You will not remember all your jobs, nor how much money you made throughout your career. However, you will remember every single person that graciously opened a career door for you, became a friend, made life meaningful.
29 November 2024 (Brussels, Belgium) – This past September marked two years since we lost Charles. I was traveling all of September, and then later in the month I also had to deal with my own grief. So this tribute comes a little late.
But it is important to me. Most things don’t matter that much in life. I probably realized that too late. Everything we thought was going to make us happy – and become how we identify ourselves – just means nothing. It really means nothing. What matters is the people. It’s the love. That’s everything.
And so Charles has not been forgotten.
Nobody helped me more in my writing, or in my perspective on life, than Charles did. He was my guru in every sense of the word.
I looked at my tribute to Christian, from one year ago, and all of it still stands. It follows below, though I’ve added a bit. Because this past year, as my writing has grown and my followers have grown and my work has received more and more attention, I realized it was due to the writing precepts laid down by Christian many years ago.
The legal technology industry was the last domain I entered, and it came late. I was 51 years old when I got involved (I am 73 as I write this, quickly approaching 74).
But it fit in with what I was doing. It was a natural part of the overlapping domains I have worked in as a lawyer and that I also covered as a journalist/writer for 40+ years: cyber security, digital/mobile media, science technology and software development. I was fortunate because I became friends with the leading lights of the legaltech industry such as Craig Ball, Chris Dale, Jason Baron, Ralph Losey, Browning Marean, and Nigel Murray.
Craig helped me to understand forensics, Jason and Ralph helped me dive into the intricacies of computer software, Chris helped me distinguish “ediscovery” from “discovery”, Browning helped me to grow a company I started, called The Posse List, which helps people find jobs in the legal tech industry. And Nigel helped me get established in Europe when I left the U.S. and moved here in 2005, as well as establish an expertise in “extreme discovery” projects – data collection/data investigation in extreme environments in such places as Cote d’Ivoire, Iran, Russia and the UAE where there was a big need.
And then there was Charles Christian with whom I had my closest relationship in the legal tech industry. We first met at Legaltech in New York many (many) years ago, and then at numerous events in the UK. So I was gutted over his death.
We were both pretty much the same age (I think he was 1 year older) and we were both journalists.
Although to be frank, he was actually a significant cut above me: a writer, editor, barrister, journalist and radio host who was always writing. And the founder of the Orange Rag and a legal tech visionary, “who long before the world woke up to the importance of technology in delivering legal services, was writing about new innovations and keeping the industry on its toes with his acerbic wit”. That last line is from a beautiful piece written by Caroline Hill, the current Editor-in-Chief of the Orange Rag, more properly called the Legal IT Insider. You can read Caroline’s tribute by clicking here.
Charles and I ended up texting, emailing and Tweeting each other a lot. Plus phone calls. We also exchanged numerous books we wanted each other to read, and/or articles to share. I became a patron to his blog.
Charles became my editor. He actually appointed himself to that position, at least on my “TL;DR” blog posts. He always thought they were too long but he knew I detested today’s environment which rewards simplicity and shortness, which punishes complexity and depth. So he let me be. Although he still excoriated me on my often daily “machine gun” posts which were filled (and still are) with typos: “That’s the journalist hitting a deadline. Not a writer. Clean them up before you post!!” Alas, Charles, that is one thing I did not faithfully follow, although I now have an editor so (hopefully) I will refrain from posting before she edits. But you know me 🤷♂️
So it was Christian who slowed me down on my long, thoughtful pieces and said to me “your posts can be in depth and that’s fine. But you do not need an army of phrases, moving across a wide landscape, to wrestle your ideas to the ground. You can be long but you need to be concise. And stay on point”. As noted, he did not edit all of my work but certainly had a big hand in those “TL;DR” blog posts you all seem to like – Christian taking aim at syntax, structure, and content.
For those of you who knew Charles, you knew he loved language. We were both subscribers to Literary Hub and we often sent each other pieces to make sure the other saw it.
He also helped fine tune two of my long running post series: one on the COVID epidemic, and one on the Ukraine War – changes ripping through the fabric of our society.
Plus my long-book-in-progress “Tales Aboard the Shipwreck Called Civilisation” to which he added the subtitle “Our many moments of rupture“. He also helped in the distribution of my longer long blog posts to build a wider audience and I owe him as big hat tip for that. His work contributed greatly to increasing my subscriber base which now numbers 28,000+.
And as you can imagine for two relics like ourselves, we often chatted about our memento mori, reflecting on our mortality … and the limits of the human body. We exchanged pieces from Epicurus and Lucretius. And we remained thankful we survived for another beautiful day.
You will not remember all your jobs, nor how much money you made throughout your career. However, you will remember every single person that graciously opened a career door for you, became a friend, made life meaningful.
Thank you, Christian.