I'm shocked at this article - U.S. Law Firms Don't Understand KM "A survey of a small number of U.S., U.K., and Australian law firms reveals that U.S. law firms have not yet connected the business implications of knowledge management (KM) with the systems they have in place. It questions whether U.S. law firms understand that knowledge management is more than a technical way of storing and organizing information." [via TVC Alert]
3:19:05 PM
CaseMap 4 - Organizing Your Legal Research - I've had a chance to try out the new version of CaseMap and, of all the new features, the one that I'm most excited by is the integrated system for keeping tabs on your legal research. Having the ability to key your authorities to the issues in your CaseMap database is pretty cool. But the legal authorities tool is useful as a stand-alone application too. If you are interested here are some more thoughts.
3:10:43 PM
ElcomSoft verdict: Not guilty - In the first major test of the criminal provisions of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, a jury finds ElcomSoft not guilty of creating a tool to steal eBooks.
"After much wrangling among attorneys over the definition of the word 'willful,' the judge told jurors that in order to find the company guilty, they must agree that company representatives knew their actions were illegal and intended to violate the law. Merely offering a product that could violate copyrights was not enough to warrant a conviction, the jury instructions said." [via CNET News.com]
A lawyer I greatly respect constantly admonished me that jury instructions are almost as important as the evidence in a case. I agree that jury instructions are important (when I clerked in federal court it was my job to prepare those instructions and I know how important they are) but they aren't always outcome-determinative. In the Elcomsoft case it appears that they did determine the outcome. And that makes the case very significant.
1:30:53 PM
Rails without Trains - Gary Boone writes an interesting essay on our beloved information superhighway and its relation to the Transcontinental Railroad. His weblog is apparently just getting started. Looks very interesting so far and so I'm going to be watching it closely. Well, actually, since it is a Radio Weblog I just subscribed to the XML button with the Coffee Mug and bada bing. I wish the rest of my life were that easy.
1:20:55 PM
Organizing your digital photos - I've written about Picasa and Photomeister before, but since it's Christmas time and you all are going to be taking lots of pictures, you need to know about this software. Read my write-up if you own a digital camera and don't have an Apple computer (and hence no ability to use iPhoto).
