Year: 2010
Kindle: has the time for law ebooks arrived?
It has taken a while, but with the release of the latest version of the Kindle, Kindle 3, Amazon has let UK residents get their hands on the ebook reader and a dedicated UK Kindle store for the first time, and at just £109 for the wifi only version, it suddenly looks like a tempting […]
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Free web resources for family lawyers
There is no better place to start any tour of free web resources for lawyers than with the 2 big hitters of BAILII and legislation.gov.uk, covering as they do the twin pillars of case law and legislation. The fantastic BAILII website covers British and Irish case law and legislation dating back to 1996 (and in […]
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LawyerLocator
LawyerLocator is the online version of the long established Butterworths Law Directory and Scottish Law Directory now offered by LexisNexis. The print directories are fully indexed and provide a comprehensive directory of UK solicitors, law firms and barristers in private practice, commerce, local government and public authorities. LawyerLocator was established in 2000 as an online […]
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e-Conveyancing: where are we now?
Nearly a decade ago a Law Commission/Land Registry report described a future landscape for conveyancing. The report, entitled Land Registration for the twenty-first century, a conveyancing revolution, set out a vision in which users of the e-conveyancing network could transact with each other securely, users could share information electronically, errors and discrepancies would be identified […]
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HighStreetLawyer.com enters the market
In the last issue we covered QualitySolicitors, which is well on the way to being an established brand on the High Street. Now there is another entrant just setting up. HighStreetLawyer.com aims to be a consumer facing legal brand created by joining together a national franchised network of law firms providing branded legal services. Existing […]
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Digital photograph rights
Typically solicitors need photographs in the following circumstances: Individual portraits for use with profiles in pitches and on web sites Team shots – for web sites, brochures or PR purposes Environment/concept shots for marketing collateral. In the years before digital photography, I can recall the tedium of inspecting (sometimes) hundreds of small proofs on a […]
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Why SaaS is important
Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) applications are being delivered with unprecedented features, scalability and reliability. World-class, mission-critical applications, even in the banking and financial spaces, are delivering on-demand benefits to organisations globally. Goldman Sachs reported in their SaaS Survey of February 2010 that SaaS moved from 37th to 18th in its IT Spending Survey in just five short […]
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Installing an intranet in a small firm – lessons learnt
Leigh Day & Co is a 24partner firm in London that specialises in clinical negligence, personal injury and human rights law. The firm has grown rapidly in the last few years with a total staff of some 150. I was asked to help commission a new intranet for the firm in 2006, it launched in […]
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SaaS is all over the place
I have been carrying out a review of my legal software pages at www.venables.co.uk/software.htm and, at the same time, inviting suppliers to provide information on any of their products which are now also provided as “Software as a Service” (SaaS). I have been amazed by the result! From just a handful of SaaS software products […]
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The new UK legislation service
Since late July we have a shiny new official home of UK legislation at legislation.gov.uk. In due course this will completely replace the two current legislation services at OPSI and the Statute Law Database. At present some functionality currently available on the Statute Law Database is not yet available on legislation.gov.uk, including full content search, […]
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QualitySolicitors – the brand
There can be very few solicitors unaware of the arrival of the QualitySolicitors brand on the legal landscape. With strong colours, launch parties, and snazzy advertising, they have made an immediate impact on the High Street. A change of plan Last year I wrote an article about QualitySolicitors (QS) as part of a series on […]
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Discussion groups online – where is everyone?
I like the LinkedIn group for the Law Society Gazette. It’s a forum for lively debate between solicitors of every background and point of view, about any legal practice-related issues they feel like airing. It attracts, mostly, genuinely interesting and useful contributions. There’s never been anything quite like it (the letters page of the Gazette […]
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