Real Lawyers Blog Carnivals

Blawg Review #42 is being hosted next at Cyberlaw Central by Kevin Thompson, an intellectual property attorney in Chicago, where his law practice is concerned with trademark, copyright, and the Internet.

This week, Kevin took a few minutes out of his busy schedule to answer a few questions about his law blog, as a preview for his Blawg Review.

How has blogging connected you with other interesting people in the legal community?

One of the highlights over the past year was being invited to the BlawgThink conference (held here in Chicago!) where I got to meet some people I'd been reading, meet some more great people I've since added to my aggregator, and then really figure out where I want to go with my blog. I still have a separate folder in Bloglines where I group the feeds from my fellow attendees.

Many, like you, who attended BlawgThink 2005 said afterwards on their blogs that the opportunity to meet face-to-face with like-minded people they were already familiar with from reading blawgs was a lasting benefit of that unique event. Was there anything on the technology side at BlawgThink or the ABA TechShow that grabbed your attention?

My big tech purchase recently was a Tablet PC, mainly to have a better way to use my commuting time. I've really loved using it. I plan to write more about how tech issues are affected by legal concerns, and thereby affecting our digital lifestyle. The tagline for my blog is "the digital world, its impact and legal framework." With that as my guide, I can write about almost anything from recent cases to controversies to my general musings on the nature of the 'net.

For attending BlawgThink in November I received some excellent software packages, including MindManager, One Note, and NoteMap. The first two really take great advantage of the tablet, I’ve enjoyed learning how to use them best. On Thursday I attended a local Bar association lunch seminar, and the speaker let me try out the tablet’s built in microphone while taking notes with OneNote. The sound isn’t the best due to room conditions, but I really like its ability to take me to the time index of the recording from when I made each note. I’ve heard that a lot of attorneys use OneNote to record depositions while taking notes, it really is great on the tablet. I’ve also got good use out of MindManager, I’m starting to get the hang of its pen shortcuts. ActiveWords has also been another great package. I’m sure enjoying learning it, and will write more about that package soon.

I noticed that your Tablet PC review was mentioned by quite a number of other tech bloggers, including one called Kevin 2.0, which really freaked me out when I saw the name. I'll assume that's not you, too. But you'd make a good tech salesman. I see from your resume that you've been there done that, while at university.

Yeah, I was in charge of the Software Sales department of the Division of Information Technology at UW-Madison.

And, reviewing your law firm bio, Kevin, I see also that your interest in writing about these areas of the law goes back to your law school days at DePaul where you were business editor of the DePaul-LCA Journal of Art and Entertainment Law, as well as vice president of the Communications and Technology Law Society. What prompted you to get into blogging?

I started blogging in May of 2005 after a fellow attorney introduced me to RSS, podcasts and aggregation earlier that year. I still remember the day I discovered, by reading a post on another blog, that he was also blogging. He'd kept quiet about it as a social experiment to see how long it would take before we found it. I started to figure out pretty quickly the benefits of getting better known for the area of the law that I really love. I started out on Blogger, and within a month I'd registered my own domain and installed Wordpress. I haven't looked back.

How would you sum up Cyberlaw Central for our readers?

The focus of this blog is the digital world, its impact and legal framework. I write about recent issues, cases, and controversies. I also give my general thoughts about the Internet and its impact upon us and our society. Internet law is my real love, especially how trademarks and copyrights intersect there.

Well, it looks like the intellectual property lawyers have the whole blogosphere covered next week. Between you hosting Blawg Review at Cyberlaw Central and Doug Sorocco and Matt Buchanan hosting the Carnival of the Capitalists over at PHOSITA, there are two blog carnival opportunities for lawyers to showcase their best recent blawg posts.

I should submit something interesting to Carnival of the Capitalists and, hopefully, Doug Sorocco and Matt Buchanan, who hooked up at BlawgThink, too, will submit one of their excellent posts from PHOSITA to my Blawg Review this week—and everyone else who wants to increase exposure for their blawgs should submit something different to each of us, right?

That's how it works. Anyone who wants to get in on these blog carnivals should just follow the submission guidelines for Blawg Review, and for Carnival of the Capitalists, and remember to take into account the special opportunities these two blog carnivals present to reach somewhat different, but overlapping, audiences interested in law and business. Have some fun with them. You'll meet the nicest people.