Ethical Use of Social Media for Lawyers
Debra Bruce will be speaking at the ABA Solo/Small Firm Luncheon on Thursday, April 28, 2011, from 11:45 am – 1:00pm on lawyers’ ethical use of social media.
When: Thursday, April 28, 2011, from 11:45 am- 1:00 pm
Where: Austin Bar Association, Seminar Room, 816 Congress Avenue, 7th Floor
Topic: “Ethical Use of Social Media for Lawyers”
Speaker: Debra L. Bruce, JD, PCC
MCLE: 30 minutes of CLE Ethics
Cost & RSVP: To reserve a lunch, the cost is $15.00 for section members and $20.00 for non-section members. To reserve your lunch, email Bill Biggs at wbiggs@sbcglobal.net no later than COB Tuesday, April 26th. (Reservations are only held until 11:55 on the day of the meeting.) Please bring a check or exact change to the meeting. If you reserve a lunch and are a “no-show,” you will be billed for your lunch. If you don’t want a lunch, no RSVP is necessary. This month’s menu: seared filet with red peppers & basil sauce, green salad with cranberries and feta cheese, roll & butter, chocolate cake with berries, and iced tea. There is no charge for section members who bring their own lunch. There is a $10.00 charge for non-section members who bring their own lunch.
Post Date: April 20, 2011
Law Practice Management Section
Using Social Media to Build Your Case: What’s Ethical and What’s Not
Presented by: Debra L. Bruce, JD, PCC, Lawyer-Coach LLC, Houston.
Lawyers who aren’t familiar with social media may be missing out. Would you like some new and inexpensive ways to: prove that an ex-spouse can afford to pay child support, find a disgruntled former employee who knows where the skeletons are hidden, locate assets of a judgment debtor, serve process when you don’t have a current address, identify an expert witness, find lost heirs, or uncover bias in potential jurors? Debra Bruce, will talk about ways lawyers can use social media to better serve their clients, and ethical issues to watch out for in the process (1.0 hour MCLE credit, including .50 hour ethics).
Date & Time: Thursday, April 14, 2011; 12:00pm – 1:00 p.m.
Place: Law Offices of Dunn, Neal & Gerger, LLP
3050 Post Oak Blvd., Suite 400 (Lakes on Post Oak)
Houston, Texas 77056.
Cost: $10.00 (includes lunch).
Information: To RSVP for the meeting, please contact Scot Dixon at sdixon@velaw.com or 713.758.3373.
Post Date: April 4, 2011
How Lawyers Can Capitalize on Foursquare and Geotagging
Jim Calloway posted about The Dangers of Photo Geotagging. He referenced a New York Times story describing how a television personality accidentally revealed the location of his home when he posted a photo on Twitter, because of the geotagging embedded in the photo. Geotagging adds geographical metadata to some media such as photos, videos, websites, and social media postings.
Calloway posited a few circumstances in which photo geotagging might be relevant to a lawyer’s case, such as evidence of “harboring a fugitive” based on a photo geotag. Posting a geotagged photo on Facebook could result in the arrest of someone with an outstanding warrant. Remember, other people can post photos on Facebook and tag them with someone else’s name, unless they have blocked that feature. And, if you think fugitives would not be foolish enough to post their own photos on Facebook, check out this Huffington Post story.
Tweets can also be geotagged on Twitter. Can you imagine scenarios where an attorney would find it useful to have recorded evidence of someone’s location at the time of posting a tweet? Perhaps an employee frequently calls in sick, and then tweets from the beach. A cheating spouse claims to be at a conference, but tweets from another city. A stalker or abusive spouse under a restraining order tweets from in front of your client’s residence.
Beyond the geo-tagging described above, location-based social networking sites like Yelp, Foursquare, Gowalla, Facebook Places, and Twitter Places include a game-like quality that entices participants to activate a geotag to “check-in” at certain locations. Participants can use the check-ins to locate friends in the area, to find out what’s “hot” at the moment, and to post tips and reviews. Some offer “badges” and titles, such as “mayor” of that location, as tokens of achievement in completing a check-in circuit or as recognition for frequent patronage. Restaurants, theaters, art museums and other businesses offer participants discounts and freebies when they check in, which results in sort of a frequent flyer program with word-of-mouth buzz for the business.
Why would lawyers care about that? In addition to some of the geotagging issues suggested above, there are a number of other potential uses in a legal matter. Could it be helpful in a divorce case to have a record of how often someone checked in at a bar? Perhaps a personal injury attorney could find potential witnesses to a car accident by tracking down people who checked in at nearby businesses around the time of the accident. Could a Foursquare check-in substantiate an alibi in a criminal case?
What other creative uses of geo-tagging (intentional or unintentional) do you think lawyers will come up with?
Post Date: September 21, 2010
Why Lawyers MUST Get Their Heads Out of the Sand about Social Media
The mushrooming popularity of social media creates novel legal issues to be resolved, as well as a lot of opportunities for mistakes by lawyers and their clients. Wake up! How can you answer your client’s questions or warn them about potential legal infractions, if you aren’t familiar with the medium? Could you be completely missing a good business development opportunity?
Many lawyers tell me their clients don’t use social media, but have they really checked? Or is that just an assumption? How do you check, if you don’t engage in social media yourself? Not long ago I spoke to about 50 lawyers, most of whom knew very little about social media. The room got very quiet when I started putting up on the screen the logos of their clients who had Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn accounts. If you asked your clients last year whether they used social media, they may have a different answer now. Could your competitors be enhancing their relationships with your clients via social media, while you remain oblivious?
Even if your clients don’t officially have a social media presence, their employees, customers, or competitors may be posting things that affect your clients. When they ask you what to do about it, how will you be able to advise them if you don’t understand what they are talking about?
Here are some examples of how you might be called on in your law practice to address social media issues.
Post Date: September 7, 2010