Legal informatics

Legal informatics is an area within information science. Erdelez and O’Hare (1997) define legal informatics as follows:

Delivery of legal services

Advances in technology and legal informatics have led to new models for the delivery of legal services. Legal services have traditionally been a "bespoke" product created by a professional attorney on an individual basis for each client. However, to work more efficiently, parts of these services will move sequentially from (1) bespoke to (2) standardized, (3) systematized, (4) packaged, and (5) commoditized. Moving from one stage to the next will require embracing different technologies and knowledge systems.

Cloud computing and legal services

The widespread introduction of cloud computing provides several benefits in delivering legal services. Legal service providers can use the Software as a Service model to earn a profit by charging customers a per-use or subscription fee. This model has several benefits over traditional bespoke services.