Patrick+Wiseman's+Homework+Assignments

Five (or more) good things about virtual law practice: 1. Low overhead, making legal services affordable 2. Asynchronous lawyer-client consultations, allowing both to attend to business when convenient 3. Opportunities to automate what's routine 4. Client screening made efficient by potential client responding to online form questions 5. Online billing 6. Opportunities to advertise using social media Five potentially bad things about virtual law practice: 1. Client data getting hacked 2. Lack of lawyer-client contact 3. Lawyer loneliness 4. Lawyers needing to be pretty tech savvy in order to be able to do it 5. Clients too
 * HOMEWORK ASSIGNMENT #1*

Three definitions of virtual/digital law practice found online: No doubt everyone will find this one: "A virtual law firm is a group of lawyers with diverse expertise that [sic] are banded together through technological means to provide a suite of services to its clients." from []

A virtual law firm is "a law firm that delivers legal services in a new and innovative way. ... a [virtual] law firm is willing to offer legal services in a non-traditional way, usually 'unbundled legal services,' and at a fixed price." from []

"By definition, a pure “virtual law firm”, which operates solely on the Internet, has the capacity to offer legal services at substantially lower fees absent the expensive overhead costs of running a practice, which results in increased access to the legal system for clients who can’t afford the often high fees of a traditional legal practice." from an article critical or the NJ Bar's requirement that a lawyer practicing in NJ have a "bona fide office," at []

Five good things about document automation: 1. Consistency 2. Efficient/inexpensive (at the back end) 3. Gives lawyers time to be creative 4. Allows clients to provide information without using lawyer time 5. Makes for much higher quality time spent lawyer to client Five potentially bad things about document automation: 1. Uniformity might tend to suppress uniqueness, so lawyer has to take care not to do "cookie-cutter" law 2. Expensive, in terms of either lawyer's time or hiring it out (at the front end) 3. Forms only as smart as the person who creates them; an error in the code (in Lessig's terms, either the software or the law) could produce consistently errant documents 4. Potential loss of lawyer/client interaction 5. End users (potential clients) might rely on automatically produced documents and think there's no need to consult a lawyer (whatever the disclaimers say)
 * HOMEWORK ASSIGNMENT #2*

Memo to senior partner re document automation websites: As you know, we're a Linux shop, so the Orrick site presented an immediate problem, in that it needs Microsoft Silverlight to work. Fortunately, there's an open source alternative, Moonlight, which, once installed, allowed the HotDocs interview to proceed, albeit with warnings that our platform was unsupported. A brief play around with the interview impressed me; the form content changes depending on what information you've entered, and, when you finish, you may download a Word document (which presumably our LibreOffice suite can handle) and save your answers in a file which can be uploaded back to the site. Depending on cost, this is a good option. The WSGR form redirects you to dealbuilder, which is OK. The software worked until I tried to view the document (which comes in RTF format); my browser lacked the necessary plugin. I was, however, able to download it and open it in LibreWriter. This one, too, looked useful, and has the advantage of (mostly) working cross-platform. The third option, using Document Driver, also worked well, and generated a .docx document at the end, which I was able to save and open in LibreWriter. All three have essentially the same functionality, which is to adjust the interview as the interviewee proceeds, so as to be in the correct "state" given the current answers. The documents produced at the end, of course, reflect the answers given. All produce an editable document, which we can then customize to our liking. Any one of these options would work well, and so we should choose based on cost, on the assumption that we'll be doing the underlying work to create the interviews which will ultimately produce the documents. I'll look into the relative costs (including what it would cost to hire someone to create the interviews) and follow up with another memo.


 * HOMEWORK ASSIGNMENT #3*

A. Fulton County Superior Court ([])

1. Nothing obvious allowing efiling by lawyers 2. or by pro se litigant 3. The day's docket: [] 4. No forms that I could see.

B. Georgia Supreme Court ([])

1. E-fling, for lawyers only, is available: [] is where to get started. 2. Only members of the Georgia Bar may e-file. The site says "[l] aw students and pro se litigants are not eligible users at this time," perhaps suggesting a change in future. 3. The calendar is linked from the main website; here's [|February's], by way of example. The docket is [|searchable]. 4. No forms that I could see.

C. U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia ([])

1. Case management and electronic case filing (CM/ECF) is available; the best place to start appears to be []. 2. Pro se filing is not allowed; only members of the court's bar may use the system. The public does have access to filings, through PACER. 3. Surprisingly, there's no obvious link to a docket or calendar. 4. Lots of [|forms], many of them fillable.


 * HOMEWORK ASSIGNMENT #4*

[Had to listen to this one after the fact, as I was on the road while it was live. But that worked rather well!]

1. Two tasks that could be unbundled: incorporation (of a for-profit or non-profit corporation); will drafting. 2. Task that lends itself to an "app" format: just about anything which requires filling out a simple form (or even a complex form, with pathways), such as estate management (but a lawyer would have to review), uncontested divorces (even uncontested, this is fraught with legal pitfalls, especially if one spouse is more knowledgeable than the other, and so should also be reviewed by a lawyer). 3. Three (no, four!) risks of unbundling: a. Failure of lawyer providing an unbundled service to be aware of other legal avenues the client might be well advised to take; b. The demise of the general practitioner and the "family lawyer"; c. The loss of "overview," so that no lawyer has a complete picture of the client's situation; 4. If a service is unbundled even from a lawyer, as with LegalZoom, there's a risk of a person using such a service not getting any real legal advice at all, where it would actually be helpful. 4. I'm not sure how this is different from 2, unless 2 was intended to be something unbundled even from a lawyer. No legal issue should be so unbundled; I have a colleague (who teaches Wills) who says, "There's no such thing as a simple will." She's right, so that even if an app can produce a will, a lawyer should review it. So, there's a service which could be handled initially by an app, and then reviewed by a lawyer. (Um, yes, I know, granatwills.com!)


 * HOMEWORK ASSIGNMENT #5*

Official sources of Georgia law available to the public seem hard to come by. LexisNexis hosts the [|Official Code of Georgia Annotated] (to which the State of Georgia claims copyright, except as to statutory text and numbering), but, at least in my browser as of 2012-03-10, it's broken. There's an official [|State of Georgia Law Library], which is only searchable, i.e., it has no links to anything useful. Searches return material from every state agency (but can be narrowed). Members of the [|Georgia Bar] have access to FastCase for judicial opinions. The [|Georgia Supreme Court] makes its recent (last 3 years) opinions available online, but you really have to know what you're looking for. In other words, useful, publicly accessible legal information is rare in Georgia. I'm frankly not confident of these results, and so I'm going to hold off putting them on the state laws page, and give another Georgia participant an opportunity to prove me wrong!


 * HOMEWORK ASSIGNMENT #6*

Until the very end, this class felt like an infomercial for the speaker's own firm/product.

Here's the relevant part of Google's EULA, which I looked for in connection with uploading material to Google Docs:

Your Content in our Services
Some of our Services allow you to submit content. You retain ownership of any intellectual property rights that you hold in that content. In short, what belongs to you stays yours. When you upload or otherwise submit content to our Services, you give Google (and those we work with) a worldwide license to use, host, store, reproduce, modify, create derivative works (such as those resulting from translations, adaptations or other changes we make so that your content works better with our Services), communicate, publish, publicly perform, publicly display and distribute such content. The rights you grant in this license are for the limited purpose of operating, promoting, and improving our Services, and to develop new ones. This license continues even if you stop using our Services (for example, for a business listing you have added to Google Maps). Some Services may offer you ways to access and remove content that has been provided to that Service. Also, in some of our Services, there are terms or settings that narrow the scope of our use of the content submitted in those Services. Make sure you have the necessary rights to grant us this license for any content that you submit to our Services.

And I'm sure I'm not the only person to think it might be amusing to look at the EULA for wikispaces, which provides:

=6. Information Rights =

Tangient LLC does not claim ownership of Content you submit or make available for inclusion on the Service. However, in order to provide you the Service and maintain the Service, with respect to Content you submit or make available for inclusion on the Service, including without limitation page content and comments you post to the Service, you grant Tangient LLC world-wide, perpetual, irrevocable, royalty free, non-exclusive, fully sub-licensable license(s) to use, distribute, reproduce, modify, adapt, publish, display, and translate, such Content (in whole or in part) solely in connection with the provision of the Service.

Interestingly, although both indicate that the user retains ownership (Google says user retains IP rights, Tangient says it does not claim ownership), both also claim a world-wide license to use the user-submitted content in connection with providing the service. Google claims a rather broader right to use, but for purposes limited to operating, promoting, etc., the service; Tangient's license is quite broad as well, but solely in connection with provision of the service. Basically, both claim the right to do anything with user-submitted content, but only in connection with providing the service. A simpler EULA might therefore read: We may do anything with your content in connection with our service, but it remains yours.


 * HOMEWORK ASSIGNMENT #7*

1. Unfortunately, the form froze on me just as I was approaching the end. Other than that (which was, of course, rather frustrating, and would have been even more so had I been a real client who would then have needed to start all over again), I liked the UI. It's not at all intimidating (unlike some of the earlier forms we used), and steps the user gently and gradually through the process, explaining things along the way if the user needs explanation. Given what's under the hood, I don't see why it would not scale well to increasingly complicated scenarios, so long as the underlying flow chart is well constructed.

2. To the extent that the input requires a fair amount of typed information, it's not going to work wonderfully on a smartphone. So maximize the use of radio button and check box popups to gather data, where possible. In my experience, smartphone (in my case, Android) apps do not handle these kinds of input very well, so that would need to be carefully thought out. People aren't going to use it if it's not easy to put the information in. Smartphones are good for gestures, sweeps, and so on, but gestures and sweeps are not very good at gathering information!


 * HOMEWORK ASSIGNMENT #8*

The Georgia Code defines the practice of law:

[|§ 15-19-50]. "Practice of law" defined

The practice of law in this state is defined as: (1) Representing litigants in court and preparing pleadings and other papers incident to any action or special proceedings in any court or other judicial body; (2) Conveyancing; (3) The preparation of legal instruments of all kinds whereby a legal right is secured; (4) The rendering of opinions as to the validity or invalidity of titles to real or personal property; (5) The giving of any legal advice; and (6) Any action taken for others in any matter connected with the law.

The unauthorized practice is also defined:

[|§ 15-19-51]. Unauthorized practice of law forbidden

(a) It shall be unlawful for any person other than a duly licensed attorney at law: (1) To practice or appear as an attorney at law for any person other than himself in any court of this state or before any judicial body; (2) To make it a business to practice as an attorney at law for any person other than himself in any of such courts; (3) To hold himself out to the public or otherwise to any person as being entitled to practice law; (4) To render or furnish legal services or advice; (5) To furnish attorneys or counsel; (6) To render legal services of any kind in actions or proceedings of any nature; (7) To assume or use or advertise the title of "lawyer," "attorney," "attorney at law," or equivalent terms in any language in such manner as to convey the impression that he is entitled to practice law or is entitled to furnish legal advice, services, or counsel; or (8) To advertise that either alone or together with, by, or through any person, whether a duly and regularly admitted attorney at law or not, he has, owns, conducts, or maintains an office for the practice of law or for furnishing legal advice, services, or counsel. (b) Unless otherwise provided by law or by rules promulgated by the Supreme Court, it shall be unlawful for any corporation, voluntary association, or company to do or perform any of the acts recited in subsection (a) of this Code section.

[I really hate this wiki interface; it doesn't react properly when I paste into it, but relocates me elsewhere on the page.]

Under this definition, anyone may appear for himself. Other than that, the definition is quite broad. It seems, though, that some of the web-based services we've been discussing would be OK in Georgia, unless they fall within "[t]he preparation of legal instruments of all kinds //whereby a legal right is secured//." I'm not sure what that latter phrase means.

Georgia is my home jurisdiction; for my other jurisdiction, I chose, for no good reason, [|Colorado].

An [|article] in USA Today, from way back (in Internet time) in 2002 describes a website, operated by a non-lawyer with a chip on his shoulder about lawyers, which had a section devoted to giving "Free Legal Advice." Not a hard case for the Ohio bar authorities! The Pocono Record has a [|story] about a guy in Missouri who has sued LegalZoom over their preparation of wills, which LegalZoom claims are the equivalent of those prepared by an attorney. LegalZoom has also been the subject of a lawsuit in Alabama, reported in the [|Birmingham News]. But LegalZoom stories are too easy to come by (here's [|another], from North Carolina), so here's a bonus, and curious, Facebook [|page], posted by someone who has apparently, without herself being a lawyer, helped people fill out legal forms. And there are some comments by people obviously ignorant of what unauthorized practice is, who think it's not if you don't get paid for it. Wrong!


 * HOMEWORK ASSIGNMENT #9*

Three effective uses of social media:

1. I know it was mentioned in the class, but my absolute favorite is [|SCOTUSblog], especially when they do their live reports from the Court. And I have no doubt that it has done wonders for the reputations of the lawyers and professors who regularly post. 2. There's a list of lawyer podcasts at [|podcastingnews], many of which look interesting, but one which looks quite effective, both in terms of information conveyed and for the lawyer, is the [|Debt Podcast], described thusly: "Join New York bankruptcy and consumer lawyer Jay Fleischman as he reveals the secrets to getting out of debt, handling credit problems, and keeping your finances on the right track. With helpful tips on how to correct credit report errors, battle harassing debt collectors, and consumer bankruptcy." 3. [|This ad] for a New York law firm seems quite effective, but perhaps I just like the English-accented voice-over!

Three ineffective uses of social media:

1. [|Here]'s a YouTube video of a Seattle PI lawyer explaining what lawyer ads mean. Although accurate enough, it's pretty boring and does not inspire one to hire the guy. (Found it at [|legalblogwatch].) 2. [|Here]'s a story about a lawyer who used YouTube to solicit clients for a class action, apparently defaming the potential defendant in the process. 3. [|A cautionary tale] - be careful what you tweet about :)

Just posted an update on LinkedIn, saying that I have now completed this course and providing a link to the course homepage. I'm so rare a user of social media, although I've been on LinkedIn for a while, that I don't know whether it's possible to link to my post, even though I made it available to "anyone"!

This has been fun!