GUIDE
Who owns what the tool produces
Output ownership, export, and portability are three separate questions, and vendor pages often answer only the first.
Updated September 20, 2026
Ownership and portability are different questions
A vendor can grant the firm ownership of the output while giving it no practical way to take that output elsewhere. Ownership is a legal statement about rights. Portability is a technical statement about export.
Both matter, and a firm can be satisfied with one and exposed on the other. The record's switching-cost note describes what leaving the product would take, which is the portability half.
Where the output lives decides how easily it leaves
A product that writes into the firm's own document store leaves work behind when the subscription ends. A product that holds work inside its own system takes it away.
This is why an assistant embedded in a practice-management platform is a different decision from a standalone drafting tool. The switching-cost note on each record states which shape the product has.
Check the export format before you need it
The question to ask is not whether export exists but what comes out. A structured export that preserves matters, metadata, and history is a different result from a folder of files.
Where a vendor publishes an export or data-portability statement, it belongs in the record. Where the vendor publishes nothing, the record says Not stated, and the question goes to the vendor directly.
The output is still the firm's responsibility
No vendor term changes the professional obligations that attach to work product leaving the firm. A tool can produce a draft; it does not review it, and it does not sign it.
That is not a reason to avoid the tools. It is a reason to treat the review step as part of the workflow rather than an afterthought, and to check the firm's own obligations with its bar association and insurer.