Law.com – Isha Marathe: “Many legal tech panels on generative artificial intelligence are still dominated by a homogenous group: white men. It’s a glimpse into the more insidious barriers that stand in the way of women tech founders fighting to make it in the industry. In a phenomenon that carries through from college classrooms to boardrooms to the U.S. Supreme Court bench—women speak fewer times than men do, raise their hands less frequently in response to questions, and get interrupted more often by their male counterparts when they do talk. Legal tech is not exempt from this tendency. Far from it. In fact, as an industry that sits neatly in between two race- and gender-homogenous sectors—tech and law—it is home to some of the most egregious sexism. Women in the industry told Legaltech News that the sector’s reaction to the boom of generative artificial intelligence is an illuminating example of how pervasive the Boys’ Club still is in legal tech. It’s a vicious cycle, they said, with fewer women self-declaring as experts on generative AI, and a disproportionately higher number of men doing so. This often results in the same voices being selected for events, leading to a prevalence of all-white, all-male panels at conferences; to blogs and articles citing the same men as “thought-leaders” in a field that is new to most. While they used generative AI as an example, women told Legaltech News that the scale of the technology’s popularity simply highlights gender disparity that has been evident across all of legal tech far before generative AI came onto the scene. Perhaps the most pervasive effect of this inequity is its translation into conversations had behind closed doors about whose product to choose when law firms are buying tech, which founder to invest angel money in, and who to promote to the C-suite position when the time comes. While some women were optimistic about the legal tech industry becoming more inclusive, others feared that the road would be far longer and bumpier than they initially thought—doubly difficult for women of color—and every gain would have to be held on to with a vice grip when it finally came…”