Nebel des Krieges

Heading into November I thought to myself “wow, I have a lot to be thankful for this year…I love my job, the ol’ career is humming along and I’m becoming active again in professional associations, I feel better -physically and emotionally - than I have in years, and generally everything feels like it’s falling into place.”

Here we are at the end of December and I am jobless, recovering from a nasty bout of Covid, and not 100% sure where my career is headed in the next year. I also made the decision to not use Twitter anymore so in addition to losing my workplace community, I lost my main social media community. My mother would refuse to acknowledge good times because she said she would be just inviting bad things to befall her and I was always like “stop being so damn Hungarian and enjoy life” but…maybe she had a point.

I’m still actually okay (aside from sounding like a 3 pack a day smoker). Honestly, getting laid off and reading the resulting social media comments was almost like being able to attend my own funeral. I’ve been very humbled to find that a lot of people that I really admire think I’m pretty okay too. I mean, I’m going to remain being an insufferable asshole but now with a touch of humble.

(There were SOME snarky comments about my former place of employment’s business model. That might have hurt my feelings, especially since I still really believe in what Reynen Court was/is trying to accomplish buuuuut….I used to work for the ABA. Any part of my psyche hurt by insulting my employer was cauterized during those years.)

Although there’s nothing permanent locked down, I’ve had lots of great conversations with people about my future. One weird side effect of this is I’ve had to tell “my story” over and over again. I don’t know how helpful it was to my interviewers, but it’s been very clarifying for me to review how I got where I am. And in discussing what I can do, it’s been funny to see how my transitions have paralleled the digital transformation of law and knowledge work.

Maybe because I’m at a “hard break” in my path, maybe it’s the cough syrup, but I really feel like we’re about to enter a new phase in the world of knowledge work, as transformational as the period from 2005-2010 when digital tools (and connections between the same) became more accessible to people whose childhood didn’t resemble Mathew Broderick in WarGames.

I think it’s going to be a combination of tools, going back to the attitudes of a 15 or so years ago before we all got caught up in walled gardens and ignoring the benefits of interoperability1, and frankly getting over ourselves and realizing the digital transformation is more than a battle for hearts and minds and not just developing the “best” tools2.

I don’t know if people would find it surprising, but I’ve always felt a real affinity for and identification with Hunter S. Thompson. I mean, I don’t indulge in hallucinogens, but “Buy the ticket, take the ride” has been a guiding principle of my life as well as the general Gonzo method of digital transformation that I seem to have taken.

I’ve been thinking a lot about a part of “Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas” which is a bit of an obituary of the drug culture and peace movement of the 1960s.

Am I comparing legal tech and innovation to the drug dilettantes of the 1960s? I mean, not entirely. And I’m absolutely not discounting the many many people that have been doing the quiet and “boring” work of digital transformation without fanfare or VC money. It’s just that there’s been a lot of operating on vibes and assuming that of course people will catch on and change literally decades of operating procedures because you rolled in and told them their way of doing things is dumb.

I really think this is changing though! That’s the exciting part of right now! We as an industry are at an inflection point of really understanding what needs to be in place for successful change and tool adoption. Or maybe it’s just me and now that I’m able to pause and take stock, the fog of war is clearing a bit and I’m able to see what I want my next phase to look more like. It’s slow and boring but I also want to maintain the excitement and community of change agents that developed in the heady days of Two Thousand Aught Eight or whatever. Multitudes, I want multitudes.

In short: I really loved where I was in 2022 but now I’m also very excited to see where 2023 takes me and all of us.

Speaking of where 2023 will take all of us, as I starting composing this, Substack alerted me to their has new button to suggest my readers start their own substack so here it is:

Start writing today. Use the button below to create your Substack

I must admit, I am planning on probably moving this to another platform since Substack is also a little morally squicky for me. (Also, just continuing with my (good) regression to my attitudes of 15 years ago, I am in the mood to build things again and not just buy.) But if you are looking for an easy way to start sharing your thoughts (and you should! We need more and especially more diversity of voices in this weird little space) it’s a pretty good starting spot. Also, the Substack recommendation thing is giving me warm fuzzy web-ring and blogroll memories.

I also want to give a hearty recommendation to mastodon. I am signed up on the Law.Buiders server but I follow and interact with people all over. At first I was like “this is just like when the camp run by Mennonites that my parents sent me3 to tried to tell us that carob was just as good as chocolate” but now I genuinely enjoy the experience. I’m sort of over people on there congratulating themselves for switching from Twitter but that is increasingly going away. (I must add when I do check Twitter I get the same feelings I get when I indulge in too much unhealthy materials. It literally feels toxic.) I generally have just jumped in and post all of the same stupid stuff that I posted on Twitter and kept it moving without going too meta. Anyway, give it a try. It’s nice!

You deserve better than LinkedIn. Try something new in 2023!

Okay, that’s it. Happy New Year!

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