As an example, consider using a digital camera or cameraphone as a document scanner in a pinch (or sending a document as a fax to a nearby fax machine when you aren't able to print it any other way).

I'm looking for some good examples and wanted to get a little help from the readers of this blog.

Remember, the idea is not something like using the top of your laptop as a cutting board, but ways to use software and hardware in unexpected, but logical and useful ways, in a pinch when you don't have the normal tools available. Another example: using a video iPod to run your PowerPoint presentation when your laptop won't work with the projector. I'm also looking for something that the average lawyer would be able to do with gadgets, hardware and software (or Internet apps) readily at hand for most lawyers.

However, I'm not looking for examples like this one, because it requires that you have a specific device available.

You get the idea.

Let me know your best ideas by leaving a comment to this post or joining the Between Lawyers Facebook Group and leaving your recommendations as a response to the discussion thread there.

On an unrelated note, be sure to take a look at a great roundtable article on legal podcasts and lawyer podcasting in the latest issue of the ABA's Law Practice Today webzine, with Denis Howell, Tom Mighell and Dennis Kennedy among the participants.

The other side of the professional blogging coin is looking at the business ramification of making money with your blogging. This session will cover the things to consider and that you may regret if you wait to long to address: copyright protection, tax ramifications, managing personal vs. paid-for blogging, your site policies, and blogging ethics.

Here are my top ten legal issues pertinent to this discussion; what are yours?

1. Communications policies (your own, or someone else's which may apply)

2. Intellectual property (your own and third parties')

3. Indirect liability for third party acts

4. Civility

5. Ethics

6. Privacy

7. E-commerce

8. Data ownership, responsibilities

9. Minors

10. Special considerations for regulated businesses/industries

• Defining community and loosely-joined individuals and interest groups
• Community goals and governance (or lack thereof)
• External innovation communities such as Procter & Gamble's and ownership issues
• Intellectual and liability concerns for company-owned or associated communities
• Whether an initiative similar to the Creative Commons movement has or is in the process of emerging
• Ownership issues and risk-minimization around products or services that emerge from external ideas
• Variations on open source licenses
• Individual rights and protections for community contributors and participants
• Anonymity and accountability
• Nefarious community exploitation: gaming, hacking, spamming
• Trust and reputation management
• The use of trademark law to use and manage community involvement; selective enforcement, the expansion of certification marks
• Insurance industry mechanisms and models
• Defamation
• Company-sponsored (and owned) communities, and the actions taken by participants who find the terms and conditions of such initiatives too draconian
• "Innovator's dilemma" management and patent strategy and the tension between old, successful products and those developed with help from outsourced customer communities
• Personal data ownership and the Attention Trust

In connection with our session at the the upcoming Community 2.0 conference, law professor Mike Madison and I will be hosting a public conference call on Monday, February 26 beginning at 1:00 p.m. PST, and we'd love your participation to help us hone in on the ownership considerations (IP; attention; identity), and issues of governance and liability, most critical to the creation, maintenance, and long-term health of business communities.  The call will be recorded and made available as a podcast from The Future of Communities blog.  You can join us as follows:

From Skype: +990008275785861

From a regular phone (long distance costs apply):
US: 1-605-475-8590

In Europe, call:
Germany 01805 00 7620
UK 0870 738 0763

The Conference Room Number: 5785861

Hope to chat with you then.

(Cross-posted to Bag and Baggage and Lawgarithms) 

[Update, Monday 2/26 @ 1:15 p.m.:] Unfortunately, we had problems with the conferencing service lined up to support this, so are having to reschedule. I'll post the new date, time, and call-in details once they're available, sorry for the delay.

Tom Mighell and I (Dennis Kennedy) just returned home from a presentation on electronic discovery (From Basics to Beyond) we did in Washington, DC for a law department.

It reminded me to mention the obvious. All of us at Between Lawyers are available, individually and in combinations, to speak on a variety of topics for your events, groups or organizations. We'll be posting more information about that soon, but, if interested, be sure to contact us to see if there are ways we might work together to present topics of interest.

I'll have more to say on this subject later after I give it some more thought, but I'm simply flummoxed by the decision Denise discusses in the post. Jeaneane Sessum has some comments that represent a good starting point to think about the issues raised in Denise's post.

Gerry Riskin's comment is an important one:

A firm cannot prosper without keeping its best people and the best people will always have choices which they will exercise based on their drive for self actualization. The Managing Partners who understand this and manage accordingly will be judged as our profession's greatest heroes.

I'll simply echo Steve Nipper's question about the consequences, especially the unintended ones, of continuing to apply Law 1.0 concepts in an evolving Law 2.0 world, especially when it comes to attracting and retaining talent. How many law students interviewing with Reed Smith this fall will ask a question about Denise? How many of them will be satisfied with the answers they get?

As I said, I'm flummoxed by Reed Smith's decision-making process. After 20+ years of practicing law, however, I do have my own ways to read the tea leaves in this decision and it definitely raises some interesting questions and speculation that will probably be discussed at the firm in the coming days. I'll probably talk about those on my own blog at some point soon.

It will be our pleasure to hold down the fort at the Between Lawyers blog while Denise takes a well-earned break. Buon viaggio, Denise.

This teleseminar may be of special interest to big firm lawyers thinking about a solo career because you won't have the risk of running into one of your colleagues in the seminar room. ;-)

More details here and here.

Dennis has also written a new article on his top ten tips for law firm technology committees that will only be available to attendees of the video webinar. This seminar is geared toward members of a law firm technology committees, managing partners and IT directors. Register here.

Sabrina will be speaking with Tom Mighell of Betwen Lawyers in a session called "Advanced Searching: Beyond Google and Yahoo!" at the ABA TECHSHOW on April 21.

[From Professor Sameulson:] Rather than impose a set of rules, [the CEO] should start a conversation within the firm about the risks and opportunities that blogging poses. [The company] should establish norms, tailored to its own market and culture, that respond to the challenges posed by blogging and other Web phenomena.

[From Ray Ozzie, regarding Groove Networks' pioneering blogging policy:] The policy was designed to address four areas of concern: that the public would consider an employee's postings to be official company communications, rather than expressions of personal opinion; that confidential information—our own or a third party's—would be inadvertently or intentionally disclosed; that the company, its employees, partners, or customers would be disparaged; and that quiet periods imposed by securities laws or other regulations would be violated.

I purchased a license for "A Blogger In Their Midst" that will let me distribute copies. I should have some extras after the conference, so if you're interested let me know and I'll be happy to forward one.