Can Lawyers Represent Clients Paying With Crowdfunding?

In the world of online fundraising, otherwise basically known as crowdfunding, the opportunities are seemingly endless. In fact, lawyers and clients have successful crowdfunded litigation. However, due to the relative newness of the crowdfunding sensation, those in the legal...

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5 Best Lawyer Dad-Jokes to Use on Social

Just being on social media may be good, but creating engaging content is better. And as Arlo Guthrie's father once told him, "Ya know Arlo, if you can't be great, it's better to be long." So when you're thinking...

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Federal Rules of Civil and Appellate Procedure Changing Dec. 1

For federal civil and appellate practitioners, there are a few rule changes coming next week that you might want to make sure you're ready for. One involves some significant changes to FRCP Rule 23 involving class actions, and the...

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Try a Different Hobby to Improve Job Performance

In Opposite World, "yes" means "no" and "no" means "yes." If you need a better explanation, ask a teenager. The point is that some things are counter-intuitive, like hobbies that can improve your work. You would think that playing...

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Law Students Send #MeToo Message to BigLaw

Since when did law students get to tell BigLaw firms what to do? Since the #MeToo movement, it seems. After Harvard law students said they would boycott Kirkland & Ellis over its mandatory arbitration agreements for summer associates, the...

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Becoming a Sports Lawyer, Not Jerry Maguire

Everybody knows Jerry Maguire was not a real sports agent, but they also know his most famous line: "Show me the money!" Leigh Steinberg is a real sports agent and lawyer, and he is oft credited as the inspiration...

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When Video Evidence Gets Deleted

A recent civil suit involving a South Carolina school and student who was incessantly bullied, attacked, and injured while at school, highlights one critical problem that attorneys can often face when trying to get that holy-grail surveillance camera footage:...

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To Tweet or Not to Tweet; It's Not Shakespeare

Matthew Stiegler is an experienced appellate lawyer, but what's more important is that he is on Twitter. That may be a misstatement of his career accomplishments. However, he probably knows more about using Twitter than the average appellate practitioner....

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Impostor Syndrome: Do You Have It, Too?

Impostor syndrome is the feeling that you are not cut out for your job, combined with a fear of being discovered as a fraud. That's the syndrome plaguing many lawyers today, writes Neha Samat in an article for the...

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How to Exploit Your Dog for Law Firm Marketing

Do you have a dog and a law firm? If so, you might want to consider exploiting your dog's cuteness to help market your law firm. Simply put, your law firm's social media needs content, and people love dog...

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Why You Should Use Calendaring Software for Court Deadlines

Why should you use calendaring software to meet court deadlines? One word: malpractice. Here are a couple more: insurance rates. Here's a whole phrase: peace of mind. However you want to say it, it should go without saying. A...

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How Not to Sabotage Your Success as a Lawyer

Here are only two ways not to sabotage your success as a lawyer.

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Real Cocktail Napkin Contract Trial Underway

Warning: The following may trigger law school exam or bar exam flashbacks.Regardless of when you went to law school, the question surely came up in your contracts class: Is a contract written on a cocktail napkin a legit contract?...

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Why High-Profile Depositions Matter

A deposition can win a case; everybody knows that, but few lawyers practice that way. Too often depositions are boring affairs from beginning to end with recitations that sound like mindless prayers: the "rules of the road," the admonitions,...

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PSA to Romantically Involved Lawyers: Use Redaction!

Lawyers do it every day. But for one pair of form-crossed Ohio lawyers, who did it and didn't redact, the state's bar decided to set an example. The two lawyers met at a conference and hit it off. They...

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Lawyers Who Count Chickens Before They Hatch Lay Eggs

Defense attorney John Shely reportedly lost the largest verdict in an individual "bad faith" insurance case in Oklahoma history. But the $25.5 million verdict did not make him the biggest loser. After all, attorneys don't really lose anything in...

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7 Social Media Tips for Law Firms

If your law firm isn't on social media, you are simply missing out on some easy and free marketing that can be done in your downtime from anywhere. Every platform you want to be on has an app that...

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Why Lawyers Should -- or Should Not -- Show Off Clients

Client endorsements are the best. "He really understood my case." "She helped me when I needed it the most." "My lawyer got me $2.1 million ...." Well, not all endorsements work. The thing is, if clients are giving you...

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Do You Language Correctly?

Lawyers may have grown accustomed to ignoring Bryan Garner and all his nitpicky wisdom about language and the law. But in his recent ABA Journal piece on modern language usage, Garner dropped a bombshell nugget of wisdom that's just...

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5 Cool Marketing Ideas for Lawyers

Giving out swag and using traditional advertising methods may not be a big driver of clients for most lawyers (or any industry really), but some of the cooler marketing ideas can actually help drive business. That is, if you...

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Sessions' Last Act: New Justice Guidelines for Civil Consent Decrees

The day before resigning, Attorney General Jeff Sessions laid down some tighter guidelines for the Justice Department on civil settlements. Consent decrees "should be employed carefully and only after review and approval of senior leadership," he said. It was...

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The 5 Best Tips for Solo Practitioners

When it comes to solo practice, the ABA Journal has long been a fantastic, and free, resource for practice tips, legal news, and motivation/inspiration, especially for solo practitioners. Like our blogs for legal professionals, the ABA Journal creates content...

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Celebrate Veterans Day Like a Lawyer

For some, the veteran's story is not a good one. They come home to find out they can never go home again. Disillusioned, their battles too often end tragically. Lawyers who help in those struggles can become heroes. Veteran's...

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5 Tips for Turning Your Case Into a Compelling Story

Whether you're headed into trial, or just some motion practice, being able to turn your case into a compelling story is critical to swaying a judge and/or jury. While applying the law to the facts might put your case...

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Top 3 Social Media Mistakes Lawyers Make All the Time

If the internet could vote, who would win the award for making the biggest social media mistake? President Trump could win for "covfefe," "special council," or any number of social media faux pas. But that would be like a...

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A Cannabis Practice Rule From the California State Bar

Three more states legalized marijuana in the mid-term elections, but a different state was way ahead of them with new guidance for attorneys in the field. California, which legalized medical marijuana more than two decades ago, has a new...

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Attorney Puffs, Client Records, Bar Suspends

In a rather shocking disciplinary action out of Ohio, an attorney has been indefinitely suspended for counseling a client in a rather peculiar way that he claims was mere puffery to bolster the client's confidence in his representation. In...

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Prosecutors: Do This, Not That

Eat This, Not That is a popular book about eating healthy, and it has nothing to do with being a prosecutor. Except this: there are things that prosecutors should do and not do. It's all about good practices that...

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Why Expand a Law Practice Across the State Lines?

Like changes in belt sizes, some law firms expand in unexpected ways. They hire more lawyers, merge with others, and morph into new entities before anyone notices. As long as there is room to grow, they will try to...

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Colorado Marijuana RICO Jury Trial Goes to Pot

The marijuana business is booming. But alongside the boom, the market, governments, and society in general are reacting to the rise of legal and medicinal marijuana. One seemingly nefarious response to the pot industry has been the rise of...

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Pornstars Need Lawyers, Too, but for What?

Stormy Daniels isn't the only pornstar with a lawyer. She may be the most famous pornstar in the legal headlines right now, but there are many lawyers handling cases for adult entertainers everyday. Michael Avenatti is just one solo...

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3 Ways to Effective Training at Your Firm

Thinking, not training, is the key to learning. Unless people think about improving their work, training them won't make a big difference. That's according to the Harvard Business Review. And what's good for business is good for the law...

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How to Select a Social Media Manager for Your Firm

If your law firm engages in marketing, more likely than not, you have social media channels open to the public. Unfortunately for those firms that are not run by social media savvy lawyers, more often than not, their social...

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