Last week was a very good week for my company, Xcential.
We started the week hosting a breakfast put on by the Data Transparency Coalition at the Booz Allen Hamilton facility in Washington D.C.. The topic was Transforming Law and Regulation. Unfortunately, an issue at home kept me away but I was able to make a brief pre-recorded presentation and my moderating role was played by Mark Stodder, our company President. Thank you, Mark!
Next up was the first U.S. edition of the LEX Summer School from Italy. I have attended this summer school every year since 2010 in Italy and it’s great to see the same opportunity for an open dialog amongst the legal informatics community finally come to the U.S. Monica Palmirani (@MonicaPalmirani), Fabio Vitali, and Luca Cervone (@lucacervone) put on the event from the University of Bologna. The teachers also included Jim Mangiafico (@mangiafico) (the LoC data challenge winner), Veronique Parisse (@VeroParisse) from the European Union, Andrew Weber (@atweber) from the Library of Congress, Kirsten Gullickson (@GullicksonK) from the Office of the Clerk at the U.S. House of Representatives, and myself from Xcential. I flew in for an abbreviated visit covering the last two days of the Summer School where I covered how the U.S. Code is modeled in Akoma Ntoso and gave the students an opportunity to try out our new bill drafting editor — LegisProedit.
After the Summer School concluded, it was followed by the first International Akoma Ntoso Conference on Saturday, where I spoke about the architecture of our new editor as well as how the USLM schema is a derivative of the Akoma Ntoso schema. We had good turnout, from around the world, and a number of interesting speakers.
This week is NCSL in Seattle where we will be discussing our new editor with potential customers and partners. Mark Stodder from Xcential will be in attendance.
In a month, I’ll be in Ravenna once more for the European LEX Summer School — where I’ll be able to show even more progress towards the goal of a full product line of Akoma Ntoso tools. It’s interesting times for me.
The editor is coming along nicely and we’re beginning to firm up our QuickStarter beta plans. I’ve already received a number of requests and will be getting in touch with everyone as soon as we’re ready to roll out the program. If you would like to participate as a beta tester — or if you would just like more information, please contact us at info@xcential.com.
I’m really excited about how far we’ve come. Akoma Ntoso is on the verge of being certified as an official OASIS standard, our Akoma Ntoso products are coming into place, and interest around the world is growing. I can’t wait to see where we will be this time next year.
