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Tech & Web

How Much Technology Do Lawyers Really Need to Know? Not as Much As One In-House Counsel Would Like.

May 30, 2013 by Carolyn Elefant

Seems that big law just can’t catch a break.  Criticized for everything from arrogant billing practices to an unhealthy obsession with profits per partner to an unsustainable pyramid-scheme business model, now  corporate counsel Casey Flaherty is beating up on big firms for their lack of techno–aptitude, reports Monica Bay at American Lawyer. But are Flaherty’s [...]

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Do V-Lawyers and E-Lawyers Fully Substitute for A Lawyer?

May 29, 2013 by Carolyn Elefant

I came across this interesting article in the Washington City Paper  criticizing the D.C. Jail’s replacement  for face-to-face visits with video conferencing.  What’s the problem, you might wonder. After all, isn’t visitation a hardship for many families?  At least video allows for continued contact without the muss and fuss of in person contact. Not entirely. [...]

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A Public Apology: Webinar Cancelled Due to Anymeeting.com’s Terrible Service – But I’m to Blame As Well.

May 3, 2013 by Carolyn Elefant

I am so, so sorry that I have had to cancel today’s free webinar on how to launch and lift a 21st Century Practice. The immediate cause of the cancellation is that the Anymeeting.com platform crashed – my assistant, more than 100 participants and I were locked out of the site. I’ll trash the service [...]

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Iron Tech Lawyer Competition – Report

April 18, 2013 by Carolyn Elefant

I left the office on Wednesday afternoon to attend the Iron Tech Lawyer competition at Georgetown Law School.  I must confess that after six months of white noise about disruption, rethinking and access to justice as a way to access venture capital, I didn’t have high hopes for the students’ projects, which employ NeotaLogic (a [...]

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The Problem With Dropbox Isn’t Security and The Limits of ABA Techshow

April 8, 2013 by Carolyn Elefant

When it comes to technology, lawyers are no different from the general public — gravitating towards the free and easy, no-brainer products like gmail or dropbox. Yet often, these tools aren’t necessarily optimal security-wise for serving clients.  But rather than scold or deride lawyers who use these tools, most of the speakers at this past [...]

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Future of ABA Tech Show: Can We Take Tech Out of Context?

April 5, 2013 by Carolyn Elefant

This year, I came to ABA Techshow intending to cover the latest and greatest tech tools and trends for MyShingle. I walked the exhibit hall yesterday, dutifully sitting through demo after demo of ipad deposition tools along with dozens of cloud-based practice management tools and portals until my brain went cloudy with all of it. [...]

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Lawyers Going Mobile Faster Than Ever

March 29, 2013 by Carolyn Elefant

Sometime in the wake of 9-11, when the Blackberry was the focus of so many stories, I asked several of my solo colleagues whether they thought they’d ever use one in their practice. At the time, Blackberrys were becoming standard for large firm and and corporate employees, but they hadn’t made their way down the [...]

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The End of GoogleReader: A Sign of Blogging’s Decline and Lessons for Lawyers

March 14, 2013 by Carolyn Elefant

As you’ve probably heard, yesterday, Google announced that it’s retiring Google Reader, a free service for consolidating and reading RSS feeds on July 1, 2013.  Launched in 2005, Google Reader has a loyal following but with user rates declining, the Reader, along with many other products, will now fall victim to another round of spring [...]

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Future of Law Friday: Marketing With Menus

March 8, 2013 by Carolyn Elefant

Buying legal services can be confusing. Sometimes – in cases where work is unpredictable, or facts are unknown, opaque information may be acceptable. But for work that is commodity in nature or more predictable, there’s no reason not to make prices available to consumers – if not on your website, then at least in materials [...]

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Could co-learning offer a rescue line for offline (live) CLE

March 7, 2013 by Carolyn Elefant

Earlier this week, Scott Greenfield asked whether live CLE can survive in a largely online, virtual world? After all, live CLE costs more to produce (room rental and potential travel costs for a speaker) and may attract fewer attendees because a live event doesn’t have the same flexibility as a watch-it-anywhere webinar. Yet, as Scott [...]

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