Tredennick2020

Last modified by XWikiGuest on 2020/02/28 01:42

Hey there:

You have a number of excellent candidates here, which is a good thing for the organization. I offered my name because I believe in service to the community and I would like to contribute to the open source movement. 

My background is a bit different than many of your candidates. I spent the first twenty years of my professional life as a trial lawyer and partner at a national law firm. 

In 2000, I founded Catalyst Repository Systems, a leading e-discovery and AI software provider for the legal profession. I grew the company to about 180 employees and five data centers located in the U.S. and Asia and we served many of the largest companies in the world including the likes of Apple, Intel, AIG, Comcast, major healthcare companies, and law firms around the world. I played a lot of roles there from CEO to General Counsel to software designer, manual writer, marketing, sales and I usually emptied out the dishwasher in the mornings. 

I sold Catalyst to OpenText just over a year ago. Rather than retire, I started a new software company, Merlin Digital Magic, with some of my development team.  In brief, we develop and host legal compliance software using open source software delivered through the public cloud. Getting back to a startup is tremendously fun and this time I didn't have to raise any money.  We rolled out our first platform a few weeks ago. You can read about Merlin Digital here: www.merlindm.com

As I was getting Merlin Digital off the ground, I realized that most legal professionals didn't understand the role open source software was playing in the technology world and had no idea how important it might be for legal. Last fall I formed the Merlin Legal Open Source Foundation and secured a 501(c)(3) as an educational organization. I am pleased to see that we have attracted members from all over the world and the message is catching fire. Our focus is to improve access to justice with the following mission: 

To foster education about the benefits of open source software; provide a central platform for legal professionals to collaborate on open source development projects; and distribute open source software under free license to individuals and organizations around the world.

You can read more about the Merlin Foundation here:  www.merlinfoundation.org

Other Stuff

I have done a lot of writing, speaking and leading organizations which can be beneficial to the organization.

Over the past thirty years, I have written eight books and countless articles, blogs, newsletters, etc. on legal technology topics. I have spoken hundreds of times at conferences across six continents.

On the legal side, I was a past Chair of the ABA’s Law Practice Management Section, was Editor in Chief of its flagship magazine and am currently active with The Sedona Conference, the leading standards body for legal, acting as  a drafting team leader for several of its publications.

I have won a few wards including being named by the American Lawyer as one of the top six “E-Discovery Trailblazers,” named to the FastCase 50 as a legal visionary and named  one of the “Top 100 Global Technology Leaders” by London CityTech magazine. I also received the Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year for Technology in the Rocky Mountain Region, and Top Technology Entrepreneur by the Colorado Software and Internet Association. Currently, I serve on the Alzheimer's Board for the Rocky Mountain Region. On the side, I am a competitive showjumper (equine), ski and play drums sometimes in a Grateful Dead and classic rock band.

If I can help the organization, I am happy to do so. But there are a lot of good choices out there as well. 

JT

pointing.jpeg

Tags:
    

Submit feedback regarding this wiki to [email protected]

This wiki is licensed under a Creative Commons 2.0 license
XWiki 14.10.13 - Documentation