Reposted by Danny Wilf-TownsendNoah Kazis @noahkazis.bsky.social · 28/09/2026I have mostly switched to lurking here but some words are so good they must be shared. “Surface the viscerality of parking and of religion” 1227
Danny Wilf-Townsend @dannywt.bsky.social · 15/09/2026After reading this, I wanted to know what the numbers would look like with more recent draft law review articles posted to SSRN. So I put a sample of 200 of them through Pangram 4, and found 57 papers with some AI use, 36 of which had >5% of their text from AI: wilftownsend.net/how-many-rec...wilftownsend.netHow many recently drafted law review articles are written with AI? A quick examination.AI use in legal scholarship may not be the most important AI topic being discussed these days, but it is having a moment in the corners of the world that care about these things. Julian Nyarko has an ... 159
Danny Wilf-Townsend @dannywt.bsky.social · 25/08/2026Excited to be back in New Haven for the academic year, visiting at YLS. Let me know if you come to town! So far I've had pizza three times in ten days, it's going to be work to keep that pace up. 010
Danny Wilf-Townsend @dannywt.bsky.social · 02/06/2026Very happy to see this study finally made available publicly. In my many conversations with law professors about AI over the last few months, this study is the one that I have found most consistently helps people update their worldview about AI capabilities. 030
Danny Wilf-Townsend @dannywt.bsky.social · 21/04/2026This is tangential, but I wonder how the idea / expression distinction will hold up over time with generated AI. Expressing an idea used to be costly, typically taking effort and often some creativity. What happens when ideas serve as prompts and expression is cheap or free, and easily iterated? 010
Danny Wilf-Townsend @dannywt.bsky.social · 17/02/2026New post up about what I think is an under-discussed problem: the low visibility that we collectively have into responsible AI use by legal professionals. We have lots of data points about hallucinations, but many fewer public discussions of responsible uses, even though ... 110
Danny Wilf-Townsend @dannywt.bsky.social · 09/02/2026A periodic update about the frequency and intensity of AI use in legal practice: Thomson Reuters reports that 55% of generative AI users at law firms use it at least daily, with 30% multiple times a day: 110
Danny Wilf-Townsend @dannywt.bsky.social · 20/01/2026Happy to see a cameo here from one of my favorite tests in all of the law: whether a procedural rule is really a procedural rule depends on whether it "really regulates procedure." 030
Reposted by Danny Wilf-TownsendJP Collins @profjpc.bsky.social · 08/01/2026Imagine, there are still people who think the United States should switch to the metric system and abandon common sense units of measurement like this 2215
Reposted by Danny Wilf-TownsendChristopher Mims @mims.bsky.social · 26/12/2025some good climate/energy news: * 96% of new US power capacity was carbon-free in 2024 (56 gigawatts!) * 2025 included the first month ever when 51% of power on the U.S. grid was carbon-free * The golbal trend is overwhelming: The world is now investing more $ in clean energy than fossil fuels 131141416
Reposted by Danny Wilf-TownsendDanny Wilf-Townsend @dannywt.bsky.social · 18/12/2025I have a new post out in @lawfaremedia.org today about continual learning, the goal of many AI developers to build tools that can learn from their users. That technology could have many uses, but also will challenge existing ways we are trying to regulate AI. www.lawfaremedia.org/article/when...lawfaremedia.orgWhen AI Models Can Continually Learn, Will Our Regulations Be Able to Keep Up?Regulation has already been hard enough for static AI models. 141
Danny Wilf-Townsend @dannywt.bsky.social · 18/12/2025I have a new post out in @lawfaremedia.org today about continual learning, the goal of many AI developers to build tools that can learn from their users. That technology could have many uses, but also will challenge existing ways we are trying to regulate AI. www.lawfaremedia.org/article/when...lawfaremedia.orgWhen AI Models Can Continually Learn, Will Our Regulations Be Able to Keep Up?Regulation has already been hard enough for static AI models. 141
Reposted by Danny Wilf-TownsendLawfare @lawfaremedia.org · 18/12/2025Regulating static AI models is already difficult and if AI tools will become ones that can learn, regulations will need to adapt quickly. @dannywt.bsky.social explores what new regulatory approaches could look like in a future where change is common and comes fast.lawfaremedia.orgWhen AI Models Can Continually Learn, Will Our Regulations Be Able to Keep Up?Regulation has already been hard enough for static AI models. 4126
Danny Wilf-Townsend @dannywt.bsky.social · 09/12/2025A thoughtful thread on the Netflix / Warner Bros merger. I think the points about consumer preferences are particularly important — it’s sometimes hard, but often important, to tease apart when law and policy arguments are inflected by different preferences about product features 010
Danny Wilf-Townsend @dannywt.bsky.social · 06/10/2025An update for Sonnet 4.5, released last week: it scored 60.2% on my final exam (with extended thinking on, 54.4% without it). That's a big step up (~20 percentage points) from Opus 4.1's scores, and puts Sonnet 4.5 close to, if slightly behind, other lead models. On a human curve, that's ~ an A-/B+ 030
Danny Wilf-Townsend @dannywt.bsky.social · 03/10/2025One other note: across the five exam answers and dozens of answer evaluations generated here, I did not notice a single hallucination. This test wasn't designed to measure hallucination rates, but it's consistent with the general sense that they have dropped significantly 120
Reposted by Danny Wilf-TownsendAlex Hemmer @ahemmer.bsky.social · 01/10/2025Our office is again hiring one or more attorneys for a one-year fellowship to work directly with the Illinois Solicitor General and her team, beginning in August/September 2026. www.governmentjobs.com/careers/ilag...governmentjobs.comJob Opportunities | Office of the Illinois Attorney General 21617
Danny Wilf-Townsend @dannywt.bsky.social · 01/10/2025For my latest round of informal tests of large language models, I looked at how good different models are at taking a law school exam—and also whether they are capable of grading exam answers in a consistent and reasonably accurate way. 🧵 www.wilftownsend.net/p/chatgpt-ta...wilftownsend.netChatGPT takes—and grades—my law school examThe latest round of informal testing of large language models on legal questions 110
Danny Wilf-Townsend @dannywt.bsky.social · 29/09/2025It was very nice to have two of my recent articles featured in JOTWELL reviews this month—Maureen Carroll on "Deterring Unenforceable Terms," courtslaw.jotwell.com/should-draft... and @margotkaminski.bsky.social on "The Deletion Remedy" cyber.jotwell.com/ai-disgorgem...courtslaw.jotwell.comShould drafters be penalized for clearly unenforceable terms? - Courts LawDaniel Wilf-Townsend, Deterring Unenforceable Terms, 111 Va. L. Rev. __ (forthcoming 2025), available at SSRN (June 6, 2024).Maureen CarrollMost of us (if not all) have entered a contract with one or ... 131
Danny Wilf-Townsend @dannywt.bsky.social · 12/08/2025A nice quick read from my colleague @JonahPerlin about an issue that I see a lot of people oversimplifying: whether an attorney's use of a generative AI tool waives privilege. This is an area where I'm very interested to see how the law develops. news.bloomberglaw.com/us-law-week/...news.bloomberglaw.comNo, Generative AI Didn’t Just Kill the Attorney-Client PrivilegeOpinion: Georgetown Law professor Jonah Perlin says using third-party technology doesn't categorically waive the attorney-client privilege. 020
Reposted by Danny Wilf-TownsendMelanie Mitchell @melaniemitchell.bsky.social · 21/07/2025In a stunning moment of self-delusion, the Wall Street Journal headline writers admitted that they don't know how LLM chatbots work. 432936468
Danny Wilf-Townsend @dannywt.bsky.social · 17/07/2025A very pleasant surprise to listen to one of my favorite podcasts and hear my own work being discussed. And it's an excellent episode and overview for anyone thinking of AI's effects on the legal profession. Some thoughts / suggestions below for anyone who wants further reading: 161
Reposted by Danny Wilf-TownsendJames Grimmelmann @jtlg.bsky.social · 24/06/2025Judge Alsup has the first true opinion on fair use for generative AI in Bartz v. Anthropic. He holds that AI training is fair use, and so is buying books to scan them, but that downloading pirated copies of books for an internal training-data database is not fair use. 🧵 12716
Danny Wilf-Townsend @dannywt.bsky.social · 17/06/2025I think this is one of the more common mistakes I see with people trying AI—the idea that if you go to a free chatbot, quickly run a question by it, and it does a bad job, then you've learned that AI cannot do a good job on that question. 030
Danny Wilf-Townsend @dannywt.bsky.social · 16/06/2025Significant ruling in one of the big algorithmic price-fixing lawsuits going on right now: www.reuters.com/legal/govern...reuters.comUS judge rules health insurers, MultiPlan must face price-fixing lawsuitsA U.S. judge on Tuesday said healthcare providers can pursue claims that technology provider MultiPlan and a group of insurers conspired to underpay them billions of dollars in reimbursements for out-of-network health services. 000
Danny Wilf-Townsend @dannywt.bsky.social · 12/06/2025A good thread on a big new generative AI / IP lawsuit—Disney and Universal vs. Midjourney 000
Reposted by Danny Wilf-TownsendThe Museum of English Rural Life (MERL) @themerl.bsky.social · 10/06/2025ChatGPT is down but The Museum of English Rural Life still stands, proving once again that Silicon Valley cannot compete with the history of rural England and its people. 86136212340
Danny Wilf-Townsend @dannywt.bsky.social · 10/06/2025I've had a few recent conversations with judges and law profs who haven't tried generative AI, or have only used it for a few minutes to write a poem or other trivial fun. After a few people asked me about how to start, I thought I'd write up my suggestions: www.wilftownsend.net/p/some-ideas...wilftownsend.netSome ideas for judges, lawyers, and legal academics on trying generative AIOn the usefulness of personal experience, and suggestions about what to try 194
Reposted by Danny Wilf-TownsendDaniel Schwarcz @danielschwarcz.bsky.social · 21/05/2025After years of studying AI & law here’s my rule of thumb: Lawyers should only use AI only when they can confidently assess, adapt & explain its output without engaging in deep, independent thinking about the core legal/factual issues. More in my new essay: papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers....papers.ssrn.com<p><span>Thinking Like A Lawyer In The Age Of Generative AI: Cognitive Limits On AI Adoption Among Lawyers</span></p>As of mid-2025, there is robust evidence that generative AI possesses the technological capability to significantly reshape legal practice. Yet legal markets an 122
Reposted by Danny Wilf-TownsendBlake E. Reid @chup.blakereid.org · 15/05/2025The problems are with the affordances of the technology and how they mislead even sophisticated professionals: these tools work extremely quickly and dispense superficially coherent and confident output. These qualities override skepticism and promote reliance. 211721
Danny Wilf-Townsend @dannywt.bsky.social · 16/05/2025This is one of my favorite books to recommend to students (I actually have two copies). One of my teaching aspirations is to someday have a seminar read this alongside @nbagley.bsky.social’s Procedure Fetish and Kagan’s Adversarial Legalism. 151
Danny Wilf-Townsend @dannywt.bsky.social · 15/05/2025"Litigation...is not simply a tool...it embodies an organization of political authority that is politically attractive to Americans–and self-reinforcing. Turning away from litigation may require re-legitimating and re-empowering other forms of authority." hypertext.niskanencenter.org/p/abundance-...hypertext.niskanencenter.orgAbundance liberalism versus adversarial legalismTo displace legal vetocracy, abundance liberals must find other ways to generate authority that people can accept. 120
Danny Wilf-Townsend @dannywt.bsky.social · 15/05/2025Very cool to see that @kevintobia.bsky.social's and my article got @lsolum.bsky.social's "Download it while it's hot!" recommendation on the Legal Theory Blog! 161
Danny Wilf-Townsend @dannywt.bsky.social · 13/05/2025People often treat AI-generated legal texts as an issue of legal ethics (e.g., hallucinated citations) or industry economics (will AI replace associates?). But as legal institutions start receiving, processing, and using generative AI, it's going to affect all of us 🧵 120
Danny Wilf-Townsend @dannywt.bsky.social · 12/05/2025I've got a new paper up with the inimitable @kevintobia.bsky.social: "Generated Legal Texts"—about texts generated by AI and used in legal institutions. These texts are arising frequently in legal contexts around the world, perhaps faster than many realize. And, we argue ... 111
Danny Wilf-Townsend @dannywt.bsky.social · 02/05/2025A nice new opportunity for an AI+Law "Shark Tank" pitch session to get feedback on early stage paper ideas in time for the summer writing push, organized by @kevintfrazier.bsky.social at UT Law. Would definitely encourage anyone with a paper idea to check it out! docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1F...docs.google.comSh[AI]rk Tank - Make Sure Your August Paper Doesn't SinkThe August cycle is on the horizon. Before you get too deep into your paper, now's the time to solicit feedback from others with an interest in AI and the Law. Please express your interest in the fo... 031
Reposted by Danny Wilf-TownsendNoah Kazis @noahkazis.bsky.social · 02/05/2025In March, HUD declared it was “revising” (read: gutting) its Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing regs. That was illegal. I got mad and submitted a comment. www.regulations.gov/comment/HUD-... It’s not in the 100 worst things happening right now, but it’s still MY thing. So, thread:regulations.govRegulations.gov 13915
Reposted by Danny Wilf-TownsendChris Geidner @chrisgeidner.bsky.social · 30/04/2025No. One: It’s a fact. Two: The judiciary is political. Three: The appointing president is often relevant to a full understand, hence newsworthy. Three (b): It is often these days a reminder that judges appointed by presidents of both parties are not acceding to Trump’s lawlessness. 1554151
Danny Wilf-Townsend @dannywt.bsky.social · 23/04/2025I started a blog! There is a lot of interesting stuff going on in the worlds of AI, consumer protection, and litigation that develops too quickly, or is too inchoate, for law review articles. I’ll be posting here occasionally—thoughts welcome:wilftownsend.netTest Case | Danny Wilf-Townsend | SubstackExperimental thoughts on law, artificial intelligence, consumer protection, and more. Click to read Test Case, by Danny Wilf-Townsend, a Substack publication. 020
Reposted by Danny Wilf-TownsendDanny Wilf-Townsend @dannywt.bsky.social · 22/04/2025This blog post also contains my favorite AI+Law anecdote so far from the teaching-and-talks circuit. 052
Danny Wilf-Townsend @dannywt.bsky.social · 22/04/2025I enjoyed two recent empirical papers on AI+Law, but realized they have somewhat different implications—in particular, about whether AI tools are actually useful for lawyers, or are too likely to err. I wrote up a blog post thinking through how to reconcile them: www.wilftownsend.net/p/is-ai-actu...wilftownsend.netIs AI actually useful in legal practice, or just a hotbed of errors?Reconciling a pair of recent empirical studies 167
Danny Wilf-Townsend @dannywt.bsky.social · 17/04/2025Notably, from a law professor perspective, this includes accurately identifying a "dog not barking" issue on a long, issue-spotter-exam-style question that explicitly discussed many things but left an appellate jurisdiction issue completely unmentioned. No model had spotted that before. 011
Danny Wilf-Townsend @dannywt.bsky.social · 17/04/2025I haven't spent much time with the new o3 model from OpenAI, but it is the first model to get all of the questions right on the informal testing of legal questions that I've been doing for a while when new models come out. 010
Danny Wilf-Townsend @dannywt.bsky.social · 09/04/2025Several good things about this order. A small, technical detail that is good but easy to miss is the court's ruling on FRCP 65(c). In other times this would be unremarkable (or just absent from the order), but the Trump admin has tried to use Rule 65 to make this kind of civil action harder. 120
Reposted by Danny Wilf-TownsendKyle Cheney @kyledcheney.bsky.social · 09/04/2025JUST IN: Trump-appointed judge in Texas blocks removals under the Alien Enemies Act, citing the SCOTUS ruling and the potential for a mistake as revealed in the Abrego Garcia case. This follows a similar order from NY judge on other AEA targets. storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us... 241345369
Reposted by Danny Wilf-TownsendChris Geidner @chrisgeidner.bsky.social · 28/03/2025NEWS: Jenner & Block sued to challenge Trump's executive order in D.C. federal court this morning. They are represented by lawyers from Cooley LLP, and are seeking similar relief to the Perkins Coie challenge. Complaint: storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us... 301749321