The Court ODR Podcast
Conversations with the judges, court administrators and researchers deciding how technology enters the courts — what they are actually building, what the evidence shows, and what it means for the people they serve.
How courts are actually adopting technology
Conversations on AI in the judiciary, access to justice and online dispute resolution. Newest first, with a full transcript on every episode page.
Courts Aren’t Just Buildings: Traffic ODR at 14A District Court
Twelve years of resolving traffic tickets online in Washtenaw County: how the informal hearing left the courtroom, how eight police agencies came on board, and why the court maintains a default rate under 1%.
Lessons for the Courts from AI’s Introduction into Arbitration
Arbitration is a creature of contract, so a neutral can pilot a new tool with the parties’ consent. A judge works inside fixed civil rules and a statewide platform. That difference decides how fast AI arrives on each side.
Bringing AI Tools Into the Judiciary
What AI looks like from the defense table — whether it narrows the gap between the parties or widens it, and the risk of a two-tier justice system.
ODR as a Justice Pathway for Unrepresented Litigants
Why twenty years of access-to-justice reform has not closed the gap, and why these systems have to live under the court’s tent rather than beside it.
The Evolution of Court ODR
How court ODR actually developed, what Alaska’s statewide programme proved and where it stopped short, and the research the field still has not done.
What Should Courts Call the People They Serve?
Litigant, pro se, party, customer — why Alaska renamed its clerk’s office customer service in 2001, and why passivity is not neutrality.
Technology is arriving in the courts either way. This is how it is going.
Every court is now making decisions about technology — e-filing, remote hearings, online dispute resolution, and increasingly AI. Those decisions get made under real constraints: fixed civil rules, statewide platforms, flat headcount and rising filings. Very little of that reality shows up in the vendor literature.
Each episode is a long-form conversation with one person doing the work — a sitting judge, a former state supreme court justice, a deputy public defender, a law professor with the data, the person who built the country’s first remote court self-help centre. The questions are practical: what did you try, what did it cost, what surprised you, and what would you tell the next court. Every episode is published with a complete transcript, so you can read it in ten minutes instead of listening for thirty.
CEO of ODR.com, and previously the architect of the dispute resolution systems at eBay and PayPal, which resolved millions of disputes worldwide. He is the author of Online Dispute Resolution for Business and co-author of The New Handshake: ODR and the Future of Consumer Protection.
Get new episodes as they publish
One email when a new conversation goes up — with the transcript, so you can decide whether it is worth your half hour.
Subscribe to the PodcastWorking on something courts should hear about?
The best episodes come from people doing the work — judges piloting new tools, court administrators clearing backlogs, researchers with data the field has not seen. If that sounds like you or someone you know, get in touch.
The conversations are useful. The systems are what change things.
ODR.com has spent 25 years building dispute resolution systems for courts and institutions — deliberately, and at scale. If something you heard here raised questions for your court, we’re glad to talk them through.