Written by Tom Gordon
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The U.S. Army’s Fort Drum, in upstate New York, is home to about 13,000 soldiers and their families. Derek Distenfield is a soldier stationed at Fort Drum. After eleven years of service, Distenfield will be leaving the Army in September. Distenfield noticed that Fort Drum had a higher divorce rate than most military bases and decided that in his post-military career he would do something to help his fellow soldiers with divorce and other legal problems they face.

Written by Danny Foster
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Recently, we wrote a guest post for our friends over at UpCounsel on Fee Sharing, Innovation, and the Consumer Interest.  You’ll have to click through to read the whole thing, but (briefly) the argument runs as follows:

Written by Tom Gordon

Richard Zorza has an excellent blog post this week on a new program announced in New York Chief Judge Lippman’s 2014 State of the Judiciary Speech. The Court Navigator pilot program will provide “trained volunteer non-lawyers” to help unrepresented New Yorkers in Brooklyn and the Bronx navigate Housing Court and consumer debt cases. Here at Responsive Law, we have long argued that providing consumers with non-lawyer options for legal assistance is a core issue for providing real access to justice throughout society. We applaud Chief Judge Lippman’s continued efforts to address the legal needs of the most vulnerable New Yorkers.

Written by Jen Roy

Groupon and Living Social are two companies which represent one of the most popular business models of the internet age. These companies offer discount certificates through online daily deal (“daily deal”) emails usable for products or services at local or national companies. These deals have restrictions on when you can use them, what locations will honor them, and what exactly the deal entitles the owner to. The deal company gives approximately 50% of the proceeds to the participating business and retains the other half. For example, a common deal is to pay $10 for $25 worth of food at a local restaurant or $10 for two movie tickets. The restaurant or movie theatre would get half of the amount paid and the company advertising the daily deal would receive the other half.

A recent New York Times article describes advances that allow computers do much of the work lawyers do in complex litigation where there are millions of documents and emails that need to be reviewed before trial. But computers can also help simplify everyday legal matters such as wills, divorces, and bankruptcies.