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The insurance company for indicted financier R. Allen Stanford would like to be released from its responsibility to pay the massive legal fees mounting on Stanford’s behalf. Stanford and two of his former company executives stand accused of bilking investors out of $7 billion in a massive pyramid scheme. Insurer Lloyd’s of London argued to a federal judge the accused lied to investors and falsified financial statements and therefore should be disqualified from having their legal fess paid under the insurance policy....

Yahoo announced last night that Marissa Mayer, the company’s president and CEO for nearly five years, will step down from Yahoo’s board after Yahoo’s planned merger with Verizon is completed. Yahoo co-founder David Filo will also resign from the board of directors. Once the merger is completed and following the sale of its core businesses, what remains of the company will change its name to Altaba, according to SEC filings. That is, if the deal goes through....

You know how connected you are to your mobile device. And the same can be said for most of the people you see with an iPhone, iPad, Galaxy, or other device. That’s why mobile web marketing is so important and cannot be ignored, even for businesses like law firms. But with new devices come new marketing strategies. The same tactics that work for television commercials and print ads may not necessarily work with mobile marketing....

San Francisco, CA, April 28, 2009 - To broaden service offerings in the rapidly diversifying intellectual property marketplace, global law firm Morrison & Foerster LLP and Northern California-based Ovidian Group, LLC (Ovidian) announced that they are collaborating to meet client needs. We believe this is the first collaboration of its kind. Ovidian is a newly launched IP asset management and business advisory firm that provides services to companies, investors and entrepreneurs around the world....

Oculus Rift is about as close as we’ve gotten so far to true virtual reality. It’s a head-mounted device that creates an immersive VR experience. A user wearing the headset, for example, can turn his head and the application responds by moving the immersive environment. Sounds pretty cool – if it ever comes to fruition (we’ve been promised the device Real Soon Now for a few years). When immersive VR experiences like Oculus Rift do hit the consumer market, will they have an application in the court room?...

The Supreme Court accepted certiorari in McCullen et al. v. Coakley et al. on Monday, a case that again raises the issue of whether the Massachusetts abortion clinic “buffer zone” law is legal. The appeal of the First Circuit decision in McCullen was brought by the plaintiffs, seven persons who claim that the Massachusetts law prevents their First Amendment freedoms in restricting their anti-abortion counseling around the clinic, reports The Boston Globe....

Just in time for International Women’s Day comes another suit alleging gender discrimination in the legal industry. Two lawyers at Chadbourne & Parke filed a class action lawsuit against their firm, alleging that Chadbourne discriminates against female partners in its compensation system. And while the suit isn’t new, having been filed last summer, a recent memorandum of law in support of class certification gives the suit’s claims more force. In 2013, male partners at Chadbourne earned 40 percent more than their female counterparts, according to the filing....

A provision of Texas’ controversial abortion law was blocked by a federal court in Austin on Monday, one day prior to its Tuesday effective date. According to The New York Times, Monday’s ruling may have changed the fate of one-third of Texas’ abortion clinics, who would have been forced to close under the provision struck down by the federal district court. What was the court’s reasoning, and which parts of the law still stand?...

On the heels of Governor Perry’s announcement that he supports a loser-pays litigation law, Texas legislators have introduced two bills to make that switch happen. The bills, which focus solely on plaintiffs, have the plaintiff’s bar up in arms. While attorneys are decrying loser-pays as an unfair barrier for economically disadvantaged plaintiffs, proponents claim that it will stop frivolous lawsuits before they are even filed. Both of these are interesting arguments with valid points, but they focus solely on the impact to the client....

There are three things we can be pretty sure of. First, Warren Lee Hill is guilty. He murdered his 18-year-old girlfriend, was convicted, and then beat his cellmate to death with the leg of the sink. He also should be ineligible for execution, as he meets the legal standard of mentally retarded per all seven experts that have evaluated him. Finally, the State of Georgia will find a way to execute him, with or without a ruling in their favor later this week....

Wells Fargo will be writing some big checks in a consumer protection case with all 50 states and the District of Columbia. According to reports, the company will pay $575 million to settle complaints that the bank pressured its employees to create fake checking, credit card, and other accounts for customers without their knowledge. Investigators said the practice affected more than 3.5 million accounts. The bank has already paid more than $600 million in restitution and $1 billion in fines....

They’ve fought for the country, but can they fight for your law firm? Probably. There are more than 20 million veterans of the U.S. armed forces alive today, with experiences that stretch back as far as the Korean War or as recently as a fresh tour of Afghanistan. A fair number of those vets go on to become lawyers, paralegals, or other legal professionals, and are capable of bringing their unique skills and experiences to bear on your firm....

When it comes to maternity leave, “The Price Is Right” seems to have guessed wrong about how to treat its employees. A jury last week awarded former “Price Is Right” model Brandi Cochran almost $770,000 in compensatory damages for employment discrimination. The next day, they awarded her another $7 million in punitive damages as well, the Associated Press reports. Cochran accused the popular game show’s producers of harassing and firing her because of her pregnancy....

Today, February 11, 2014, is “The Day We Fight Back,” a movement dedicated to reforming government mass surveillance. It’s an important cause, one that we hope you’ll join by heading to TheDayWeFightBack.org and contacting your representatives in Congress. But is it enough to merely deal with government surveillance? Part of the the reason why the NSA has been so effective at monitoring American citizens is because of private data mining by tech companies....

It is beginning to seem to the casual observer that the Florida Bar is being a bit slow in adapting to the ways by which attorneys in their state are using the web to market themselves. The Bar’s rules of ethics are making it difficult for attorneys in that state to use a website tag line and, in a separate issue, possibly even blogs, to market their legal skills to the wide audience to be found online....

A good reputation is central to a successful practice. Compared to other professions, attorneys are especially dependent on their reputation to bring them business, respect, and career success. But it’s not just word of mouth that shapes your reputation anymore. When it comes to a lawyer’s reputation, the Internet is where it’s at. That means that attorneys need to, at the least, devote some time and effort to monitoring and managing their online reputation....

Word of mouth referrals remain essential to building a successful practice. But when potential clients are looking for a lawyer these days, they’re doing more than just asking their family and friends. They’re turning to the internet – and increasingly to social media. Today’s clients aren’t just googling “personal injury attorneys,” they’re looking to learn about you on Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter as well. Here are some ideas to help you reach them, turning that virtual browsing into actual business....

Lawyers are writers. A majority of legal work involves some form of writing, whether it’s an email to a client, a brief for the court, or a memo for a partner. Yet, there’s often little attention paid to the craft of writing, despite its central role in an attorney’s practice. Well crafted writing can help set you apart from the crowd and make you a more effective practitioner – but it’s a skill that takes work to develop....

In the market for or curious about cloud-based practice management solutions? Today, we continue our series of reviews on some of the more popular contenders in the area. Amicus Cloud is the newly-launched fully-online version of their popular small firm practice management software. It has been designed with accessibility in mind - from huge touch-friendly buttons to compatibility with mobile and desktop browsers. As with the other contenders, we are going to use a dinosaur of a netbook to put the platform through its paces....

Fresh on the heels of settling a labor class action (assuming the objectors don’t nuke the deal) regarding a Silicon Valley anti-poaching pact, Apple finds itself again on the defensive, and again, it’s a labor class action. Late last week, a San Diego judge certified the class, which covers nearly 21,000 current and former hourly retail and corporate Apple employees over a four-year period from December 2007 to August 2012, reports the San Jose Mercury-News....