I am not an Internet legend, at least not yet. I have no viral posts or tweets. I am just another voice, with a few hundred Twitter followers. And my Klout score, a middling 45, reflects that. A score in the mid-60s would make me part of the top 5 percent of the Internet cognoscenti. For comparison sake, FindLaw for Legal Professionals is a 61. I’m a 45. I’m nobody. What would a mid-60s score mean?...
Long before kids spent all day playing on iPads, they spent hours and hours playing with Play-Doh, the putty-like stuff perfect for molding, throwing, and sometimes eating. And Play-Doh, of course, came with a distinctive aroma – that strange bouquet of flour, salt, and boric acid. Now Hasbro, Play-Doh’s owner since 1991, wants to trademark that scent. In a filing with the USPTO, the company describes Play-Doh’s unique parfum as “the combination of a sweet, slightly musky, vanilla-like fragrance, with slight overtones of cherry, and the natural smell of salted, wheat-based dough....
I’m not sure about the rest of you, but in California, we’re required to take 25 hours of continuing legal education (CLE) every three years. It seems like a long time, right? And yet, invariably, you approach two and a half years only to realize you’ve done none of the required hours. This isn’t a problem for everyone. Lawyers at BigLaw firms get free CLEs, usually at lunch, so they’re getting hours on the regular....
If you’re handling a case with significant eDiscovery needs, it’s impossible to go it alone. Even large firms and businesses will bring on eDiscovery counsel, vendors, and experts to guide them through the process. When it comes to choosing your eDiscovery team, where should you start? Here are some simple guidelines. It’s not tax, criminal defense, or mergers and acquisitions, but eDiscovery is a substantive area of law, and one that requires experienced practitioners....
If you work in-house at a large company, you’re probably familiar with secondments, the temporary placing of an outside attorney within the company. The term is military in origin, referring to sending off an officer to aid another organization but the idea is the same: Admiral IP Lawyer joins the team for a few months as the company revises its licensing agreements, for example. Secondments are becoming increasingly common, but the deal is almost always the same: an outside firm lawyer joins a client company for a month or two or three....
Lawyers can’t ignore social media anymore. Facebook can be a way to reach potential clients, for example, while a strong Twitter account could help increase your profile in the legal community. At the same time, social media is not “one size fits all.” Attorneys need to understand the differences between the main social media platforms and adjust their strategies accordingly. If you’ve used either platform, you know that Facebook and Twitter are worlds apart....
District court’s entry of summary judgment in favor of the insurer is affirmed as director and officer (D&O) policies exist to fund indemnification covenants that protect corporate directors and officers from personal liability, not to protect the corporation, and to extend coverage to situations in which the directors and officers are not themselves the actual targets of the claims made would transmogrify D&O policies into comprehensive corporate liability policies which is contrary to both the letter and the spirit of the D&O policy at issue....
Antonio Mari was shot and killed by a client’s estranged spouse. Sara Quirt Sann was shot and killed by a client’s estranged spouse. Two murders, same story. Antonio and Sara were both family lawyers. It’s a tragedy all the way around, and a sad reminder that divorce is like a grenade that takes out anybody in the area. So why do we call this ongoing war “family law”? Family Law Antonio Mari was a nice guy, especially for a lawyer....
Patent trolls are companies with a bad reputation for buying patents and then suing individuals for infringement, often in frivolous suits. The typical troll sends out patent infringement claims to a wide number of defendants in spite of weak evidence. Many small companies are forced to settle rather than face the prohibitive costs of litigation. But a new bill seeks to change that by shifting the cost of litigation. Trolls beware....
As more and more tools continue to be developed to help businesses service clients, lawyers may want to take a step back and take a crack at thinking up new ways of doing things around the office. Even if all you can think of are ways to save time in the way the office operates, those efficiencies should translate into savings which should translate into more earnings. And simply by taking a step back and looking at how you actually operate, it’s very likely that you’d be able to find at least a few tasks that could be automated, or done better or quicker, with the help of technology....
Happy Friday! We know, you’re not in the mood to read dense case law right now – you want something lighter. In fact, you’re reading this blog for just that purpose. We’ve got your back. Here are three quick, local updates from Fourth Circuit cases, including oral arguments in a prison contraband smuggling sentence appeal, an interesting note on amici in the Supreme Court’s UPS pregnancy discrimination case (originally out of the Fourth Circuit), and a federal judge in West Virginia’s decision to stay out of the gay marriage controversy until the Supreme Court steps in....
The SEC just announced a $325,000 award given to a former investment firm employee who blew the whistle to the SEC with specific information that allowed the federal agency to begin an investigation that later uncovered extensive fraudulent activity at the tipster’s ex-employer. This notion that you should’t hesitate as a whistle blower has seen court precedent before. Late last year, the SEC announced an award of $30 million for another anonymous tipster whose material information led to a successful enforcement action – making that the biggest ever in the history....
Google had a problem: Nobody could understand the complicated app permissions. For example, do you know what “Broadcast Sticky (Intents)” is? I have no friends, and no hobbies, other than my dear smartphone and even I had to look that one up. The solution, according to Google, is to “simplify” the permissions and to stop asking you to grant new permissions when apps update automatically through the company’s Play Store, at least when the new permission is similar to one you’ve already granted (e....
Square has unveiled its newest product Square Cash, a service which allows users to send mobile payments from debit card to debit card using only email, but should lawyers use it? This question has considerable impact for solo practitioners and small firms, whose client base may consist of many small clients who are often behind on their payments. Lawyers using Square Cash won’t have to wait for checks in the mail, but other features of this payment service make using it for lawyers’ fees questionable....
Texas redistricting lawsuits are before the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, reports The New York Times. The legislators in the State of Texas, under a Republican supermajority, redistricted this year, carving out boundaries for the Texas Legislatures, the State Board of Education and Congress. Shortly thereafter came the lawsuits, in cities and courts across Texas, including Austin, Sherman, McAllen and San Antonio, reports The Times. With most of the redistricting lawsuits being filed in San Antonio, the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals has designated a three-judge redistricting panel to hear the redistricting lawsuits....
The NSA wants it, eDiscovery professionals are obsessed with it, and your files are secretly full of it. It’s metadata, the data about data that’s kept in most electronically stored information. And it’s had a major impact on the legal field over the past several years. So when it comes to metadata, you’ll want to make sure you know your stuff. With that in mind, here are our top metadata explainers and tips, from the FindLaw archives....
Conviction of defendant for distributing cocaine base and sentence of 198 months’ imprisonment as a career offender is affirmed where: 1) defendant’s speedy trial right attached on the date of his federal indictment; 2) defendant forfeited any Interstate Agreement on Detainers (IAD) claim by failing to raise it in the district court; 3) district court’s amendment of one indictment from distribution of “cocaine” to “cocaine base” did not affect the substance of the charges and therefore did not offend the Presentment Clause; and 4) the district court did not abuse its discretion in its evidentiary rulings; and 5) there is no flaw in defendant’s sentence....
We talk all the time on FindLaw’s Strategist blog about branding and how it’s important to you as a lawyer. Truthfully it is – and you can, and should, use branding to differentiate yourself from other law firms. Tossing around the word “brand” can be a little bit inside baseball, though. You all out there reading this in Internet Land are lawyers, not advertising executives. So just what is a brand, anyway?...
Even if your practice doesn’t typically include civil rights issues, on Election Day it might be worth offering your two cents as an attorney when it comes to voting. If early voting is any indication, the day’s events may lead to some nasty encounters and questionably legal activities in polling places. Ensuring that the election is fair and legal is the right thing to do if you can help with the process....
Nelson Mandela, South Africa’s first black president and enduring icon of the struggle against racial oppression, died on Thursday at the ripe age of 95. America’s first black president, Barack Obama, paused to reflect that he himself was “one of the countless millions who drew inspiration from Nelson Mandela’s life.” For attorneys, law students, scholars, and clients, Nelson Mandela’s legacy inspires us to trust in our legal capabilities, to practice forgiveness over vengeance, and to doggedly press on....
