Dennis Kennedy

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April 30, 2003

Pocket Presenting

Presentations Magazine has the best little guide to using PDAs for presentations that I've ever seen. The print version of the magazine is also free to qualified subscribers and has lots of useful information for speakers.

Posted by dmk at 10:24 PM

A Truly Useful Google Tip

Using Google to search for something that you already know is out there on the Internet can be very frustrating, especially when the search terms are common words (e.g., Kennedy, to pull one out of thin air). Elwyn Jenkins, on his excellent Microdoc News blog suggests the simple trick of including your search terms in a sentence that is likely to use those terms and using that in your google search. Unfortunately, that meant that "Dennis Kennedy is a St. Louis lawyer" brought back more accurate results than "Dennis Kennedy is the coolest guy," but I really like the technique.

Posted by dmk at 10:23 PM

Well, Knock Me Over With a Feather!

A new survey from the FTC concludes that "two-thirds of unsolicited commercial e-mail is deceptive in some way," according to an article in USA Today. Mercifully, the article did not include the taxpayer cost of this study. Compare the survey results to your own experience.

Posted by dmk at 10:20 PM

April 28, 2003

Pocket PC and Tablet PC

I got a question today from someone trying to decide between a Pocket PC and a Tablet PC. The question reminded me that these questions are extremely difficult to answer in the abstract. The key thing you must know is how you are planning to use it and for what purposes? The correct answer is always "it depends." However, I put together a few thoughts and thought that they might be worth sharing.

Q: Please help me decide between a pocket PC and a tablet computer. I am leaning toward the pocket PC.

A: For what it's worth, Bill Gates is using a Tablet PC.

This is a difficult question to answer in the abstract without knowing the intended use, but I won't let that stop me.

Cost: The cost of a Pocket PC is 10 - 25% the cost of a tablet PC.

Maturity: Pocket PC technology has been around for quite a while. Tablet PCs are clearly generation 1 and improvements are expected in the fall. You are correct in saying that the Tablets did not sell like hotcakes, at least to this point.

Power: A tablet PC is the equivalent of a full-fledged notebook computer. Pocket PCs are much less powerful and are meant to be adjuncts to your main PC.

Apps: Tablet PCs can use any software that runs on Windows. Pocket PCs use "pocket" applet versions of the Office products. That may well be adequate, but you need to know that.

Here are a few rules of thumb:

1. If you are planning to buy a notebook anyway, a Tablet PC is only about $200 more, and, for that reason, deserves a close look.

2. The early consensus on Tablet PCs is that the best choice is a combo notebook/tablet.

3. For someone like a lawyer who likes to write on pads, Tablets deserve a close look.

4. I wouldn't buy either type without going to a store and trying them out.

5. A Tablet PC would have the higher "cool factor."

6. If you expect a Pocket PC to take the place of a notebook, you will be disappointed. Pocket PCs are best at enhancing your mobility and letting you synch data to the Pocket PC to carry with you.

7. Shopping on the Internet can net you some great bargains on Pocket PCs these days.

8. It is very easy to have unrealistic expectations with both Pocket PCs and Tablet PCs. A Tablet PC would be the more expensive disappointment.

Shopping tips:

I'm impressed with my Toshiba e740 Pocket PC. They have a newer version called the e750, that would be more current. The Compaq iPaq Pocket PCs are generally considered the top of the line products. The reasonably priced Dell Pocket PCs are also worth a look if you are looking for a more reasonable price. Also, consider buying a foldable keyboard for a Pocket PC to make it more versatile.

Posted by dmk at 08:42 PM

April 24, 2003

Postcards from the Edge

Law.com has a very good collection of articles on innovative ways five featured companies are using their intellectual property. As Mark Voorhees says in his introduction to the articles, "But there is perhaps one common element in these tales. The lawyers are playing against type. . . . They don't teach this stuff in law school." Highly recommended reading.

Posted by dmk at 09:59 AM

April 23, 2003

Ray Ozzie: Perspective: A Mosaic of New Opportunities

Ray Ozzie is the CEO of Groove Networks and the creator of Lotus Notes. He's written a new article outlining his predictions on dominant trends in computing. Not suprisingly, his vision involves greater collaboration and virtual workspaces, but Ozzie, a blogger (and it's great to see that his sabbatical from posting may be ending), sees the increasing number of inputs and quantity of information we deal with driving this process of change. He notes, "We're chained to e-mail and the Web, drowning in an information flood that leaves us feeling more and more like human message-processing machines." Many will agree with this sentiment.

Ultimately, he argues, "these changes will transform the personal computer into an interpersonal computer. This will be a rich, self-synchronized and readily interchangeable device focused specifically on people and what they do with one another online."

His message is an optimistic one. He says, "Even though our current use of PCs, productivity tools, e-mail and the Web seems quite sophisticated, we've only just begun to understand how to apply them and effectively realize their benefits. The next 10 years will find us moving decidedly from an era of personal productivity to one of joint productivity and social software. "

Posted by dmk at 07:52 AM

April 22, 2003

Practical Protection Practices for Your Intellectual Property

A great article in CSO (Chief Security Officer) Magazine covers the practical "where the rubber meets the road" issues of protecting a company's IP on an every day, in the trenches, basis. The article contains excellent examples of what companies like Sony and W. L. Gore do to protect intellectual property through technical, administrative and policy approaches. It all starts with thinking of IP as "intellectual capital."

Posted by dmk at 02:46 PM

RSS Feeds / News Aggregators

A few more goood resources on RSS feeds and news aggregators:

Via the highly-respected Tom Mighell, the Fagan Finder Explanation of RSS, How You Can Use it, and Finding RSS Feeds covers most of the key practical issues. From Hebig.org, the RSS Feed Reader / News Aggregators Directory is a great collection of resources.

Posted by dmk at 02:43 PM

April 21, 2003

Pattern Recognition

"The future has never been more like the present than it is now."

William Gibson hooked my attention with the famous first line of his novel, Neuromancer, "The sky above the port was the color of a television, tuned to a dead channel." And it's been a great ride ever since.

I highly recommend his newest book, Pattern Recognition, which touches on many things that I find most interesting these days, including the subject of pattern recognition. In a way, we all see the patterns we want to see, but it struck me that the book touched on the blogging phenomenon in a fundamental way, without ever mentioning them. There is a current dance between art and expression and commerce and marketing that plays out in the book as well on the streets of the Internet these days.

The book is written in Gibson's superb and challenging style, one in which you must resist the urge to fight in order to be rewarded by the flow of it. There are classic Gibsonian characters and observations on our world - it's fascinating that the main character has a physical allergy/phobia to trademarks, yet works as a finder/arbiter of what is cool.

While Neuromancer seemingly predicted the nearly two decades that followed it, Pattern Recognition is set right in the present - the post 9/11 present. Pattern Recognition is about 9/11 without explicitly being about 9/11 in much the same way as is Bruce Springsteen's The Rising, and a strong common thread of "missing" runs through both. Both Gibson and Springsteen, to me, have presented the most artistically rewarding responses to 9/11, both deserving multiple re-readings and re-listenings.

Posted by dmk at 11:24 AM

Microsoft Licensing: Showdown at the 6.0 Corral

CIO Magazine has a good article on the frustrating history and difficulties of Microsoft licensing. So many companies have or will run into these issues that it is important to get a good understanding of the various approaches companies are taking. One very interesting stat: 60% of CIOs surveyed said that changes in Microsoft's licensing practices have caused them to consider Open Source alternatives.

Posted by dmk at 11:22 AM

Langa's Article on Ten Great Free Software Tools

Fred Langa's recent Information Week column contains a list of his favorite useful free software tools. There should be a few to put on your downloading list.

Posted by dmk at 11:20 AM

Avoiding Armageddon

I recently finished Benjamin and Simon's The Sacred Age of Terror, which seems to be a good overview of the terrorism of our day. I do not think that anyone will finish this book with any sense of optimism for the long haul, even in spite of recent military victories.

It's the unfortunate nature of our modern world, but the site for PBS's Avoiding Armageddon series provides good info and resources on weapons of mass destruction, terrorism and the like. There's also a companion book.

Posted by dmk at 11:18 AM

April 17, 2003

A Cornucopia of Legal KM

There are two recent collections of "KM in law firm" articles that are well worth checking out. The first is in the current issue of Legal Technology News (requires free registration, but you get a free subscription to an excellent legal tech publication) and FindLaw's Modern Practice webzine. Between the two you'll find a good number of the leading thinkers on legal KM and links to legal KM resources.

Posted by dmk at 07:45 AM

April 16, 2003

Blog Evolution - War Blogs Without the War.

Tom Yager's Ahead of the Curve column in Infoworld has recently become one of my favorite reads because he addresses the implications of technology in addition to the implementations of technology. For example, his recent column called "Natural Selection" is an thought-provoking (in the best sense) meditation on consolidation in the IT industry and its implications.

The article, among other things, poses a key question in the new post-war blogging era: which bloggers will stick with it for the long run and which will bail out?

What sound does a war blog make when there is no war? The survivors and innovators will continue and I'm sure that I'll see some favorites disappear, but I can't wait to see the cool ways those who continue evolve their blogs.

Posted by dmk at 11:12 PM

Good Article on Upcoming New Versions of Adobe Acrobat

At TechShow, David Masters said that Adobe Acrobat was a necessary tool for lawyers. There's even a blog on PDF for lawyers. Today, the informative PDFZone newsletter had a link to a good overview article on the soon-to-be-released Acrobat version 6 and its three new flavors.

Posted by dmk at 11:06 PM

April 15, 2003

Happy HIPAA

To celebrate the official April 14 HIPAA privacy deadline, two useful overview resources:

HIPAA Basics: Medical Privacy in the Electronic Age from the Privacy Rights Clearinghouse

and

Many Unaware of Medical Records Privacy Rules

I'm keeping a list of HIPAA resources at http://www.denniskennedy.com/hipaa.htm.

Posted by dmk at 12:03 AM

April 14, 2003

Recent Thoughts on PDAs for Lawyers

I made some posts to a listserv today as sort of a beginner's guide to PDAs. I thought I'd collect and share them.

1. Having a Palm device is not a requirement of getting into the 21st century. Not by a long shot.

2. Like many technologies, Palm devices can be useful tools to address specific needs. If you don't have the needs, you don't need the tools. In the case of the Palm devices, the specific need is to have information (generally calendar and addressbook info) readily accessible when you are away from your office. If you spend 95% of your time at your office computer, the purchase of a Palm device is hard to justify.

3. As others have mentioned, once you have identified a real need, you'll need to consider what software you want to use (there are programs for just about everything), your budget, your style and your eyesight. You'll carry and use a device that you actually enjoy carrying and using - especially if you are wary about the devices in the first place. Also, I recommend color over mono because the screens are much easier to read, a concern for those of us on the verge of entering the bifocal era. The Sony screens, in particular, are amazing. A visit to a store where you can compare display, look and feel is definitely in order before buying.Color will drain the charge on batteries more quickly than you will like. That's the bad news. The good news is that color units come with rechargeable battery packs, so you need to remember to keep the device in the recharger/cradle on a regular basis. The "good old days" of getting 2 months use out of a pair of AAA batteries on a Palm III are gone. The typical standard Palm apps (calendar, to do list) actually use very little color, but the color display screens are so good that the improvement in clarity alone is a reason to give the color units careful consideration.

4. As I mention in a recent Law Office Computing article (http://www.denniskennedy.com/mobilecomputing03.htm), I think that for a number of business and other reasons, the Sony devices are the devices of choice these days. Note, though, that carefully watching sites like www.dealnews.com or www.half.com, you can find lots of bargains on many of these devices. Be aware, though, that there are some concerns that both Palm and Handspring may get out of the hardware business (one reason I recommend the Sony devices). As I suggested earlier, if you shop on the Internet, you are likely to find some great deals - I'd hesitate before paying anything like a retail price on PDAs these days. See, for example, http://www.overstock.com/cgi-bin/d2.cgi?PAGE=PROFRAME&PROD_ID=61898 for a great price a refurbished Sony Clie.

5. Although this article is a little outdated in terms of today's models, my "Getting Started with Palm" article (http://www.denniskennedy.com/palmstart.htm) still offers a useful way to think about these devices.

6. For what it's worth, I use a Sony Clie T615C. I just won a Toshiba e740 Pocket PC with WiFi, so I'll be exploring that route. If you are thinking about Pocket PC as an alternative to Palm, I'd take a look at the Dell models, which are priced lower than most other Pocket PC devices.

Note that Sony devices are Palm OS devices. Here's a handy guide: Palm, Handspring (Visor) and Sony devices all run the Palm operating system. Toshiba, HP, Compaq, Dell and a few others run the Pocket PC OS from Microsoft and tend to be much more expensive (up to about $800) but have stripped down versions of MS Word, etc. Lawyers tend to use Palm devices; business people tend to favor the Pocket PC devices (especially when the company pays for them). Palm OS devices still command approximately 80% of the market.

7. My two cents on the PDA/cellphone combos: I like two separate devices, each of which does a good job at what it's supposed to do, rather than a combo. I know some people who like the Treos, but they are definitely techies and they have heavy, specific wireless needs. The big question is whether you like holding something the size of a Palm up to the side of your head for an extended time (most people don't and I can't even imagine it), or whether you are comfortable talking on a headset. In St. Louis, there is some acceptance of seeing people talking away on a headset (even in elevators or in line at a restaurant), but in other areas, people may just think that you are a nut talking to yourself. The other issue about the combo devices is that some of the cell providers that carry them are not the highest rated service providers.

Posted by dmk at 11:52 PM

April 10, 2003

TechShow 2003 / 2004

I'm working on putting together my reflections on TechShow 2003, which I'll try to post this week. It was fun, the people I met were great and there's plenty of cool tech happening.

I'll be on the TechShow Board for TechShow 2004. My goal is simply to do my little part to make TechSHow 2004 the coolest, rockingest TechShow ever. In order to help do that, I'd like to solicit comments, suggestions, ideas, criticisms and the like from attendees, past attendees, non-attendees and future attendees. What will it take to get you there next year? Send me an email.

Posted by dmk at 10:02 AM

Looking for Legal Marketing Articles for Law Practice Today

As many of you know, ABA Law Practice Management Section's Law Practice Today Webzine is now live. In addition to being one of the main co-editors, I am also the lead editor of the Marketing section. If you have articles on legal marketing, new or previously published, that might fit our webzine, please let me know and we'll see if we can put you in front of this great audience.

Posted by dmk at 09:59 AM

News Aggregator Tools List

The always-great Shifted Librarian blog mentions a great list of news aggregation tools.

Posted by dmk at 09:57 AM

It's the Microcontent

It's darn hard to describe to people what a blog is. I think this article on "microcontent" by Elwyn Jenkins is a great starting place. There's not just one kind of blog.

Posted by dmk at 09:55 AM

Teaching in the Wireless Cloud

A fascinating article by Bryan Alexander discusses the many implications of both wireless and the habits of a wireless generation on academia and education. The education world is changing because of wireless - I can see that in the law school class I teach - and some of the changes this article suggests are positively exciting.

Posted by dmk at 09:54 AM

April 01, 2003

Dennis Kennedy Launches Solo Career

Yes, I am leaving Thompson Coburn to start a solo career. The mix of what I want to do no longer fits within the context of a large law firm and I’ll be starting a couple of new enterprises.

First, I’ll have a law practice that will look a lot like what I was doing at Thompson Coburn in the area of information technology law. I want to concentrate in what I think of as “consumer protection law” for businesses entering into important technology agreements. The focus will be on review and negotiation of information technology contracts, software licenses, e-commerce agreements and the like. I plan to use many of the technologies I’ve written about to deliver legal services.

Second, I’ll be doing a limited amount of consulting for a select group of clients in the area of legal technology. In addition to working with innovative law firms on web and technology projects, I’ll also consult with legal departments and large consumers of legal services in the area of “client driven technologies,” of which I’ll be speaking at the upcoming ABA TechShow and of which you’ll be hearing much more about from me. I’ll also work with a small number of legal software vendors in the area of marketing and development.

Finally, I plan to do more speaking and writing than I have been able to be in the last couple of years, including providing workshops, seminars and, very likely, a new email newsletter. I’ll continue to teach a class in IP and e-commerce licensing and drafting as an adjunct professor at the Washington University School of Law.

There will be more details on my web site at www.denniskennedy.com.

As always, I welcome your support and advice and look forward to being able to keep in touch with you as I move into these new ventures.

By the way, this move should mean more blog time.

Dennis

Posted by dmk at 12:11 PM