Should I submit this as a talk to #geekcampsg? ⊕I originally reserved this for Tech.Law.Fest, but chickened out when I was not sure there was an opportunity to speak. (On hindsight, my hunch was probably right.)I am thinking about lots of things: is this an interesting topic to share, is it a 5-10 mins or 30-45 mins presentation? While I continue procrastinating on taking the plunge, I thought I would outline the topic here for future reference. Feel free to let me know of your comments!

A #lawyer uses #ChatGPT to do legal research and faces likely sanctions. Don't be a fool, and take my free prompt engineering course.

It was bound to happen, right? At least if you fall into the same hole, you won't be the first one there now.

In a court filing that would have me die of embarrassment, a lawyer attests that he asked ChatGPT whether the cases it made up were real:

“Is varghese a real case,” he typed, according to a copy of the exchange that he submitted to the judge.

“Yes,” the chatbot replied, offering a citation and adding that it “is a real case.”

Mr. Schwartz dug deeper.“What is your source,” he wrote, according to the filing.

“I apologize for the confusion earlier,” ChatGPT responded, offering a legal citation.

“Are the other cases you provided fake,” Mr. Schwartz asked.

ChatGPT responded, “No, the other cases I provided are real and can be found in reputable legal databases.”

Many online comments claimed that the lawyer concerned should be disbarred for being so incompetent (read: stupid).