Blog

Yes. It is Friday. It is April 1. It is April Fool’s Day. And what is April Fool’s Day without a post from Eric Turkewitz, a New York personal injury lawyer?

OK. Moving on. Here are some items worth checking out from our Facebook page:

• Virginia State Bar News – Internet Scams Target Lawyers. James M. McCauley, Ethics Council for the Virginia State Bar, outlines various scams targeting lawyers that have been reported. Scammers may identify themselves as a corporate officer of a legitimate overseas company asking for help in collected a debt, or they may identify themselves as seeking legal “representation” in order to collect divorce settlement monies from an ex “on assignment” in an Asian country. McCauley suggests lawyers file a complaint with the Internet Crime Complaint Center if you suspect you’ve been scammed, or call the Virginia State Bar’s Legal Ethics Hotline: (804)775-0564. We’d also suggest reading Avoid a Claim Blog’s Collaborative Law Agreement Fraud Scam post, as provides the text of some of the email scams.
• MyShingle.com – Blame it on Solo. There was much back-and-forth between Kevin O’Keefe of LexBlog and Will Hornsby of the ABA, over a recent ABA Standing Committee on the Delivery of Legal Services survey about how people find lawyers, and a subsequent ABA Journal headline (see RLHB comments). Carolyn Elefant points out that the survey “was about how consumers find lawyers, not how lawyers attract clients,” and does a nice job of reframing the “to blog or not to blog” debate around solo and small firm lawyers.
• TechCrunch – Why Statrups Need to Blog (and what to talk about…). A guest post from Mark Suster, who is a venture capitalist with GRP Partners, talks about why to blog, and what to blog about. He walks through the 3 W’s and an H, using his own experience, and offer tips on specific things you can do to get started, and keep going.
• Lawyerist – Hosting a WordPress Website for Your Law Firm. While there are other blogging platforms, like Blogger, WordPress is arguably the defacto favorite for law firms. Sam Glover walks you through the three options for setting up a WordPress blog for your law firm. So if you’ve been thinking about blogging, or don’t like your current blogging platform, give it a read and then give WordPress a try.
• NYT You’re the Boss Blog – A Start-Up’s Financial Reckoning. Good read that chronicles SolTec Electronics and how its founder, Dawn Gluskin, was so focused on “sales, marketing, and business development — her areas of expertise — while simultaneously running her 11-employee company” that she lost sight of the company’s financials. Serves as a good reminder of why it is important to keep an eye on your whole practice, not just your lawyering expertise.
• Jim Calloway’s Law Practice Tips Blog – Deep Thoughts on the Future of Law Practice. A comment on Jordan Furlong’s post, “The Stratified Legal Market and its Implications,” it also points to some other resources on the topic, namely a podcast and an Oklahoma Bar CLE course he has put together. The CLE course will also be a live webcast, set for May 18.
• ABA Journal – Web Attacks can Diminish your Good Name, but Something can be Done. Good read about the “Internet’s potential in a networked world to shape and alter reputations,” and not necessarily for the better. It walks through some real world examples, applicable laws, free speech debates and some steps you can take if you find yourself in the crosshairs.
• Attorney at Work – Wireless: Be Safe at Home. Much credence is given to protecting yourself while using a public Wi-Fi hotspot, whether at the local coffee shop or at the airport or some other public space. Little, if any, credence is given to protecting yourself while at home since, well, who really thinks about the security of their home Wi-Fi? It’s home, it’s secure! Not so fast, especially if you live in an urban area, so be sure to read this piece on how to protect your home Wi-Fi, too.

Until next week…

What a week! Twitter turned five. The New York Times announced its digital subscription plans. Air strikes were launched against Libya. Japan continued to struggle forward. And as if things weren’t rattled enough, AT&T announced its proposed acquisition of T-Mobile USA.

And, in no particular order, here are some interesting news items collected from our Facebook page:

• ABA Journal: Law Firms Need to Act More Like Businesses and Hire Accordingly, Prof Says. Summary of arguments made by George Washington University business professor James Bailey in the Washington Post Capital Business column. Among other things like using flat and alternative fees, Bailey argues that law firms need to hire “business-savvy nonlawyers,” or those with business and management experience, for leadership roles.
• New York Times You’re the Boss Blog: How Much Technology is Too Much? Rarely is the day we don’t see something about law firms, lawyers and technology, so we found this piece rather interesting in both its question, and the examples it provided on finding that balance of technology and human interaction. It also serves as a good reminder that technology is not always the best, nor simplest, solution.
• Law Technology News: Cloud Computing: Ethical Shades of Gray. Cloud computing is an inescapable buzzword. Its ethical considerations, indeed its ethical implications, are not. It’s tempting to turn a deaf ear to the debate now as viewpoints have been expressed often, but Devika Kewalramani doesn’t. Instead, Kewalramani reminds us where the debate started, what remain common concerns and why and what approaches can be taken to maintain, in a word: perspective. And it should be noted that Clio (Themis Solutions) is a founding member of the Legal Cloud Computing Association.
• New York Times You’re the Boss Blog: Should I Dump My Servers and Embrace the Cloud? While ethical considerations are a focal point in the legal profession, and rightly so, this article reminded us of a more basic question: keep and update existing legacy systems on servers in the office, or migrate to the cloud? It sheds some light on the thought process, and pros and cons of staying the course vs. making a change.
• The Inspired Solo: 9 Productivity Tips for Lawyers who use Evernote. Leave it to Jay Fleischman to offer up some excellent tips to get the most out of Evernote. Though we use Evernote ourselves, we found the Instant Research (Tip 3), Evidence Locker (Tip 5) and Dictation (Tip 7) tips quite helpful. Give it a read, and if you’re not using Evernote already, you might be inclined to give it a try.
• PMA Tips: How Do People Find a Lawyer? The ABA Standing Committee on the Delivery of Legal Services commissioned Harris Interactive to conduct some public opinion research in 2010. Specifically, the research examined “aspects of decision-making when people seek services for personal legal matters.” This post provides a nice overview of the findings, with a link to the complete report.
• Ars Technica: HTTPS is Great: Here’s Why Everyone Needs to use It (So We Can Too). A good read that provides some background on HTTP and HTTPS, and discusses the challenges of “wholesale encryption of all HTTP traffic,” using the Ars Technica site as an example. It provides some useful nuggets for those who tend to surf the Web, or otherwise work from the local coffee shop that offers free Wi-Fi.
• Slaw.ca: Expanding HTTPS Support Slowly Making the Web More Secure. From Clio co-founder Jack Newton, it also discusses HTTPS. It provides a quick overview of why HTTPS is a good thing for the Web and its users, and points out that you can enable HTTPS on Twitter, in addition to Facebook and Gmail, to keep prying eyes of apps like Firesheep at bay.
• ATL Small Firms, Big Lawyers column: Why Are You a Small-Firm Lawyer? A good read from Jay Shepherd about applying Simon Sinek’s mantra, “People don’t buy what you do; they buy what you do it,” to the practice of law. Towards the end, Shepherd also talks about his experience with defining the “why” of his practice, and how it shapes his practice.
• Ignite Law: 2011 Talks. Legal tweeters were all a, well, twitter, this week as final voting took place for Ignite Law 2011, taking place April 10, the day before ABA TechShow. Last year was the first Ignite Law event, and this year looks to have just as interesting a lineup.

Until next week…

You may follow us on Twitter, you may “like” our Facebook Page, you may simply read this blog or perhaps some combination of all three. And though our Facebook postings also post to Twitter, we know it can be easy to miss things, or forget to favorite or flag something for future reference. So, we thought we’d start something new: a round up of our recent Facebook postings.

In no particular order, here are some pieces worth reading:

• Law.com Small Firm Business – Shingle-Hanging 201: Another Year, Same Approach. An open, frank, heartfelt piece from David Koller, who will be chronicling his “journey from firm life to solo life and beyond.” He uses the “recency effect” as a springboard for a discussion, and observations, on what brought him into the solo realm. It’s a good read for anyone considering going solo, just starting out or stuck in a rut.
• TechnoLawyer Blog – SmallLaw: You Can Sharpen a Pencil but It Ain’t Gonna Write You a Poem and Other Lessons From My First Year of Practice. In the same newly solo vein as Koller’s piece, but with a technology twist. Pete Armstrong discusses the pervasive misconception that “if you have technology, you have a law firm,” and offers some important lessons he learned from his first year as a solo lawyer.
• North Carolina General Assembly - S254: An Act to Allow Non-Attorney Ownership of Professional Corporate Law Firms. Big news out of North Carolina, and perhaps the biggest non-cloud related news to date. It has sparked controversy over whether or not law firms will feel compelled to make decisions based on the best interest of shareholders instead of firm clients.
• Forbes – North Carolina Bill Would Let Non-Lawyers Invest in Law Firms. In this Forbes post, Daniel Fisher does a nice job outlining provisions of the bill, and safe guards against lawyers putting investor interests ahead of clients, and also draws comparisons to erosion of patient-first medical practices in this “era of managed care.” We’d also suggest reading the comments to the ABAJournal article.
• Law21.ca – 21st Century Solo and MyShingle.com – 21st Century Solo, A Chain-Blog Post, Part II. A very good point-counter point-type discussion about being a solo lawyer in the 21st Century.
• Content Marketing Institute – 12 Things to Do After You’ve Written a New Blog Post. Whether you just started blogging or have been blogging for awhile, these 12 tips are helpful. They range from the obvious, like shortening the URL to the less obvious or easily overlooked, like linking to your blog in your email signature or adding blog posts to your email newsletter.
• New York Times Travel Section – How Not to Get Sick from a Flight. Some helpful tips and information to keep in mind for the next time you travel, especially with conference season approaching.
• New York Times Small Business Guide – A Small Business Made to Seem Bigger. Good article with some useful information on how to use technology to be productive and make your one-person business seem larger. Covers such areas as scheduling, organization, accounting and also offers some offline tools and tips.
• Solo Practice University – Life as a One-Man-Band — The solo Practitioner. Suzanne Meehle offers some good advice on establishing systems for assembling files, managing cash flow, task management, just to name a few. She also offers a simple tip for solos: ask yourself “How do I…?” for every task that you do. She said you can then create a list of major tasks, break them down into sub-tasks and you’ve got your system for completing that task.

Until next week…