Disclaimer: The PMA Pipe and PMA Tips are offered as a service to our members. Materials and links on these pages are intended to provide only guidance and are not legal authority. Some information is from jurisdictions other than Florida, and may reference the law of other jurisdictions. Views and opinions expressed by the authors of the articles contained in the PMA Pipe or PMA Tips may not be those shared by The Florida Bar’s Law Office Management Assistance Service (LOMAS). For assistance with law practice management and law office management issues particular to Florida law firms, we suggest that you contact a LOMAS practice management advisor for a confidential teleconference at 866-730-2020 or 850-561-5616.
FROM THE PMA PIPE
An outpouring of information, blog excerpts and articles from PMA's across North America |
When It’s Time to Say “So Long…” From time to time I get calls from lawyers who are looking for information on shuttering their practices. Sometimes it’s for happy reasons, like appointment or election to a judgeship or a long-awaited retirement. Other times it involves a family relocation and, sometimes, small firms just don’t gain the traction they need to keep on [...]
from: The Last Word 11/21/2009 Home Sweet Office I never blogged about my Home Sweet Office article due to some technical issues here. But it is clear more and more lawyers are considering an office-based practice. I find it interesting that many of the success stories involve an...
from: Jim Calloway's Law Practice Tips Blog 11/21/2009 Electronic Receipts: Legally Sufficient in Oregon? Preparing return receipt certified mailings is a hassle. It’s time consuming, costly, not exactly sustainable, and often guaranteed to make your staff tear their hair out. Enter the green alternative: the electronic return receipt.Earlier this year, Washington state paved the way for use of electronic return receipt delivery with HB 1426. The bill provides:“Whenever a [...]
from: Oregon Law Practice Management 11/18/2009 Independent Contractors A number of law firms choose to classify part-time employees as Independent Contractors because it’s easier than adding them to payroll, or dealing with tax deductions, workers compensation, and benefit decisions based on part-time or erratic hours of service. But what are the risks involved?
from: Law Practice Management 11/18/2009 Google Wave Invitations on September 30, 2009 Body: Are you curious about Google's new Google Wave product, which has been described as an attempt to re-envision the concept of e-mail and online communications and collaboration? Google will reportedly be sending out 100,000 invitations to use Google Wave on September 30, 2009 (invitations for developers have been available for a few months).
You can sign up to let Google "know how to reach you when Google Wave is available" by entering your e-mail address and other information (such as if you'll be willing to report bugs and feedback, take surveys, or just want to use the product) at https://services.google.com/fb/forms/wavesignup. This signup feature has been available since May of 2009, so anyone signing up now might not be included in the first "wave" of general Google Wave invitees. However, you may want to sign up sooner than later if you're interested--according to Wikipedia, Gmail was available only by invitation from Google and other Gmail users for nearly three years, from April 2004 to February 2007.
As with other Software as a Service products where your data is stored on third-party servers, you will want to carefully examine the product’s terms of service, as well as the product's various privacy and security settings. For example, questions have arisen as to Gmail’s terms of service for lawyers and whether they might waive privilege. (See for example the post Use Gmail – Waive Privilege? on the blog 3 Geeks and a Law Blog). Furthermore, Google Wave is still in early testing stages and may have any number of bugs and errors--Google Wave at this point might be best viewed as a chance to experiment with a potentially useful new technology as opposed to a product to be relied on for important day-to-day work.
For an overview of existing collaboration tools for lawyers, see the ABA publication The Lawyer's Guide to Collaboration Tools and Technologies: Smart Ways to Work Together.
For more information see:
The Official Google Blog:
Went Walkabout. Brought back Google Wave.
PCWorld.com:
Google Wave Opens to Select Users this Fall
Mashable.com:
Is Google Wave Ready for Its Debut?
ABA LTRC:
Software as a Service (SaaS) for Lawyers
Category: Web/Communication Technology
Published: 9/28/2009 4:26 PM
from: ABA Site-tation 11/16/2009 This Smartphone Will Self Destruct in 5 Seconds Body: According to the 2009 ABA Legal Technology Survey Report: Mobile Lawyers more than four-fifths of respondents report using a smartphone while away from the office (82%, compared with 67% in the 2008 survey and 53% in the 2007 survey). The most regularly used feature was real-time e-mail (86%, compared with 75% in the 2008 survey and 68% in the 2007 survey). When asked what type of security was used to protect confidential information on a smartphone most asserted the use of password protection (90%), however only 6% reported the use of remote data wiping. Consider that in the city of Chicago alone the results of an international survey conducted by PointSec Mobile (now CheckPoint) reported that 21,000 “PDAs and Pocket PCs” were found in the back of Chicago cabs over a 6 month period. The good news? Almost 14,000 of these devices were reunited with their owners.
How does a cabbie find out to whom to return the lost device? Probably by turning on the device. If it is password protected they will have little luck. You could put a small sticker on the back of the device with a phone number to report the phone if it is found. However, another safety net is to install or deploy the ability to remotely wipe the device if it should become lost or stolen. PC Magazine has an article that describes methods and software to remotely wipe smartphones including BlackBerryOS, iPhone, AndroidOS, PalmPre and Windows Mobile devices. Consider remote wiping as an extra step to keep your client’s confidential information out of the hands of others.
Category: Mobile Lawyers
Published: 9/28/2009 10:54 AM
from: ABA Site-tation 11/16/2009 ABA TECHSHOW Discounts, Plus Best of TECHSHOW It’s time to start thinking about making plans to attend ABA TECHSHOW 2010. For those who are not familiar with it, TECHSHOW is the ABA Law Practice Management Section’s annual two and a half day CLE program and vendor expo centered around practice management and the use of technology in the practice of law. ABA [...]
from: The Last Word 11/14/2009 Lawyers and Alligators Lawyers and Alligators is the title of a piece I wrote earlier this year about how we lawyers deal with prioritization in our lives. Most lawyers have already switched to a digital calendaring system and now it is time to...
from: Jim Calloway's Law Practice Tips Blog 11/14/2009 The Ethics of Social Media In her column, A Word of Caution: Social Media for Lawyers, Oregon State Bar Deputy General Counsel Helen Hierschbiel shares six cardinal rules for lawyers using social media. The advice is spot-on. If you or your clients are using Facebook, LinkedIn, MySpace, Twitter, or any other social networking site, be sure you understand the ethical implications [...]
from: Oregon Law Practice Management 11/14/2009 Smartphone Shootout – Which Is Best For You? Big-firm-lawyers with BlackBerrys are so common that the image this phrase conjures up is almost a cliché. And many solo practitioners have been quick to adopt the stylish iPhone, so that they can keep on top of calls and email with a minimum of assistance from staff. After all, solos don’t have to [...]
from: The Last Word 11/13/2009 A Tale of Two Emails or I Don’t Talk to Strangers I received two email messages recently. Each was from someone I did not know. Both posed a single, easy-to-answer question, but it’s amazing how different my reaction was to each.The first contained nothing but the question and the sender’s name and city. The question challenged something that I had written in an [...]
from: The Last Word 11/12/2009 Friday PMA Blog Roundup - 9/25/09 Body: More great content from the law practice management advisors. Here's what they've been writing about recently:
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Category: Technology News
Published: 9/25/2009 10:36 AM
from: ABA Site-tation 11/12/2009