The lawyer of the future will exist as a ‘polytechnic’ or ‘many-skilled’ professional, applying their legal expertise to a client’s changing world in an increasingly agile way and within a range of organisational settings. For legal educators, there is a need to consider how education can best prepare future lawyers for this reality. The long view suggests that we should be looking to build core skills in legal, design and logic principles rather than learning specific technologies that may be rapidly superseded. But how can we develop these skills, and how we can balance the need to understand core academic principles of law against the need for applied, workplace experience? This chapter looks at the balancing process, focusing on the impact of changing roles in law firms and the demands of the in-house legal and law-advisory-organisation dynamic. It examines how legal education can instil within lawyers, both an understanding of the principles of law alongside an appreciation of the application of those principles in the workplace. It presents a vision of the roles and specialisations that are likely to emerge within the profession, and considers how the future work of lawyers will sit alongside alternative paths into the legal industry.

Game-based legal learning has emerged as a topic of intense interest over the last decade as a means of ‘modernising’ legal education, with game-based learning eliciting a wide range of responses from the legal academy. Somewhat unsurprisingly, resistance in the name of tradition has persisted. Yet, the view of game playing as a distinctly modern pedagogical development, and opposition on the basis of tradition is sheer folly. Ludic education has been the dominant teaching method for millennia, with legal game playing traced at least to the time of Cicero. Revealing the rich history of game playing in law, this chapter details ludic legal education from the declamation of Ancient Rome to Nintendo’s Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney. It observes the way in which games can operate as a compelling delivery device for instruction, allow for experimentation, and encourage students to voice their opinions in a field where the sheer breadth of precedent and the relative impenetrability of legal texts may prove intimidating. In demonstrating the potential of game playing to overcome barriers to learning, this chapter considers the modern design principles that have enabled games to emerge as robust and enjoyable content delivery devices in legal education.

In this chapter, the author discusses blockchain's energy problem. Beginning with an account of Boden, Sweden's emergence as the "Node Pole," the chapter explores how much energy the blockchain is consuming, why it is consuming as much as it is, and what can be done about it.

In this chapter, the author dicusses alternative approaches that governments have available to deal with new technologies. Beginning with an account of Malta's efforts to attract blockchain business to the country, the chapter then goes on to explore three regulatory paradigms for technology: (1) the "do nothing" approach; (2) the permissive approach; and (3) the restrictive approach. The chapter explores the pros and cons of each.

In this chapter, the author discusses how blockchain falls between the cracks in legal systems. Beginning with an account of the prosecution of one cryptocurrency founder for securities fraud, the chapter then goes on to show how blockchain's unique structure makes it particularly difficult to regulate, and how regulators have struggled to catch up.

In this chapter, the author discusses the world of crypto-crime. Beginning with an account of the arrest of Alexander Vinnik, the Russian accused of running a money-laundering cryptocurrency exchange, the chapter goes on to describe the ways in which blockchain has allowed dramatic levels of criminality to spread throughout the industry.

In this chapter, the author discusses similarities and differences between blockchain and democracy. Beginning with an account of Jerry Brito's efforts to promote bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies in policy circles, the chapter then goes on to explore the ways in which blockchain attempts to emulate democratic government, but also the ways in which it falls short.

In this chapter, the author explores how the blockchain is being used in the world. Beginning with an account of a famous hack involving the virtual currency Ethereum, the chapter goes on to explore the rise and fall of bitcoin, the spread of initial coin offerings, and the development of business-oriented blockchains.

At the beginning of this book, I wrote that the blockchain stands at the intersection of three great themes of modern society: technology, money and democracy. At its heart, the blockchain is a technology for democratizing money – along with many other aspects of our daily lives. Its aim is to use advances in cryptography and computing power to improve the way that our economy works and to give us all greater control over our information, our data and, ultimately, our lives. In the Age of Technology, this is what democracy is supposed to look like. Not a day goes past that we do not hear laments about the stranglehold that big technology firms like Apple, Google and Facebook have over our online identities. Giving power back to the people is an elegant solution to this problem. But decentralization also has its drawbacks. It can be chaotic. It can be confusing.

In this chapter, the author explores the philosophical roots of the blockchain. Beginning with an account of Satoshi Nakamoto's famous bitcoin white paper, the chapter then goes on to describe the history of virtual currencies, the cypherpunks, and debates in political theory over the benefits of centralization and decentralization.

In this chapter, the author discusses how blockchain works, with a particular focus on bitcoin.Beginning with an account of an infamous flaw in bitcoin, the chapter goes on to describe the cryptography that allows the blockchain to serve as a decentralized repository of immutable information.

In this chapter, William Magnuson provides an introduction to the key themes of the book, including blockchain's relationship with broader issues in society. Beginning with an account of the Mt. Gox hack, the chapter then goes on to explore how blockchain revolves around three key ideas: money, technology and democracy.