I would not be where I am today if it weren’t for ABA TECHSHOW.  Years ago, when I was an associate in a law firm, getting more interested in law office technology and less interested in practicing law, I attended TECHSHOW in Chicago. It was the early 1990’s and so much was happening in the legal/tech world. The atmosphere was electric, and I met other lawyers from around the country – all enjoying a truly unique experience. No other so-called legal conference has the same focus on “real” lawyers.

That first TECHSHOW, I met a kind, generous lawyer who encouraged me and introduced me to people instrumental in putting on the conference. His name was Jim Keane, and his legacy as a pioneer and amazingly nice guy lives on, even though he passed away too young from cancer.  In his honor, TECHSHOW awards the annual James I. Keane Memorial Award for Excellence in eLawyering.

Chicago seemed really distant to me back in those days and it was a big step to get on the plane and go there by myself. But looking back now, 17 years later, it was one of the best steps I ever took. This year, TECHSHOW is March 25-27, at the Hilton Chicago. If you’re interested in taking the leap, please take advantage now of the Early Bird pricing and special SC Bar discount. Just enter discount code EP1001 when you register. I hope I see you there!

The South Carolina Bar Convention was held January 21 – 24, at Kiawah Island Golf Resort. My favorite part, as always, was the Technology seminar on Thursday afternoon. The Tech seminar has become something of a tradition at the Convention. Over the years, we’ve been honored to have some top-notch national speakers from the world of legal technology. Past speakers have included Ross Kodner, Sharon Nelson and John Simek, Craig Ball, Walt Mossberg, Jim Calloway, and more. This year, Convention attendees were wowed by Carole Levitt and Mark Rosch, of Internet for Lawyers.

Mark and Carole are nationally known and respected “cybersleuths.”  Mark’s background is in business, the entertainment industry and technology; Carole’s is in law and library science. Together they have created Internet for Lawyers, through which they speak, write,  and assist lawyers with finding the electronic “smoking gun.” Their current book, The Cybersleuth’s Guide to the Internet, will be joined soon by two new books for the ABA Law Practice Management Section – Find Info Like a Pro, vol. I, will debut at ABA TECHSHOW in March.

The session was fast, funny, and informative. Mark and Carole really know their stuff. I learned many things I didn’t know about research on the Internet. Judging from the comments from the lawyers attending, I wasn’t alone. In three hours, we covered everything from how to investigate people and companies using free web sites, to some great tips on software and web sites most lawyers have, but aren’t using as well as they should. I know it will be hard to top this year’s program. I’ll be looking hard for next year’s speakers when I attend ABA TECHSHOW in March.

Did Santa Claus bring you a new electronic item? Or did you purchase new hardware as a year-end capital expense? Whatever the reason, if you find yourself with old computers or electronics that are too old to benefit anyone (even the National Cristina Foundation won’t take Pentium II computers anymore), you need to responsibly dispose of the old clunker.

Being responsible means taking or shipping it to a government or private recycling center. It means doing a little research on the Internet to find out where to go and which location accepts what.  It means sanitizing hard drives and other storage media so that you don’t breach your ethical and legal duties to safeguard your client’s property (not to mention your own personal data). This can be done using software like Darik’s Boot And Nuke, Disk Wipe or Eraser .

You can also use a physical device to erase, like Drive eRazer, which works well if you have miscellaneous hard drives without the computer case. CD’s, DVD’s, floppies and tapes are the Tribbles of the law office – they have a way of self-proliferating. Most new paper shredders can shred CD’s and old floppies.

Once your computer is sanitized and free of data, you need to find someone who will accept it for proper disposal. It is not proper to put a computer in a landfill!  For a list of e-cycling websites, go to the PMAP pages of SC Bar.com and find “old computers.”  Be sure to read the article there on disposing of computers responsibly –  by yours truly and Ross Kodner: “Dumpster Disasters.”  Good luck and happy e-cycling!

Maybe you’ve heard about a thing called “metadata.” Say what? Usually, dropping buzzwords and using plain English is helpful, but not here – since metadata means “data about data” or “information about information.” Gee, thanks.

Metadata is actually the code or words contained in electronic documents that help the document function better somehow; for example, making it easier to search for the document on the computer. According to Catherine Sanders Reach, Director of the ABA Legal Technology Resource Center, “Metadata helps users save and retrieve documents more readily, by capturing information such as author, editor, “date created” and “date revised” in the hidden part of the document.

“However, other information about the document is also captured, such as additions, deletions, revisions, versions, comments, and other information about the document that an attorney may not want to share with others”

So, while metadata is useful, it can also be dangerous. Anyone with the inclination and a little know-how can look at metadata. Unfortunately, well-publicized stories of metadata embarrassments abound. Usually, they involve an electronic copy of Microsoft Word emailed or otherwise transmitted (intentionally or otherwise) to another person who exploits the information contained in the metadata to suit his or her own ends.

It’s not difficult to see that this could be particularly dangerous for lawyers, whose ethical duties to clients could be breached as well. Although South Carolina has not weighed in with an ethics opinion, the majority of states with opinions held that lawyers have a duty to exercise reasonable care to avoid disclosing confidential information via metadata when transmitting electronic files. To see all existing opinions, visit the ABA Legal Technology Resource Center’s metadata ethics opinion comparison chart.

The question then is “how do I get rid of metadata?” (I wish to clarify that we are discussing the metadata in documents the attorney creates, not metadata which may be present in electronic evidence in a lawsuit, which may be subject to the federal and state rules or laws.)

Many “solutions” to the metadata problem aren’t practical – such as not transferring electronic files; scanning documents and saving in a new format; or copying and pasting into a plain text editor. A more realistic solution is to clean the documents before you share them. Microsoft attempted to address the issue with Office 2003 by releasing an add-in removal patch for Word, Excel and PowerPoint files. In the year since it was released, there have been many reports of it failing to do a complete job of metadata removal, so I do not recommend relying on it.

Office 2007 comes with more built-in metadata removal tools, including Document Inspector. For a more in-depth discussion and instructions on metadata removal in Office 2007, see http://bit.ly/1pS6OM.

For most lawyers, third party software remains the best means of removing or minimizing metadata. Two products to consider are Metadata Assistant by Payne Consulting  (priced from $80.00 for single workstation and more for enterprise-wide versions) and Workshare Protect (starting at $29.95).

While most of the problems with metadata arise from Microsoft software, to a lesser degree metadata is in other products as well, such as WordPerfect and PDF files. For pointers on dealing with WordPerfect, see www.corel.com and search for metadata in the knowledgebase.

Adobe Acrobat (PDF) is usually a secure format for transferring documents electronically if the document is secured or restricted. For more on securing Acrobat PDF files, see http://www.adobe.com/support/security/.

The most important thing to know about metadata is that it exists and to exercise caution when transferring electronic files, utilizing removal tools when necessary.

What if you need to arrange a conference call among a group of lawyers – but don’t have a fancy phone system or service? One solution is to use one of a number of services on the Internet that offer “free” conference calls. These services either provide free conference calling by using a toll number (i.e. not an 800) number that the attendees dial or you can get toll free number for a reasonable price.  Some to try: FreeConferenceCall.com®, Free Conference.com®, or Totally Free Conference Calls. You could also try Skype. For web conferencing with up to 20 people, take a look at DimDim.