Adoption

The Power of Starting Simple: AI in Legal Practice

Learn to implement AI in legal practice through a measured, step-by-step approach.

Legal Research

The Evolution of Legal Research: From Case Digests to AI Innovation

Legal research has come a long way from its origins in medieval England.

AI Strategy & Adoption

AI Agents and Agentic Workflows: A Defining Difference

AI agents and agentic workflows are two terms receiving quite a bit of attention in legal tech.

AI Strategy & Adoption

Lost in Translation: Combatting Technical Myths in Legal AI

Complex technical generative AI concepts often get misinterpreted between developers and legal practitioners.

eDiscovery

Preserving Chat Data: Takeaways from the Google Play Store Case

Chat is becoming an essential source of data for eDiscovery.