Accuracy is not everything, even to lawyers
Technical accuracy gets you to functional. User comprehension gets you to transformational.
People's Law School showed what many legal AI projects overlook: accuracy alone does not equal usefulness. Although their Beagle+ chatbot reached 99% accuracy, the true insight was realizing that accuracy's value ends where user needs begin.
Delaying launch through accuracy milestones—70%, 80%, 90%—exposed that technical success didn't automatically create value for users. When the launch finally happened at 99% accuracy, client feedback showed a disconnect: responses were legally correct, but not usable. Non-lawyers couldn't turn the technically precise information into action. The team realized that precision without practical accessibility fails to empower users.
That constraint forced a fundamental redesign around user comprehension rather than legal completeness. The team discovered that non-lawyers needed context bridges—explanations of why something matters, what typically happens next, and how to actually implement advice. Legal accuracy without practical scaffolding left users more confused than helped.
For in-house counsel, this highlights why legal AI often falls short, even with high technical performance. While legal professionals bridge the gap between legal details and practical action, regular users often struggle to do so. The system had to move beyond legal accuracy, making information actionable for those without legal training.
After months of iteration, their current 79% user satisfaction rate reflects this hard-won understanding. Legal information becomes useful only when it connects legal concepts to human situations. Beagle+ now bridges that gap by contextualizing legal rules within practical scenarios users actually face.
Technical accuracy brings functionality. But only user comprehension transforms legal AI from a tool into a solution.
