practicehacker

Lawyers Jason and Geoff Anderman want to make online document automation simple. Easier said than done. Many have tried. None have succeeded.

Hotdocs is one option; as are Richard Granat’s DirectLaw and similar “virtual practice” applications such as VLO Tech. Over the years Ixio and other desktop software solutions have tried to deploy their systems to the Web with mixed results too.  But just being online isn’t the point. The question is whether an application can add value in this (over)crowded field.  Large firms have been doing this for 2 decades and can afford to make mistakes or even do things the hard way using a virtual private network (VPN). Smaller firms have done this for a good 5 years. And with the advent of DirectLaw, Advologix – which adapts Salesforce.com for lawyers – and the prevalence of SaaS, sole practitioners can now get in on the act.

So can WhichDraft get it right? Based on my interview with the founders … maybe. At least they have a better starting point than their predecessors who literally had to cover the cost of expensive legacy systems and weren’t native web-based solutions.  My advice is to try WhichDraft and voice your suggestions loudly. These guys seem smart enough to listen and give us what we want instead of making us take what they’re giving. Are you listening, Thomson West?

According to the 2009 LexisNexis^® Martindale-Hubbell^® Survey of Corporate Counsel, more than 70% of lawyers are members of a social network; up 25% over last year. Largest gainers were lawyers aged 46 and over, who showed 30% growth. Over 50% of respondents think online networks have the potential to change the business and practice of law. 65% expressed interest in joining an online professional network designed for their profession.Survey results of note include

• 1/3 of corporate counsel use a social network daily
• ½ of lawyers in private practice use social networks daily
• Most lawyers use social networks one or more times per week
• Only 6% of lawyers Twitter, but 70% of that group twitters daily

The survey is available online at www.leadernetworks.com.  Martindale-Hubbell^® Connected is the online network developed by LexisNexis Martindale-Hubbell.

Read the whole story here.

get on with it already

Has Google’s marketing department been co-opted by Lucas Studios?  I’ve been angling to try Google Wave, the much-touted “next generation” communication platform, for a year. Thus far nothing. This is the longest I’ve waited for a promised payoff since the first Star Wars prequel. And we all remember how that turned out … so make with the Wave already.

MobileArchiver

MobileArchiver tracks SMS messages and call history on your cell. The software is fairly simple to use – just hook your phone up to your computer and it automatically archives SMS messages and call history to Microsoft Outlook. The archived records look just like email, and you can search across them using either the native Outlook search or a third party tool like Google Destkop. Currently the product supports only phones running Windows Mobile, but a new edition currently in beta supports most major platforms including

• iPhone
• Blackberry
• Nokia Series 60

The new version of the software will also include features such as time and billing. Developer Sansango says it is dedicated to helping road-warriors and mobile power-users integrate phones into their work by making things intuitive and automatic. See screenshots of the product and download a free trial at www.mobilearchiving.com; or check out the beta version.

Windows 7: Suckers!

Even by monopolist standards Microsoft is offensive.

According to a recent study by overpaid consulting firm Frost & Sullivan, Windows 7 will “change the personal computer industry forever.”Wow! How else will Windows 7 rock my world? By working trouble free? By preserving my data and ensuring a smooth transition from (yuch) Vista? Even better. Windows 7 will “break the link between the operating system and the hardware upgrade cycle for the first time in history.” 

To clarify, this means that in order to remedy the crappy performance of Vista, users will have to pay top dollar for Windows 7, hope for the best, and there’s a chance that they may not be forced to buy a whole new computer.

How do you guys do it? No, seriously – how do you guys get away with this every year? It’s bad enough that you feed us defective products and sell the fix in your next upgrade, that you treat your users like cattle, that you insult our intelligence by providing buggy software and not owning up to it; but now you’re making a virtue out of doing what you should have done right the first time?

Maybe it’s time for another antitrust suit …