Eagan, Minn. – FantasySCOTUS, the Internet’s leading Supreme Court Fantasy League, launched its sixth season, sponsored again this term by Thomson Reuters, the world's leading source of intelligent information for businesses and professionals.

FantasySCOTUS, operated by LexPredict, promotes study, discussion and greater understanding of the workings of the nation’s highest court. It unites experts, crowdsourcing and computer algorithms to make predictions on how each of the nine Justices will rule on cases in the Court’s 2014-15 term. Last year, more than 20,000 attorneys, law students, and other avid Supreme Court followers participated.

LexPredict, a legal analytics and service provider, has developed a revolutionary new predictive algorithm that will also participate. {MARSHALL}+, named after Chief Justice John Marshall, applies sophisticated machine learning technology to analyze the upcoming Supreme Court cases. This year, FantasySCOTUS will be hosting a tournament between {MARSHALL}+, Supreme Court experts, and other FantasySCOTUS participants.

“We expect this year’s FantasySCOTUS to be the largest and most dynamic yet,” said Josh Blackman, creator of FantasySCOTUS.  “The “People v. Machine” competition, with {MARSHALL}+ competing against the best Supreme Court predictors brings an intriguing new element. We hope that it will do for the law what IBM's^® Watson™ did on Jeopardy!^®. Along with my colleagues Daniel Martin Katz and Michael J. Bommarito II, who were instrumental in developing {MARSHALL}+, we are very excited for what this technology means for the future of legal decision-making.”

“FantasySCOTUS is a wonderfully engaging platform,” said Karl Florida, managing director of the small law firm and consumer businesses for Thomson Reuters. “It encourages law students, attorneys, academics and others in the legal field to more closely study the workings of the Supreme Court as it hears arguments, accepts briefs, and deliberates on some of the most pressing legal issues facing the nation. The {MARSHALL}+ algorithm brings a whole new technological dimension to studying the Court, and we look forward to our sponsorship of this term’s FantasySCOTUS and the insights that it will bring.”

Thomson Reuters

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