ABA Ethics 20/20: Summary Recording and Powerpoint

Thanks to all who participated in today’s ABA Ethics 20/20 call. We had a decent turn out, including a member of the ABA Ethics 20/20 Commission. As promised (especially for those who called in late due to my time zone error), here’s the recording of the call and the Power Point presentation. The recording is long – a bit over an hour – and the Powerpoint has a ton of text, but there was a lot of information to cover. These are critical proceedings for all lawyers, and I tried to take a balanced approach in the overview before spouting my own views. I’d love to hear your comments or concerns – feel free to post them below or email them to the Commission.
ABA 20/20 Recording

Abaethicspapers1104

One comment  – there’s some discussion at the end of the tape with Mr. Ury, who is an Ethics 20/20 Commission about the October 14 hearing – it actually did discuss confidentiality issues as suggested here.  The ratings were discussed at a different hearings and here is the notice of the October 14 hearing.

One of my recommendations in my presentation is that the ABA encourage lawyers to use discretion in abiding by their ethics obligations.  To this end, however, we need access to ethics opinions.  The ABA’s position on copyright hasn’t changed much since I last complained about it.  Opinions are available for a limited time, access at 20 bucks a pop. The alternative is to join the Center for Professional Responsibility which costs $100 on top of ABA membership. And while the ABA says that the opinions are available at local libraries, the library that I use no longer carries the hard copy binders, but carries the opinions on LEXIS and Westlaw, for a fee.

ABA Issues papers available here: Cloudcomputing and Lawyers Use of Online Marketing Tools.

Information for filing comments with the ABA: Comments should be sent to: Natalia Vera, Senior Research Paralegal, Commission on Ethics 20/20 ABA Center for Professional Responsibility, 321 North Clark Street, 15th Floor, Chicago, IL 60654-7598. Phone: 312/988-5328, fax: 312/988-5280 and email: veran@staff.abanet.org.

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