Last week I was honored to give a keynote at the annual Canadian Discipline Administrators Conference in Toronto hosted by the Law Society of Upper Canada. The attendees were the discipline authorities of the different Canadian Bar jurisdictions. After speaking with several of them and based on the Q & A session, I can report that [...]

One of the more recent initial resolutions published by the ABA Commission on Ethics 20/20 clarifies Model Rule 5.5 as it relates to systematic and continous presence and shows the Commission’s acceptance of the growth of alternative law practice structures, such as virtual law practice. Comment [4] of Rule 5.5 covers when systematic and continues presence is [...]

A couple weeks ago, I wrote a post for the NC Law Blog entitled “What Contact Information Must a Non-Traditional Law Firm Provide?“. The post discussed how more non-traditional law offices are opening up, many of them delivering legal services online, and how this is raising the question of how to comply with residency requirements, [...]

The ABA Standing Committee on Ethics and Prof. Responsibility has published a new ethics opinion, Formal Opinion 11-459 “Duty to Protect the Confidentiality  of E-mail Communications with One’s Client”. I didn’t see this one coming, but I think it’s a move in the right direction. The situation described in the opinion relates to when an attorney has [...]

I wrote a couple weeks ago about South Carolina’s new Formal Ethics Opinion 11-05 regarding an attorney’s use of services, such as Groupon, to offer discounts and deals on their legal services.  North Carolina also has a proposed ethics opinion, 2011 Formal Ethics Opinion 10 entitled “Lawyer Advertising on Deal of the Day or Group Coupon Website.” The [...]

By now most of you have read the news that Google Ventures invested $18.5 million into Rocket Lawyer. Back in 2008, we read that Rocket Lawyer had partnered with Lexis Nexis and their Lawyers.com service. Should we really be surprised at this next stage of evolution? Many of us in the legal industry are trying to figure out what the [...]

Last week The Law Society of British Columbia’s Cloud Computing Working Group published online a report with recommendations regarding the use of cloud computing by legal professionals. Recommendations included in the report include: 1)      Guidelines to help lawyers conduct due diligence in researching a technology providers and cloud-based solution.  (The report refers to “third party [...]

South Carolina has published a new Formal Ethics Opinion 11-05 about attorney’s using services, such as Groupon, to offer discounts and deals on their legal services. To my knowledge, the ethics opinion is the first from a state bar that is specifically related to this topic. The question posed in the opinion is: Does a [...]

The Ethics Committee at the North Carolina State Bar voted to send the proposed formal ethics opinion 6 (FEO 6), entitled ”Subscribing to Software as a Service While Fulfilling the Duties of Confidentiality and Preservation of Client Property” back to the subcommittee to reconsider responses they received to inquiries #1 and #2. Both of these inquiries contained worrisome [...]

The ABA Commission on Ethics 20/20 has published for comment its draft proposals on Lawyer’s Use of Technology and Client Development.   Proposed changes relate to Model Rules 1.18 (duty to prospective clients), 7.2 (advertising) and 7.3 (direct contact with prospective clients). Overall, the Commission concludes that no new restrictions need to be added to a [...]