TechnoLawyer

Today's issue of TechnoLawyer NewsWire covers a metadata removal solution for mobile devices and Webmail (see article below), a Bates stamping and watermarking utility for Microsoft Word, an online file storage and sharing service, an iPhone business card scanning app, and an iPad VPN app. Don't miss the next issue.

Metadata Removal for Smartphone and Webmail Users

Imagine that your clan lives on an island not far from a hostile clan on another island. After much effort, you build a defense system that no boat can penetrate. But you soon discover that your rivals have invented something called an airplane. Now what? Law firms find themselves in a similar predicament regarding document security. After investing in technology to prevent lawyers and staff from emailing documents containing metadata from their PCs, your firm now needs to safeguard their smartphones and Webmail accounts too.

Workshare Protect Server … in One Sentence
Workshare Protect Server prevents metadata leaks via email sent from corporate Webmail accounts as well BlackBerry, iPhone, and other mobile devices.

The Killer Feature
The term "metadata" refers to invisible information in PDF and word processing documents such as annotations, redacted text, and tracked changes.

With "minimal user training," Workshare Protect Server removes metadata from Microsoft Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and PDF attachments (including those in .zip archives) sent via mobile devices, Outlook Web Access, and Lotus iNotes. Workshare Protect Server also has a minimal footprint. There's no client software to install or configure.

Other Notable Features
As its name implies, Workshare Protect Server enables you to centrally manage and configure your firm's metadata policies. From the administrative Web-based console you can also monitor, track, and audit all metadata leaving your firm.

Workshare Protect Server includes a number of reports. For example, users can receive a clean report via email, which lists all the metadata removed from a document. Administrators can receive email alerts when policy violations or other issues arise. Other features include cleaning overrides and embedded email support.

Workshare Protect Server integrates with Workshare Protect (desktop metadata removal software) and Workshare Professional (document comparison and metadata removal suite).

What Else Should You Know?
Using the application programming interface, you can customize Workshare Protect Server to remove metadata from third-party software such as Microsoft SharePoint and document management systems. Pricing starts at $70 per seat. Current Workshare customers are eligible for special pricing. Learn more about Workshare Protect Server.

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So many products, so little time. In each issue of TechnoLawyer NewsWire, you'll learn about five new products for the legal profession. Pressed for time? The "In One Sentence" section describes each product in one sentence, and the "Killer Feature" section describes each product's most compelling feature. The TechnoLawyer NewsWire newsletter is free so don't miss the next issue. Please subscribe now.

Coming today to Answers to Questions: Rene Fourie compares Symantec, AVG, and Avast antivirus software, Susan Traylor reviews SpeakWrite for cell phone dictation and transcription, Lawrence King reviews MessageSave and QuickJump, Fred Kruck reviews the Garmin StreetPilot c340 and offers advice when buying a GPS unit, and Jerry Gonzalez explains why you should upgrade to Windows 7 now. Don't miss this issue.

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Coming today to TechnoFeature: In the context of eDiscovery, ensuring client compliance with legal holds is a difficult task. How do you ensure your client has enough information to properly preserve potentially relevant electronically stored information? How do you determine who to notify of the hold, and if and when to reissue the hold? Finally, if your efforts are challenged, what kind of evidence can you produce to establish good faith on your part and on the part of your client in meeting your legal hold obligations? In this review of Zapproved's Legal Hold Pro from, trial technology and computer forensics consultant Bruce Olson evaluates Legal Hold Pro, a Web-based service for managing the legal hold process.

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Our flagship newsletter never disappoints thanks to its in-depth reporting by leading legal technology and practice management experts, many of whom have become "household names" in the legal profession. It's in TechnoFeature that you'll find our oft-quoted formal product reviews and accompanying TechnoScore ratings. The TechnoFeature newsletter is free so don't miss the next issue. Please subscribe now.

Originally published on April 12, 2010 in our free BigLaw newsletter.

Last year at the LegalTech conference in New York, Andrew Adkins, founder and director of the University of Florida Levin College of Law's Legal Technology Institute Legal Technology Institute, "roamed the exhibit floor for two days talking with vendors about the legal technology industry in general and asking exhibitors and conference attendees their thoughts about the near future and how technology will impact the profession." He performed the same exercise two months later at ABA TECHSHOW. He found that lawyers and legal vendors had just as many questions for him. Thus was born the 2010 Perfect Practice Legal Technology Institute Study (PP-LTI Study).

Legal vendors told Adkins that they wanted to know (1) what percentage of the legal profession uses practice management systems, (2) what barriers existed to their implementation, and (3) whether the legal profession had "reached a plateau" in adopting them. From this departure point, Adkins along with Perfect Practice and several other sponsors developed a survey, and distributed it to more than 25,000 randomly-selected lawyers, legal administrators, paralegals, and law firm IT personnel. The survey, however, did not stop there. Adkins also wanted to learn more about the legal profession's use of other technologies.

Larger Firms Lead the Way With Dual Monitors, Security

The PP-LTI Study yielded some surprising results. For example, Adkins found that small law firms by and large have failed to embrace even relatively simple technologies that address core concerns or promote important values such as efficiency, and client confidentiality.

For example, dual monitors "significantly increases efficiency," especially for those who copy and paste text between documents or use multiple applications. More than 66% of respondents, however, reported using only one monitor, and only 18% of this group indicated that they planned to add a second one within 12 months.

Large firm users were more likely to have adopted this technology, with 40% reporting that they used more than one monitor. Nonetheless, Adkins notes that neither cost nor complex integration concerns should restrict the adoption of dual monitors in smaller firms. "With costs of an extra monitor less than $200, law firms and legal departments should explore this benefit of increased productivity (and billable time)."

Also surprising were lackluster numbers with respect to the adoption of technologies that address concerns about client confidentiality and security. "While attorneys always voice concerns, we often find that they don't take advantage of technologies that can help them achieve these goals." Only 53% of respondents reported using metadata clean-up software, and only 25% said they used encryption.

Again, large firms were significantly more likely to have embraced these measures. Of the respondents who reported using metadata cleanup software, 78.2% were large firm users, while small firms lagged behind at 21.8%. Similarly, large firm practitioners were about twice as likely as their small firm counterparts to use encryption software.

Adkins Amazed by Document and Practice Management Numbers

The PP-LTI Study also revealed a surprising result about the profession's approach to document management. "It still amazes me," writes Adkins, "that law firms and legal departments have not implemented document management." A similar study, conducted in 2000, indicated that less than 50% of legal professionals did not use a document management system. A decade later, Adkins noted a marked lack of movement toward the embrace of this technology. More than half of respondents — 52% — said that they did not use a document management system. However, adoption rates were significantly higher at large firms where 80% of attorneys reported using a document management system.

With respect to the study's raison d'etre — practice management systems — Adkins found additional surprises. In 2000, only about 25% of legal professionals reported using a case management system. While Adkins "thought that number would have doubled in ten years," the 2010 survey indicated that only 32.7% of respondents were using case, matter, or practice management software. Large firms lead the way although small firms are not far behind.

Survey respondents reported several barriers to the use of a practice management system: 37% of those surveyed said that their "current method works and is not worth changing." Cost was a big concern for 34% of respondents. And, among users and non-users alike, survey respondents identified both the "total cost" and "integration into the firm or law department" as problems.

The PP-LTI Study found that lawyers who were already using a practice management system were significantly less likely to identify cost as an issue, which "seems to indicate that those firms and legal departments using a CMS understand that there is an acceptable cost for using technology," writes Adkins.

Conclusion

The PP-LTI Study provides comprehensive data on the usage of many other technologies, including SaaS, word processing, litigation support programs, and paperless workflow technologies. It also analyzes specific features of practice management system functionality such as its integration with other programs in common usage. Finally, the survey's results address the legal profession's approach to outsourcing, future technology purchases, and the allocation of technology resources within law firms and legal departments. The PP-LTI Study costs $395. You can download an executive summary and review the survey questions used for free.

Read our companion article, New Study Paints Unflattering Portrait of Small Firms.

How to Receive BigLaw
Many large firms have good reputations for their work and bad reputations as places to work. Why? Answering this question requires digging up some dirt, but we do with the best of intentions. Published first via email newsletter and later here on our blog, BigLaw analyzes the business practices, marketing strategies, and technologies used by the country's biggest law firms in an effort to unearth best and worst practices. The BigLaw newsletter is free so don't miss the next issue. Please subscribe now.

Today's issue of TechnoLawyer NewsWire covers the first iPad-specific word processor (see article below), an iPhone VoIP app, an online contract review platform, eDiscovery processing software, and a suite of services for enhancing and protecting your online reputation. Don't miss the next issue.

Touch the Future of Word Processing

Dominant products rarely survive paradigm shifts, and those that do tend to become also rans in the next era. Take word processing for example. WordStar got caught flat-footed with DOS, WordPerfect with Windows, and some say Microsoft Word with the Web — though the jury remains out on that last shift. But what if the Web isn't the next paradigm shift like we once thought? What if Google Docs is out of luck before it even becomes dominant?

Pages … in One Sentence
Apple's Pages is a word processing app for Apple's iPad.

The Killer Feature
Pages is the first word processor designed for a capacitive multitouch screen — a screen you use with one or more of your fingertips.

You can use Pages in portrait or landscape mode. You enter text, numbers, and symbols using the iPad's virtual keyboard or an external keyboard (Bluetooth wireless or dock-connected). What you would normally control with your mouse — formatting text, setting margins, etc. — you control via the touch interface with your finger(s).

Other Notable Features
You can access documents to work on in three ways — via iTunes, email attachments, and iWork (a Web-based workspace). Pages can open Microsoft Word files and export in PDF and Word formats.

Pages ships with 16 templates for common documents such as letters and reports. You can import into a document any images that reside on your iPad. Pages automatically saves every change you make and also provides unlimited undo even after closing a document.

What Else Should You Know?
On the Mac, Pages is part of Apple's iWork suite. For the iPad, Apple sells it alone, but its counterparts also exist — Numbers for spreadsheets and Keynote for presentations. In Numbers, the virtual keyboard contains keys for creating formulas. You can give Keynote presentations from an iPad using a VGA adapter. Pages costs $9.99 as do Numbers and Keynote. Learn more about Pages.

How to Receive TechnoLawyer NewsWire
So many products, so little time. In each issue of TechnoLawyer NewsWire, you'll learn about five new products for the legal profession. Pressed for time? The "In One Sentence" section describes each product in one sentence, and the "Killer Feature" section describes each product's most compelling feature. The TechnoLawyer NewsWire newsletter is free so don't miss the next issue. Please subscribe now.

Originally published on April 4, 2010 in our free SmallLaw newsletter.

This year's ABA TECHSHOW focused on practicality (and I'm not just saying that because it's on the Web site). In that spirit, let me begin by giving readers what they want most, followed by a little perspective on how we got here. To begin with then, below you'll find my picks for the year's 12 Best of TECHSHOW. Also, don't miss my TECHSHOW interviews.

Best Of TECHSHOW (In No Particular Order)

Clio: For SaaS practice management Clio still rules. Rocket Matter has much catching up to do.

Contracts Express: Formerly known as Deal Builder. Contract drafting in the cloud. Subscription pricing.

Worldox: For document and information management Worldox is the worst. But the best. Go figure.

SpeakWrite: Love this idea — dictate into any phone and get the document in 3 hours by email.

Certex: Professional checks prepared in the cloud. Old idea. New twist. Way to innovate on a budget.

SurePayroll: Payroll sucks, but preparing it at your leisure sucks slightly less. That's a win-win, baby.

Walz Group: Certified mail is a necessary evil. Walz figured out how to save money and time. Sweet.

Proximiti: Proximiti Communications makes automated billing software that works. Plus VoIP phones that save money and integrate with your billing.

FastCase: I've said it before and I'll say it again — for free and mobile research FastCase is it (for now).

WestlawNext: What? I can change my mind. WestlawNext really is better — so much that I use it myself.

Lexis for Microsoft Office: Recognizes and updates case citations as you put cases in your brief. Awesome.

DirectLaw: Like the Highlander, there can only be one. DirectLaw is still the one to beat for a virtual practice. An oldie but a goodie.

How We Got Here

We all know that ABA TECHSHOW 2010 caps a decade marked by relentless churn. We also know that despite such turbulence (or maybe because of it) the biggest law firms got bigger while others blinked out of existence.

As a result, there are fewer large firms than there were a decade ago and the firms still in business employ fewer lawyers than their predecessors. The upshot is that more lawyers are on their own.

Hypothetically then, if a piece of legal technology or office appliance can't save me time or make me money, why buy it? The concept seems simple enough, but it turns out that until recently the ABA TECHSHOW floated above these economic facts of life.

In fact, it was just a few years ago that the show's organizers deviated from their traditional focus on big firms, big vendors and big price tags — right about the time in 2004 that I asked a group of assembled ABA TECHSHOW board members why they favored big firms so heavily "Tech Show favors large vendors?" they answered. "Ridiculous." Or was it?

ABA TECHSHOW 2.0

Despite those ardent denials, the following year's show was markedly different. Ask any of the attendees, vendors, or speakers who were there: clearly the balance had shifted away from biglaw vendors in favor of more agile developers and competitive pricing. I am happy to stay that 2005 became the tipping point.

Every TECHSHOW since has continued the trend toward technology startups, smaller vendors, and lower cost alternatives to big ticket staples — even going so far as featuring SaaS vendors on an equal footing with the vendors of desktop-based solutions.

Maybe it was something in the water back then because 2005 was also the year when the technology industry recovered from the dot-com debacle with thousands of twenty-somethings around the country producing Web-based applications to handle everything from photographs (Flickr) to instant messaging (Dodge Ball).

This wave of Web 2.0 innovation was inspired by necessity. Lawyers, no less than any other group, were in need of a technological shot in the arm to deal with the pressures of a dwindling client pool, downward pressure on income, and soon the added pressure of rapidly declining asset values. Practical technology could mean the difference between remaining the profession and packing it in. At that point the stage was set for a revolution in getting smaller, simpler, cheaper, and, oh yes — faster.

Coming Full Circle

Given the trend that started 5 years ago, we can clearly see why TECHSHOW 2010 was so full of practical developments. Instead of trying to sell solutions for problems nobody had, this year's crop of vendors appears to have been busy in 2009 applying technology to virtually every workaday task in the average law firm — from depositions to drafting, research to practice management, even virtualizing practice itself. So it makes perfect sense that this year's TECHSHOW was not about who made the biggest and best, but rather who can provide the most affordable and efficient with a small footprint that doesn't require a Ph.D. to install.

I've never been more satisfied, and I'm sure that I wasn't the only one. TECHSHOW this year wasn't just about the latest crop of sexy gizmos. It offered a solid helping of legal technology comfort food and office must-haves that would be a relief to veterans and a revelation to young lawyers. And after all, what could be more practical than that?

Written by Mazyar M. Hedayat of M. Hedayat & Associates, P.C.

How to Receive SmallLaw
Small firm, big dreams. Published first via email newsletter and later here on our blog, SmallLaw provides you with a mix of practical advice that you can use today, and insight about what it will take for small law firms like yours to thrive in the future. The SmallLaw newsletter is free so don't miss the next issue. Please subscribe now.

Coming today to Fat Friday: David Estes reviews LogMeIn Hamachi, Diana Brodman Summers responds to a recent issue of SmallLaw about solo life, Tom Trottier shares tips for increasing the speed of Windows Vista on a laptop, Jonathan Jackel discusses Apple's software update strategy, and Patricia Joyce adds one more business lunch faux pas to Lee Rosen's recent SmallLaw column on 15 rules of etiquette for business dining. Don't miss this issue.

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Coming today to Answers to Questions: William Shilling describes his almost paperless, cloud-based law practice, Kristi Bodin discusses the key to client happiness when using fee retainers, Vusumzi Msi reviews Dragon NaturallySpeaking Preferred and explains a WordPerfect workaround, Steven McNichols reviews Norton GoBack, and Wesley Profit reviews NOD32 Antivirus software. Don't miss this issue.

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Do you believe in the wisdom of crowds? In Answers to Questions, TechnoLawyer members answer legal technology and practice management questions submitted by their peers. This newsletter's popularity stems from the relevance of the questions and answers to virtually everyone in the legal profession. The Answers to Questions newsletter is free so don't miss the next issue. Please subscribe now.

Today's issue of TechnoLawyer NewsWire covers a solution for online meetings, remote access, and remote support (see article below), a Web-based decision tree application for predicting litigation outcomes, email conversion software, a computerized pen that captures your handwriting, and an iPhone billing app that syncs with Timeslips. Don't miss the next issue.

Teaming With Possibilities

You've had it with business travel. So you look into online meeting solutions. You'd also like to access your file server at work from home. And your IT department wants to deploy software and provide technical support from the comfort of their cubicles. Suddenly, you're looking at three different products, nay services, each with a monthly fee. Whatever happened to the concept of a software suite

TeamViewer … in One Sentence
TeamViewer is a desktop application for online meetings, remote access, and remote support.

The Killer Feature
Back in the day, you only had to endure four recurring bills — car payment, mortgage, telephone, and utilities. Then came cable TV. Then your Internet connection. And for some of you alimony. But you could still count your monthly expenses on both hands. Nowadays, your credit card statement rivals the tax code in length — blog hosting, Web site hosting, online backups, online accounting, online case management, etc.

TeamViewer harkens back to simpler time. You pay one price one time and receive a lifetime license, including all future updates. The Business edition ($749) enables you to use TeamViewer on one computer. You can add additional computers for $139 each. It lacks some advanced features.

The Premium edition ($1,499) runs on an unlimited number of computers. The Corporate edition ($2,690) adds priority support and more flexibility regarding concurrent sessions (the number of people who can use TeamViewer at the same time).

Other Notable Features
TeamViewer only needs to be installed on your computer. For example, if you want to give a presentation or collaborate on a document with a client, they need only download a lightweight Web applet. TeamViewer works through firewalls and creates a secure connection — secure enough for a VPN through which you can transfer files.

Presentation mode include video streaming, voice over IP, application sharing (rather than showing your entire desktop), multiple monitor support, virtual whiteboards, and time tracking.

Remote administration tools include remote reboot, monitor deactivation, and the ability to see all the computers available for you to access.

What Else Should You Know?
TeamViewer runs on Mac OS X and Windows. TeamViewer Portable enables you to run TeamViewer on any computer from a USB drive. TeamViewer Host enables you to control unattended servers. An iPhone app also exists. Learn more about TeamViewer.

How to Receive TechnoLawyer NewsWire
So many products, so little time. In each issue of TechnoLawyer NewsWire, you'll learn about five new products for the legal profession. Pressed for time? The "In One Sentence" section describes each product in one sentence, and the "Killer Feature" section describes each product's most compelling feature. The TechnoLawyer NewsWire newsletter is free so don't miss the next issue. Please subscribe now.

Coming today to TechnoFeature: Decisions, decisions. Andrew Collier, Director of Information Technology at Polsinelli Shughart, and his colleagues recently had to decide which smartphone to support at the firm. They devised a battery of tests for the six smartphones under consideration: BlackBerry Bold, BlackBerry Storm, HTC Ion (Google Android), iPhone 3GS, Palm Pre, and HTC Pure (Windows Mobile 6.5). Which smartphone won the smackdown? Read Andrew's firsthand report in this TechnoFeature article to find out.

How to Receive TechnoFeature
Our flagship newsletter never disappoints thanks to its in-depth reporting by leading legal technology and practice management experts, many of whom have become "household names" in the legal profession. It's in TechnoFeature that you'll find our oft-quoted formal product reviews and accompanying TechnoScore ratings. The TechnoFeature newsletter is free so don't miss the next issue. Please subscribe now.