On today’s Legally Speaking Podcast, I’m delighted to be joined by Jacqueline Watts. Jacqueline is an Emerging Technologies Lawyer at boutique law firm, Allin1 Advisory. She is also the Head of Corporate Commercial Law. Jacqueline is passionate about discussing law in the virtual world – publishing her book on ‘Law in the Metaverse’. Earlier this year, she was on the panel as part of the City of London’s Access to Finance for Early-Stage SMEs, and at the end of last year, she spoke about legal issues concerning the metaverse & Web3 at the Tech Summit.

So why should you be listening in? 

You can hear Rob and Jacqueline discussing:

– The Evolving Role of Lawyers in Emerging Technologies and AI

– Why the Metaverse Matters and How Immersive Virtual Worlds Reshape Legal Practice
– Regulatory Challenges and the Future Governance of Virtual Rnvironments

– The Importance of Contractual Foundations for Innovators and Tech Founders
– Ethical, Safety and Human-Behaviour Considerations in Virtual and Immersive Spaces

Connect with Jacqueline Watts here – https://uk.linkedin.com/in/wattsjacqueline

Transcript

Rob Hanna (00:00)

So a very big warm welcome to the show, Jackie.

Jackie (00:04)

Hi Rob, thank you so much for having me.

Rob Hanna (00:06)

Oh, it’s an absolute pleasure to have you on the show. And before we dive into all the amazing things you’re doing in and around the world of legal, we do have a customary icebreaker question here on the Legally Speaking podcast, which is on the scale of one to 10, with 10 being very real, what would you rate the hit TV series suits in terms of its reality of the law if you’ve seen it?

Jackie (00:28)

I have seen it and it’s a bit of a guilty pleasure so yes it’s always nice to speak about suits. I think really in my practice it’s probably about three or four but I do do the odd bit of litigation and I do try and channel a little bit of Harvey into that so maybe swinging up to maybe six for the litigation side maybe in my head more than in real life, but.

Rob Hanna (00:53)

There we go. A very justified answer all around and with that we can move swiftly on to talk all about you. So would you mind telling our listeners a bit about your background and career journey?

Jackie (01:02)

Yeah, so I have been practicing for about 12 years now. I started off and I wanted to go to the bar and I did the BBC as it was then. I went to the Netherlands and I worked. I interned at the Special Court for Sierra Leone because I wanted to be a war crimes humanitarian lawyer and deal with international criminal law. And I was working then when I came back as a paralegal dealing with criminal law and prison law and appeal work. So pretty much any notorious criminal that we could Google and helping that side. And then I decided, well, I want to cross qualify, want to become a solicitor. And I needed three months work experience. And I applied where I still am 13 years later. I went there for three months work experience and I never left. So I just fell in love with the commercial and just realized that actually

what does it mean to be a lawyer? means helping people, I think, and it means having that relationship, that trusted relationship with clients and being able to assist around that. and yeah, I’ve just never left.

Rob Hanna (02:19)

Well, and that’s such a great case that isn’t it? And it’s lovely to see that you’ve found somewhere and it’s felt like home and you’ve been able to flourish throughout your career. I want to talk about emerging technologies because it’s an interesting area and I’m pro tech myself because you are an emerging technologies lawyer. What led you to specialize in this particular area of law?

Jackie (02:39)

So maybe by accident is probably the truth. So where the firm is located, so it’s located in the city and it’s on the shortage old street boundary, very close to where the old Google campus was based. So I really cut my teeth and found my feet around those early stage founders, startups, scale ups who were going through probably about 10 years ago now trying to go through and

Rob Hanna (02:42)

Okay.

Jackie (03:09)

make something in the tech space. So happy accident, I think.

Rob Hanna (03:15)

Yeah, well, very happy accident and it’s all worked

out for you for the good. So I guess the accidents happen. Talk us through what a typical day looks like then as a merchant tech lawyer, but also head of corporate and commercial at your current place. Give us a bit of a flavor of your days.

Jackie (03:28)

Yeah,

so I’m not sure that is a typical day. So I work in a really small boutique firm and that’s maybe the beauty of why I’m still there because there is no typical day in terms of what I do. I have a lovely team of lawyers who help support me and my clients range from early stage tech

Companies that are just starting out don’t know where to start don’t know what to do have a brilliant idea want to innovate change their own space and not know how that fits into the legal framework and what might need to be changed and ⁓ I said I I do deal with a number of different clients I tend to see myself as a GP and I say this to my clients when I first meet them that from my perspective my role is more about

triaging what their needs are, helping them understanding what the bigger picture is and I may not be able to specialise in everything that they need but I can certainly point out and direct where they need to go, who they need to speak to and what can be done. it’s yeah I see myself more as a legal GP.

Rob Hanna (04:44)

I like that, a legal GP. Yeah, being able to do, and that’s to your point around no two days the same, right? You don’t know quite what you’re getting in terms of the problem or opportunity indeed in terms of the types of work you do. Is there something you’re currently involved in or recently been involved in you would like to share with us and what do you most enjoy about the work that you do?

Jackie (05:02)

So for me, what I really enjoy doing is working with innovative founders, founders who are trying to carve out a market, carve out a space that doesn’t really exist. So I have clients who are trying to disrupt the sporting field, ad tech, ⁓ and in fintech, working with them to say, actually, there isn’t necessarily a legal precedent here. There isn’t a right or wrong answer. And I’m a big believer

that ⁓ a lot of issues, lot of ills can be solved with private law, with contractual provisions being put in place and going back to first principles, understanding what are we here, what are we trying to achieve here and working backwards. So just acknowledging that

there isn’t necessarily an answer or a right answer. But I’ve been working with, for example, clients have been breaking into AI for about four five years now. And before we started to have mainstream discussions over what needs to be included, what needs to be addressed, regulation, you know, before we even had the idea of having any form of regulation or AI legislation, and how do we deal with that transparency? And so for me,

It’s all about dealing with things transparently via contracts to try and solve some of those issues.

Rob Hanna (06:33)

Yeah, no, great, great point. you know, so I always encourage people contracts, get things in writing, get things actually put in place. Is there a memorable case that you’ve worked on today that you’d like to share?

Jackie (06:38)

Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah, so well, lots of memorable cases. I tend to work at the early stages, so I’m not necessarily always mentioned or something that I can necessarily speak about. But ⁓ working with clients who have broken through in the US ⁓ and advertising marketing clients, negotiating with most of the US networks, a lot of the UK ⁓ broadcasters around.

Rob Hanna (06:55)

Yeah.

Jackie (07:13)

the idea of integrating AI at the very early stages, what data can be used for training and what they want in terms of ownership of IP. I think for me, although I can’t necessarily diverge, know, what actually was the name of the client, but it was cutting edge ⁓ media AI that has revolutionized that industry and from the very outset being involved with them, making sure that

you can’t just fit into a SaaS agreement which some of these enterprise clients wants to try and shoehorn a lot of these innovation and innovative clients into. And I think that’s where for me is a really interesting area working in this space is saying, actually, this is one opportunity where as a smaller business, where you’re going into enterprise, you can say, I want to use my terms, I want to use my paper because…

my product doesn’t fit into your procurement terms. It doesn’t fit into the same model as perhaps buying a SaaS product or perhaps buying a paper. I’ve seen, this is going back a few years now, but I have seen procurement teams trying shoehorn tech products, it was before SaaS products, into just software agreements or even into just general procurement.

of goods and it doesn’t work. So it’s actually a really nice space where you can say, even though I am the underdog here, I am completely aware that I’m selling into a very big organisation. Your terms just don’t work for what we’re providing.

Rob Hanna (08:53)

I guess that’s the power of being a pioneer, isn’t it? In many respects, because like you say, it can’t just be a vanilla or what we’ve already done because people are innovating and things are moving and it’s not fit for purpose for where the direction of travel of the famous Wayne Gretzky, you where the puck is going and these founders are seeing and having that vision. I think it’s great that you can kind of fight their corner and make sure that the foundations are set for them as a business or all the infrastructure so then they can go on to hyper growth and all those great things obviously we’re seeing now in the modern world.

Want to talk now about fast growing things, metaverse and gaming. you know, I’m again, I’m all in on this sort of stuff. I love it. I’m, I’m pro tech for good, but for those who think the metaverse is just a gaming concept, how would you define it in the context perhaps of your work and why should lawyers be taking notice of the metaverse?

Jackie (09:39)

So I have, whenever I speak about metaverse to people, say, well, isn’t the metaverse dead? I say, well, no, I think it’s just gone through a bit of a rebrand. There’s so many interchangeable names, terms that refer to, it might be immersive technology, spatial computing, web three, you’re starting to have the boundaries of maybe digital assets around it as well. I think the EU summed it up that they, the EU are doing a massive drive in terms of regular

and forward-thinking innovation around the metaverse. They call it virtual worlds.

from their regulatory perspective. And they’ve got that they’re predicting that, you know, we’re not really going to see seismic change for the next 10 to 15 years. So we’re really at this cusp, I think, of change in the way that we’re interacting, the way that we work, the way that we live, the way that we have relationships with each other. so we, you know, this really is now the fourth revolution, you know, we’re going through

Rob Hanna (10:46)

Yeah

Jackie (10:47)

industrial revolution and this change, I think we’re starting to see it in real life now as lawyers with the realities of having to face AI coming at us and having to then acknowledge and make those changes and ⁓

know, legal practice changes, society changes, we have to then react to that. And I was reading something recently around the way that the law

has changed and reacts to these industrial revolutions. we’re talking about 1600s industrial revolution and you see we move from cottage industries, we move to factories and we start to say, well actually we need to have legislation to deal with working conditions. So we start to see factory acts. So it’s the same for me in terms of where we are now. We’re going through this seismic change in the way that we work, live.

interact and I think that we’re very naive if we think that that’s not going to impact on us as lawyers because for example Roblox you know this has really taken people by storm in terms of gaming but I think that it is a game but I think it does it a bit of a disservice to to refer to it in a condescending way as just a game it’s a lifestyle people are spending considerable amounts of money

in terms of building commerce and exchanging, exchanging values. You’ve got real, you know, had IKEA last year who advertised and recruited for a job working in the metaverse. And so that then brings wider legal implications. How do you deal with employment rights? And, you know, our traditional way in which we say, well, this is your place of work. This is what jurisdiction applies.

This is what laws apply. How do you apply that when it is immersive, it is completely virtual, and it’s not virtual as in Zoom or Teams. This is immersive virtual where there doesn’t necessarily have to be any physical connection between the people. It’s the next stage of the innovation.

Rob Hanna (13:08)

Yeah. And look, change is the only constant in business and life, isn’t it? And I think, you know, like you were talking to, particularly with Roblox, huge. I mean, what a brand, what a success story in terms of what they’ve been able to achieve. And, you know, things are going to change and digital matters. You know, we can’t get away from the fact that we are digitally connected. We’re not too many years off all of us wearing glasses and you’re having that world. And I think we have to embrace it. But look at it from a lens of actually, this is positive and these are the good things that

come with it, of course, with some caution and we need to think about the risks and the regulation and that side of things. But absolutely, I think things will continue to change. And I think it’s exciting. So let’s talk about navigating the metaverse though on the flip side, because you believe people will still want to turn to traditional lawyers and real life courts. So it’s vital lawyers understand this world and its unique features. So what are the three most important factors lawyers need to know to navigate the metaverse?

Jackie (14:04)

So I think for me, one thing is about retaining the ethics and integrity of the profession itself and what we stand for in terms of ⁓ our rules and our code of conduct, et cetera. So one thing when I was ⁓ looking at this in a bit more detail is around the harm that could be presented because you don’t necessarily know who is behind the mask. don’t know. So if we think of the concept that we’re going

to be able to meet clients, speak to clients, interact with clients in a virtual arena in a metaverse type forum. How do we know who that, how do we know, for example, in a divorce that we’re not inadvertently speaking in the presence of a spouse, in the presence of children to the spouse themselves? How do we deal with legal privilege and confidentiality in that space? So I think for me, it’s going right back to jurists.

exponential values and looking at what do we stand for? What do we need to retain that we have now in the virtual space? So one of the things I looked at is the idea of the rule of law and the idea of justice in the metaverse. What does that mean? know, the idea that the rule of law is effectively based on societal norms and the idea of what would… So how do we translate that when

we’re moving to a space where we have real time, immersive transactions that are happening simultaneously all around the world between somebody who’s based in very different jurisdictions. Where do our societal norms come from? Do they come from the idea of where we live? Is it a community-based? And is it something that, are we gonna see metaverse communities that are aligned regardless of where you’re living?

but creating their own societal norms within those spaces. So I think it’s going back and saying, what does law actually mean? And I think you said this earlier in the conversation, and it’s a word that I’ve been thinking about a lot, which is pioneering. This is a new frontier. And I think we get the opportunity at this stage to draw those lines. What does it mean for us to be…

Creating this new frontier and how does that transcribe? into into the law and regulation and then I think the last point for me is How what values are we going to ascribe and what standards do we want in terms of the regulation? And what I mean by that is we’ve already spoken about contractual provisions and private law basis now to at the moment most of the relationships most of the platforms most of the metaverse

in its current iteration, which, you know, there is a debate over whether it really is the metaverse. You know, there’s lots of ⁓ arguments around that, whether it’s a proto-metaverse, you know, the early stages of what we’re looking for. But for me, it’s, you know, at the moment, we’re drawing lines based on terms and conditions, based on the idea of meta’s…

terms of service or on roadblocks or to central lands, they’re setting their terms of use and their rules as private tech companies and they’re mandating those onto users. There’s already been cases many years ago in the US around what would happen if you get shut out of one of these metaverses or one of these platforms and effectively,

you know, talking about what’s happening in, in, ⁓ roadblocks now, you’ve, you’ve got people having their whole business, their whole life on this platform. Should a decision around that be based on private individuals, albeit tech giants, or should we be moving more towards a public law perspective and we regulate these, these tech giants, ⁓ by standards of

reasonableness or the way that we’d look at like administrative law because we don’t elect, you know, who’s going to make decisions in meta. We don’t elect these people. So I think it’s kind of rethinking what do we want and how does that reflect the safeguards that we’ve installed over centuries, I think. And I think this is where, you know, you’re saying we’re going to turn to traditional justice and traditional lawyers and

traditional real-life court systems because it’s safe for people people are used to that people know that You know, we’ve already seen that online. There’s many forms of alternative dispute resolution. There’s ⁓ Different ways that you can deal with issues online but it comes a point where Users say I’m going to turn to court. I’m going to escalate this to litigation because we’ve

reformed centuries of safety around what that looks like for a final arbitrator of fact to say and law to say this is how it should be interpreted.

Rob Hanna (19:29)

It’s fascinating, isn’t it? And it’s, it’s, know, it’s interesting to see where things will go. And you were touching on regulation. Now it’s going to be sort of my next question, you know, who regulates the metaverse. So I guess sort of building on what you were saying there, and I think you would add and, know, what would you like to see as an ideal solution?

Jackie (19:30)

Yeah.

So I think that going back to that whole idea of justice, the rule of law, and centuries ago we said there should be a separation between ⁓ in politics and judiciary, so having the divergence of who’s in charge. I think that as we evolve to a proper metaverse where there’s the ability to move between

universes and between platforms proper interoperability so you can actually move and you know I buy a virtual handbag for my avatar in in roblox and I can move that with me I own that that’s that’s part of me and I can move that and use that in other platforms in other ways I think if we start to look at that then we need to go back and say well actually how do we

how do we regulate, how do we govern this new space? And one thing I think we have to be quite alert about is do we impose Western standards of governance on that? Are we going to turn the metaverse, are we going to colonise the metaverse effectively and say, this is the way that we think is right, you’re gonna have to have a democratically elected, whatever that means, person who’s in charge of the metaverse.

And to do that, we’re shutting off other systems that don’t subscribe to the same basis as us. And who is to say that we are correct in the way in which we’re doing that? So are we going to see lines drawn where it’s pretty much territorial? You know, we invade part of the metaverse and say, this is going to be governed under English jurisdiction, and these are our rules, and this is how it’s resolved. And see,

different territories take control of different spaces. I don’t know, I think this is something which is as yet hasn’t been determined. But one thing I know that the very early stages around this is that the judicial task force are looking at the idea of parity in terms of private law and in different jurisdictions and different Commonwealth jurisdictions.

and doing a lot of work around what that means because I think that, as I said before, this idea of it being a revolution, we’ve never had to encounter something like this before where actually we are creating these rules from nothing and what are we going to do? And I think now is the time to be doing it. And the EU definitely are very much thinking around…

that side, there’s really interesting use cases and interesting evolutions around, for example, the commodity of data, the idea of data in this space, ⁓ where our currency is going to be data. And so the EU looking at the idea as to who should own that data and it should be going back to the individual, it shouldn’t be

that these tech giants own the data. So there’s gonna be quite a lot of changes in the EU around the idea of a digital passport and the right to be able to move that around with you. I think there’s gonna be a lot of changes. Speaking to different people, some people think that these changes, just as we’ve had the avalanche of AI, when this gets going, we could very much see the same sort of avalanche takeover when…

I think we have somewhat, and I love AI, you know, I’ve got lots of clients that deal with AI. I’ve been involved with it for a while, but I think that we’ve, that’s only a very small part of the picture where we’re at now. And I’m actually writing my second book at the moment, which is all about the industrial metaverse and the industry 4.0 and the idea about, in my opinion, the coming together of all these different

emerging technologies we’ve spoken about for probably the last 10 years, the big data, talking about cloud computing, talking about immersive technologies, AI coming together, for example, use cases like digital twins and connectivity around real life. You know, how do we merge together real life and this digital space? And I think once that

then there’s going to be seismic change in terms of it. So we as lawyers, think part of our role is to interpret what clients need, how they’re living and society to be able to advise. And so really for me, it’s about understanding, understanding what’s happening and trying to be ready as much as we can be to deal with it because people are people and I think

That’s going back to the point I said about being a GP in that we, I think as lawyers, yes, we have become very siloed in terms of the different practice areas. But when you boil it all down, we come back to the point that we’re helping people and it’s dealing with the regulation of human behavior and how we interact with each other. And so.

this is still going to be the case, whether we, you know, unless it doesn’t matter anymore and there’s no humans, then there’s still going to be some need for being able to interpret that human behaviour.

Rob Hanna (25:45)

Yeah, and thank you again for such a ⁓ thought out in-depth answer there because it’s important, isn’t there? And this is going in this direction of travel. We are going there, whether we agree with it, disagree with it, or have other views. And so it’s important we have this conversation and we debate it, discuss, educate around it. I think just on that, in terms of as lawyers,

being forever curious, open to learning and helping the everyday person. What are some of the examples of people who might be using the metaverse or thinking about the use of metaverse more? You know, some simple crimes that people may be less aware of that you should maybe thinking about and are there courts in the metaverse or does the prosecution take still as of today in real life courts?

Jackie (26:26)

So they have tried people in the metaverse, which I think it was a South American country that had the first ever metaverse court case. But it’s traditional law being tried in the metaverse. And the same that the Dubai Arbitration Court also has the ability to be able to have hearings in the metaverse.

⁓ We saw the online safety act come out which has ⁓ established a number of really, this is my legal curiosity, very interesting ⁓ new types of crimes which I think is a realisation that can be exploited in the metaverse. For example, they had more around communication offences,

cyber stalking and harassment. There’s a very interesting new piece of ⁓ a new offense around deliberately ⁓ causing an epileptic fit and to be so using that which is really ⁓ I think there’s a risk of that in the metaverse where it’s effectively exploiting known vulnerabilities. So it’s ⁓

there’s examples, was a campaign in respect of, it’s a known thing which is really, really terrible, that trolls on some sites, epileptic societies and community type web pages, ⁓ flashing ⁓ images to try and cause that reaction. ⁓ And I think that’s a really interesting…

inclusion within that, within the regulation because not everybody, there’s going to be different issues that present themselves in the metaverse. For example, know, wearing a headset, if you’re going have to work on a headset, the guidance at the moment is to only wear it for, you know, less than an hour in terms of that exposure. So we’re going to have different forms of health and safety considerations. What if somebody

falls over, you know, they’re working in the metaverse at home. Where does the liability sit in terms of that? And what changes are employers going to have to implement to be able to safeguard around that? There’s also, I think the other thing that I find quite interesting in the metaverse space is the idea of doing business in the metaverse and how you, you know, we’ve, we’ve, we’ve

formulated with, I think, as a society, we say this is where the harms are, and this is where the law and regulation needs to come around and try and fix or address those specific harms. So one of those areas around consumer protection and the reams of protection that’s in place around that. How does that translate when things are being sold in an immersive experience where

you know, opportunity to manipulate somebody’s thoughts are very real. You know, you’ve got now technology that is able to interpret and use thoughts, know, albeit the way in which those are exhibited, maybe by sweat or by the way that we’re moving in our eyesight and being able to advertise

deliberately because of the way that somebody is behaving. Where do we draw those lines? Where do we say that we need to protect individuals? How do we stop? And I think this is a very real conversation it’s having now where we’re starting to see off coms codes starting to be implemented around online safety, around age verification, which is just the start of those conversations around what we need to do to protect.

the more vulnerable people in society from the harms that this digitalization is going to cause them. how do we incorporate terms that someone’s selling something in the metaverse? How do we protect and make that bring up someone’s attention? what are we going to do to… And I think that’s where I’m very exciting and interested around it is advising clients on…

that space, the use cases for the innovation, because we’re not there yet in terms of necessarily litigating and dealing with it. So we don’t really know how a court is going to interpret that. We have a good idea. We have case law to fall back on. We have principles to go from, but we don’t really know how it’s going to be finally determined. So some of it is around just implementing

security, safety and best practice around that. I’m not sure if I answered your question but I might have gone off on that.

Rob Hanna (31:48)

You did. And it

leads nicely onto another question I was going to ask because you’re talking a around sort of that, you due diligence, you know, and what kind of due diligence should businesses do before launching products or services on platforms like Roblox or Decentraland or, or others?

Jackie (32:05)

So as a minimum, understand the terms and conditions that they’re signing up to and understand what they actually own and what they’re permitted to do. So for example, ⁓ for Roblox, ⁓ you don’t own your avatar, so that’s owned by Roblox. So ⁓ that goes into really interesting conversations around image rights and the idea that if you’re going to be…

generating goodwill in this space in respect of an avatar, who should own that? And, you know, if you’re talking about celebrity use in the metaverse, how do you protect that brand and that goodwill in terms of the physical representation of yourself? And there’s already been cases around that. I think if you are in that space and you’re dealing with

somebody who already has a reputation, then it’s having the conversation with those platforms. And as I said before, saying we fall outside of your general terms and conditions. Our client already has that goodwill, it’s going to be a digital representation of them. We want to be able to use that avatar across multiple platforms. We want them to be able to use that.

online for their own advertising, know, for their LinkedIn profile or for their ex account. And so being able to use that. it’s, it’s really, I think, going back and saying, we, we have to now, when we’re advising clients, consider about their profile, their presence in the metaverse. If you’re advising clients who are, you know, on private client considerations and death,

or divorce? Do they have any assets in this space? You know, we’re starting to already think about digital assets. What about virtual assets, which have got a considerable value, but understanding it might have considerable value that’s been invested into it. Does it have value? Does it actually have any value? Can we actually pass it through inheritance rules? Or instead, is it something that

dies with the individual and how do we classify that and how do we know what they have, where it is. So I think it’s looking at real life issues in that space, understanding that we are still going to have relationships, we are still going to have work, ⁓ employment, we’re still going to have businesses and be selling.

How does that change? So for example, if you are registering a trademark now, are you going to make sure that you also cover the virtual representation of those goods and services? how then does it, how does it look in that space? So for example, if you are in the metaverse, take an example of Coca Cola, if you’re gonna buy a bottle of Coke in the metaverse, your avatar can’t really drink that.

So do you have the licensing rights to be able to use that ⁓ representation? Because what is the purpose of that can of Coke? That can of Coke is then ⁓ really about the branding. And so it’s having a different conversation. It’s not the same. And I had conversations with, I’d say conversations, I think maybe, know, heated debates around the idea of…

you know, isn’t it just the same as going into a shop and buying a can of Coke? Well, it’s not the same because when you go into a shop and buy a can of Coke, for example, you’re buying the drink that’s inside and advertising is a secondary purpose that really the brand itself is determined. This is how I’m going to collectively gather this goodwill. But in the metaverse, it’s the flip is the flap a complete reverse. And so how do you ensure

that if you are Coca Cola, that somebody’s not exploiting your brand and has the right permissions and used to be able to use it. I think there’s a lot of change coming and it’s just being alive to the fact that this is what is happening. It’s not, the metaverse isn’t dead. It might be called different names now. I think everyone has a different name for it, but the…

the evolution of the internet, the change in way that we are, you know, as a society, digitalizing everything, the commodity of data, everything is changing and it’s just being alive to what do we need to do to actually protect our client, not necessarily only in real life, but also now making sure that they’re protected virtually as well.

Rob Hanna (37:18)

Yeah, and that’s going to be so important. And you touched on so many points there, you know, I was going to mention, which is so valuable around the virtual assets piece, particularly around inheritance proceedings, I just say the IP, you know, the amount of challenges that are going to go with that. And you gave some great examples. So yeah, I think, like you say, you can’t assume that everything’s going to stay the same because it’s not, and you need to be, you know, and that’s why we try and bring these sort of forward looking with solutions, conversations to the show, because it’s, you know, it’s, is the direction of travel. And I think it’s the people that are really

prepared to have the conversations and innovate and like you say, hotly debate, but try and get forward. we make an impact on the world, but for good with what we’re doing. And earlier this year, I believe you were on a panel as part of the city of London’s access to finance and early stage SME. So could you tell us a little bit about that panel discussion you had and what were the key topics you discussed?

Jackie (38:07)

Yeah,

no, so we were basically talking around ⁓ different ways that founders can access funding ⁓ for them. So I work with a lot of early stage founders who are looking for funding to be able to grow their innovation because the reality of emerging tech and all tech businesses is that it’s very expensive and it costs a lot to innovate.

So we were talking about ⁓ different tax reliefs around, for example, EIS and SEIS, are fantastic government initiatives that reward investors into ⁓ innovative startups and scaling up.

companies, spoke about government grants and around R &D tax relief and the idea as well and I think this is really important because ⁓

for clients that I deal with who tend to be early stage, they may be spun out of a university initiative or they may have had a brilliant idea, they may be ex-corporate who are saying, you I really want to disrupt the space, lot of legal tech saying, you know what, I’m a lawyer but actually I’ve got this fantastic idea as to how to shake up from a technological perspective. ⁓

They don’t necessarily know where to go in terms of funding and to be able to finance that. you know, lots of ⁓ different noise around equity versus debt. And it’s really hard to signpost who you need to speak to. And sometimes it’s just really about going back to basics, like what they’re doing in innovations like the City of London, which is, I think it’s their charter to really focus on SME businesses.

for the next few years and to say, know, we don’t know who to go to and I think that we as professionals and as lawyers sometimes forget that, sometimes forget that, you know, I have so many clients say to me, know, X, Y and Z, you need to take tax advice on that or that’s an accounting question or that’s something, you know, you need to go and speak to insurance about that.

Nobody tells you that. No one tells you how to run a business. Perhaps you might be lucky enough to do an MBE, but you know, most business owners I know have just got a fantastic idea and a will to get things done. And I think this is really enlightening. I remember that in my early stage of my career and working and looking at the idea of employment and as a firm, we did a lot of work.

around LGBTQ plus issues and a lot of HIV discrimination work. And I think that’s when it struck me that no one teaches you how to be an employer. And we put a lot of obligations, a lot of requirements on employers that standard that they have to ascribe to. And we hit them over the head quite frankly, when they don’t comply with that.

But they are people that end up being made to face quite difficult decisions that they don’t know the answer to. And so in that context, it’s where do I need to go to? What do I need to do? And understanding that I think just having that understanding really of the perspective of the clients, don’t really know what they need.

all of us often don’t know what we actually need and it’s just by discussing it and saying ⁓ actually you know what that’s a really great idea let’s let’s think about that and I think understanding that it’s all joined up it’s all joined up and I think that we’ve artificially put those lines and barriers in place ⁓ over you know over the generations and we’ve and actually it’s just taking a step back and saying

Rob Hanna (42:00)

Yeah

Jackie (42:26)

What does this person need to flourish and to help? And how do we make sure that what I’m advising them to do from a legal perspective works from a tax perspective, works from a finance perspective, means that they’re going to be compliant with their insurance requirements. And how do we make sure all of that is united? So it’s just accepting that they’re businesses, I think, at the end of the day, and they’re clients, and they come with multiple dimensions.

Rob Hanna (42:54)

Yeah, it takes me back to my early days when I was setting up companies and know, founding businesses, know, my mentor said to me, you know, grow as you go. Because like you say, when you’re talking about this might be insurance, this is accounting or more thinking of doing something or a structure, is it an LLP or is it something else we’re trying to do? know, sometimes you just don’t know, right? And so like you say, it’s just being human and actually, you know, going along and you know, because there’s so many things that come along as part of your journey, particularly your first time founder that are just going to hit you in the face that you know, you just kind of have to deal with, right? And I think that’s why also having the right counsel.

and lawyers that understand your business and want to work with you. And I think that’s a really important point that not only a good at the law, but you can work with, is, is, is, is super valuable. You touched on before your upcoming book, but I want to talk about your previous book because you recently published the law in the metaverse and it addresses the key challenges faced by businesses, policymakers and individuals in the metaverse. So what do you hope readers will take away from diving into the

Jackie (43:50)

I hope that they take away the idea that real life issues will still matter as we move and we change.

applying that virtual lens to real life issues. So for example, looking at the idea of divorce, just ticking off and making sure that if we’re advising a divorce client, or a family law client, that they’ve considered these virtual aspects as well. So when I was speaking to the publisher regarding the promotion of the book, and they were saying, well, this is a technology book. I said, it’s not a technology book. It’s a book for lawyers. It’s a general,

general book that deals with

all legal issues, anything that you know, it deals with human behavior and real businesses and how we interact. So for example, how do you deal with domestic violence in the metaverse and non molestation orders? Should we make sure and I think we should that those orders have provisions that deal with contact in a virtual space? How do we deal with that? How do we govern and relate to that?

online harms and how do we protect? there’s a bit of a philosophical aspect around the rule of law and justice and looking at some of those reimagining how we address that space, how we look at that space. But it also has lots of practical issues as I touched on before regarding compliance and how do we know our client that we’re dealing with when we’re dealing with somebody in that

space. think that ⁓ from a a pragmatic perspective, how do we collect evidence and data? How do we present that data to the courts and extract what’s relevant so that we can then, you know, represent our clients in the best possible possible way. And it’s just really like, you know, it’s looking at real life issues, because I do think that, as I said, people will still turn to

traditional lawyers, you know, as you said before, I think people buy people and people, you know, we speaking before about the businesses not really knowing where to turn. It’s the same thing in this space. You know, if something goes wrong, we have been conditioned. If something goes wrong, we go to the police, you know, we go to real life, real life courts, real life authorities to try and deal with that. ⁓

And we’ve already got, know, Europol and Interpol both have presence in the metaverse now. So it’s having an aspect to understand really, this is on the horizon, how do we navigate our practice? Our practice is going to change, but it’s opening the door to new areas.

As I said, think that everything is really, everything’s interconnected. It doesn’t matter what space, you we are pioneering this new frontier where we’re setting the boundaries how we want them. we ultimately we’re protecting clients against harm, identifying issues and just being alert to that new space.

Rob Hanna (47:16)

Yeah. And that’s the word, isn’t it? Being alert, being alive to the fact of, you know, these changes and I’d say trying to do our absolute best to protect our clients. so they, you know, can go on to flourish and whatever they choose to do. And this has been a fascinating discussion. This might be slightly difficult, but what future developments can we expect in the next sort of five or 10 years? Do you think?

Jackie (47:37)

So I do

think there’s going to be much more focus on this immersive technology. So I think, as I said, that it’s going to be the coming together of all these different technologies to have a completely different way in which we’re going to interact and live with each other and being able, you we’ve already changed so much, even in my lifetime, you know, but, you know, in terms of like,

in the last hundred years, the way in which society has changed and that we truly are able to interact, to have commerce with, to be in relationships with people anywhere in the world. you know, this whole cross border issue for lawyers in terms of jurisdiction laws, I think we’re only at the start of trying to be able to address all that.

really means for us and being able to carve out where the liability sits, where who’s responsible for what, what are the expectations that we have of each other and how do we protect society and protect each other in that space that you know we can we can draw redraw those lines of expectations and really that’s where

I think liability, insurance, contractual provisions, that’s really what we’re spelling out, what we expect of each other, because I think as I get more more experienced and older, I think where we end up in disputes is that misalignment of expectations. And we don’t ask those questions, we just assume X is going to do Y, and that might not be what’s aligned. And so ⁓ in terms of…

having that foresight in this field to be able to say this is what we need to do. And this is an area where the Law Commission, for example, are already making massive strides. There’s really interesting thought pieces and changes that have already come about because of this rapid digitalization of, you the world has changed so much, I would say in two years. Legal practice has changed so much, probably in a year.

And you know, more is to come as you know, we see this avalanche really of technologies and in terms of AI and you know, we’re at the like, the absolute start of what AI can actually do, you know, we’re looking only at a really small subset of AI. Let’s just wait and see. I think it’s a fascinating time to be a lawyer.

I think it’s a fascinating time to work in the law because, you know, we’re going through this revolution. It’s a really intriguing time because society is changing. And so as a result, everything else is going to change.

Rob Hanna (50:47)

And I look at it from a glass half full as well. think it’s exciting. And like you say, we’re going through this revolution. I guess that leads nicely to my last question for you, which is around advice for aspiring solicitors, for people who are interested in becoming an emerging technologies lawyers, maybe what’s one piece of key advice you would give to them?

Jackie (51:03)

I think it’s to be curious and to not necessarily think that there’s an answer. I think there isn’t always an answer and I think you just have to have it rooted in rationale, reasonableness, justification, but allow yourself to think outside the box. Allow yourself to think what actually is happening here. What is this client?

trying to develop? What is this technology trying to achieve? And work, almost work backwards to say, what are those issues? Why is that important? And just stay curious and stay just just be like a sponge because it’s happening now. It’s

Rob Hanna (51:53)

Yeah, I’m

every day I come to this curious, you know, learning being open to learning and yeah, I think it’s such a such an important point because you know, only certainty as I said before is change. This has been a fascinating discussion. Jackie really enjoyed it. If our listeners want to learn more about you, your career journey, or indeed your books, feel free to share any websites or social media handles where people can go to find out more.

Jackie (52:14)

Okay, brilliant. my LinkedIn profile is Jacqueline Watts, and I’m at a firm called All in One Advisory. And if you follow me on LinkedIn, then you’ll be able to get all of the contact details for the firm and everything else.

Rob Hanna (52:31)

Fabulous. Well, thank you ever so much once again, Jack. It’s been an absolute blast having you on the show from all of us on the legally speaking podcast sponsored by Clio wishing you lots of continued success with your career and future pursuits. But for now, over and out.