AI Struggles to Identify Specialist Legal Blogs

“ Specialist blogs—particularly those combining law with religion, technology, healthcare, or regulation—are likely to remain influential precisely because they are hard for AI to replicate accurately without expert input”

Since A brief experiment in legal blogging using AI in 2023, a number of aspects of Artificial Intelligence (AI) have been explored on L&RUK. Recently, A further examination of AI in legal blogging looked at developments in the use of AI in sourcing to material for use on this blog, and AI and L&RUK readership considered referrals to the blog from search engines, visitors and other referral bodies (websites, AI &c).

For the present post, we asked both Copilot and to ChatGTP to provide an answer to the question: To what extent do search engines identify Law and Religion UK as a source of information (on law and religion)? [1 ] . The responses were followed up by additional considerations on the future role of AI in “specialist blogs” [2 ].

Copilot

Copilot states that search engines determine the “authority” of a blog through a mix of indexing, backlinks, citations, and topical relevance. It notes that L&RUK is fully indexed and is treated as a legitimate information source; the site is crawled and indexed by search engines, with posts appearing in search results for UK law‑and‑religion topics. Its listing in curated legal directories, such as Access to Law, signals reliability to search engines. Furthermore, its cataloguing by the IALS Digital Resources collection is considered to be “a strong academic endorsement”.

Copilot observes the importance of these inclusions – “search engines use such curated references as quality signals. [L&RUK ] is recognised as a specialist, authoritative niche blog “. This reinforced the blog’s authority within its domain, even if it is not a general‑purpose news source. The areas in which search engines tend to identify Law & Religion UK are: ecclesiastical law; religion‑law interactions; burial/cremation law; church governance; human rights issues involving religion. However, it is not treated like a mainstream news outlet, so it will not appear for broad legal or political queries.

Furthermore, “[i]ts authors’ reputations strengthen its search credibility. Search engines factor in author expertise. The site’s main contributors…are recognized in academic and professional contexts, which boosts perceived trustworthiness”. In summary, L&RUK is deemed to have high authority within its niche, with search engines treating it as a reputable, expert‑driven source for UK law‑and‑religion issues.

ChatGPT

The response from ChatGPT was similar to that from Copilot, although it did identify additional specific issues. It noted that the available evidence suggested search engines were the dominant pathway through which users reach Law & Religion UK, (as  noted in in our earlier post), but this did not necessarily mean that the site was strongly “identified” or branded as a primary authority by those engines in the same way as major academic publishers or institutional databases.

However, it demonstrates that search engines consistently identify the site in response to user queries, making them the primary mechanism of discovery. There are two different senses of “identification”:

(a) Technical discoverability — High. Search engines are:

• clearly index a large volume of the blog’s content;
• routinely return the site in search results; and
• drive the overwhelming majority of visits. Importantly, “this suggests strong SEO visibility and topical relevance, especially for niche queries in UK law-and-religion issues”.

(b) Authority recognition — Moderate / niche. The same evidence also indicated:

• The blog functions as a specialist, issue-driven resource, often accessed via specific queries rather than brand searches;
• Its readership is heavily UK-based (~85%), reinforcing its jurisdiction-specific niche;

• It is classified externally (e.g. by the Institute of Advanced Legal Studies) as a blog resource rather than a formal academic database or journal.
  This implies that search engines are likely to treat it as a relevant expert blog for particular topics although not necessarily as a canonical authority such as Westlaw, LexisNexis, or major journals. Interestingly, on the nature of its search visibility, the pattern of usage suggests that:

• Users often arrive via long-tail or issue-specific searches (e.g. case law, ecclesiastical law topics);

• Older posts continue to receive traffic, indicating persistent indexing and retrieval across time.
  Thus, “ search engines are not just identifying the homepage—they are deep-indexing individual posts as answers to specific legal-religious queries”. Support for this observation has been the recent spike in page-reads of the post on the offence of Preventing lawful and decent burial, 11 March 2024, prompted by the case of Robert Bush, funeral director at Legacy Independent Funeral Directors in Hull, (which we referred to on 19 October 2025).

There has also been a continuing interest in the 2017 post on scattering Ian Brady’s ashes, which appears to have been prompted by uncertainties in the funeral arrangements for Ian Huntley, (the analysis of which we have not covered). However, the same interest does not appear to have been shown in case of the exhumation of Dr David Kelly, the former Iraq weapons inspector who took his own life near his home in Longworth, Oxfordshire, in 2003.

ChatGPT’s overall assessment is that “To a very great extent, search engines identify and surface Law & Religion UK as a source of information—indeed, they are its primary gateway for users. This identification is “strong in visibility and retrieval (high discoverability)” although “[m]ore limited in terms of perceived authority or brand prominence (niche authority rather than dominant source)”.

Future role of AI in L&RUK

At its present state of development, the strength of AI lies in its ability to access and synthesize existing material, and rephrase a wide range available knowledge; in contrast, specialist blogs can give added value through insights which not easily replicated: original analysis; first-hand experience (e.g. interpretation of recent judgments or new/prospective legislation, or commentary on emerging or ambiguous situations.

Furthermore, specialist blogs located at the interface of two disciplines, such as law and religion, occupy a specific niche which it is difficult to replicate, at present. However, this advantage may narrow over time with further developments in AI and its increasing use by experts with “hybrid applications” of AI and expert use becoming common.

It is widely acknowledged that there has been a rapid expansion in the rate of development and use of AI technology. Within the EU, Regulation 2024/1689, adopted on 13 June 2024, established a comprehensive legal framework for artificial intelligence within the European Community. In July 2025, the Law Commission published the discussion paper AI and the law , in which it considers the nature of AI, how might AI issues arise, and the need for clarification on the fundamental issue of legal personality.

The emergence and development of Artificial Intelligence (AI), and Generative AI (Gen AI) in particular, have created both opportunities and challenges for authors, researchers, and publishers. Oxford University Press (OUP) and other publishers have formulated guidelines on the responsible, appropriate, and transparent use of Gen AI by authors and editors in its research publishing.

Whilst AI has the potential of summarizing lengthy judgments &c, or exploring areas for which we have limited expertise, the material so generated is unlikely to be used in the absence of references/links to primary sources. To date, the direct use of AI by L&RUK has been limited and this is clearly identifiable from the context of the text; however, it is possible that indirectly, the many referrals to the site via search engines will have been influenced by the search engine’s own AI.

[1 ] …noting that “ Copilot …gives a response more tailored to a user working with Microsoft 365 (i.e. dp) and their perceived areas of interest”.

[2 ] A “specialist blog” is a blog that focuses on a specific niche, topic, or area of expertise, rather than covering a wide range of general subjects. Key features are: Narrow focus: It concentrates on one subject; Expert-level content: Posts are often more detailed, informed, and targeted toward people interested in that field; Defined audience: It attracts readers who share a particular interest or need; Authority building: The goal is often to become a trusted source.

Cite this article as: David Pocklington, "ChatGPT, Copilot, and L&RUK" in Law & Religion UK, 8 April 2026, https://lawandreligionuk.com/2026/04/08/chatgpt-copilot-and-lruk/

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Comment *

Name *

Email *

Website

Notify me of follow-up comments by email.

Notify me of new posts by email.