Month: January 2010

IT in the Supreme Court

The new Supreme Court is the UK’s most technologically advanced court. One remarkable innovation is that, in each of the three courtrooms, there are four fixed cameras. These record all proceedings for display on large monitors in the exhibition area. Although the sittings of the Court are not yet made available on the Web or […]

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How to make, and save, more money using IT

Here are some ideas about how firms could simplify their life, cut out unnecessary processes, and thereby make – or save – more money. Many of these ideas involve the use of IT and build on the use of email, your web site and internet access to legal resources. I hope you can find at […]

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Digital media law highlights of 2009

Copyright, in various guises, has featured heavily in the media this year, being in the spotlight at both legislative and judicial level, with high profile decisions in UK and EU courts, and numerous papers, reports, consultations and reviews at UK and EU level. In addition, developments in consumer expectations, business models, and technological innovations have […]

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LawNet – stronger together

In this series on referral companies, I have so far looked at Quality Solicitors, a very new player run by a barrister for solicitors, and Contact Law, a non-solicitor run organisation which started in 2005. LawNet is very different from both of these. Started in 1989 by Simon Maddox, a visionary solicitor in Birmingham, it […]

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Pro bono law – getting organised online?

Around half of all solicitors occasionally do legal work for free. There is no reason to think the numbers for barristers and legal executives are any different. “Pro bono” advice – as it is known – occurs in many different contexts from phone advice in the office to evening law clinics in community centres to […]

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The Blacklaws Davis hybrid law firm model

Traditional high street law firms are under attack on every front. The recession reduces their bread and butter property work and they face ever rising overheads and staff costs. The solution for some firms has been to specialise and to gain competitive advantage by adopting a more businesslike approach and IT solutions. Three years ago […]

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Governance and cloud computing

Over the next two or three years, different organisations, in the form of alternative business structures, will be offering legal services. Many will emerge from the outside the legal sector and will almost certainly employ IT models currently in use within the commercial sector. One such model is cloud computing. There are two types of […]

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A new way of using RSS

RSS (Really Simple Syndication) feeds have always been considered to be a simple way to deliver changing content to websites. The benefit for firms is that the site stays “fresh” leading to more page views, longer visitor sessions and (it is hoped, in the case of law firms), impressed site visitors who decide to form […]

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