InsideCounsel SuperConference

If you've been following Blawg Review on Twitter @blawgreview you already know that some of the well-known lawyers who blog, Dan Hull, Scott Greenfield, Patrick Lamb, and Stephanie West Allen, are among the leading lawyers speaking at the Ninth Annual InsideCounsel SuperConference in Chicago next week.

And you've heard that we'll be getting together with some of the most interesting General Counsel in and around the conference events.

There really are a lot of interesting topics on the program. In addition to the keynotes by Robert Bauer, David Boies, and Dick Thornburgh, there are sessions that I'm especially interested in attending.

The Changing Face of Green Business
An emphasis on environmental concerns has placed a premium on environmental sustainability and the “greening” of mainstream business in both image and practice. In the meantime, “green” start-ups such as alternative energy companies are being talked about as some of the main drivers of the recovering economy. How is this changing the corporate landscape? Can your company go green and stay in the black?

Elisa D. Garcia C, EVP, General Counsel & Corporate Secretary, Office Depot, Inc.
Howard A. Learner, President & Executive Director, Environmental Law & Policy Center
John Parker Sweeney, Member, Womble Carlyle Sandridge & Rice, PLLC, Chair, DRI Climate Change Litigatin Task Force

Moderator:
Melissa Maleske, Managing Editor, InsideCounsel magazine

The Impact of KSR, Seagate, Quanta, and Bilski on Business Decisions
What will be the impact of recent important decisions in patent law, and what do you need to know to protect your company’s valuable IP assets?

H. Carol Bernstein, VP, Secretary & General Counsel, Cabot Microelectronics Corporation
Michael J. Forzano, Intellectual Property Counsel, Pall Corporation
Robert J. Zeitler, VP & General Counsel, Molex Incorporated

Moderator:
Robert F. Green, Member, Leydig, Voit & Mayer, Ltd.

Secondments: The Immersion Approach
Secondments, which have most often been done by U.K. firms, are gaining traction here in the U.S. There are benefits all around: the outside firm gains a deeper relationship with the client, the client gets a lawyer who understands their needs and culture, and the lawyer becomes more valuable to the firm upon return. Hear from lawyers who’ve been seconded, and in-house counsel who’ve taken them on. What did they learn? What were the benefits? Would they do it again?

Mark Chandler, SVP, General Counsel & Secretary, Cisco Systems, Inc.
Elisa D. Garcia C. EVP, General Counsel & Corporate Secretary, Office Depot, Inc.

Moderator:
Rees Morrison, President, Rees Morrison Associates

The Business Education of Lawyers
Lawyers are good at problem solving and identifying issues, but often find it challenging to gain a firm grasp of the business side. What are the 10 things lawyers need to understand about business that will make them better able to serve their clients?

Alan K. Tse, General Counsel, LG Electronics MobileComm USA
Karen Wishart, EVP & Chief Legal Officer, TV One, LLC
Marti L. Wronski, VP & General Counsel, Milwaukee Brewers Baseball Club

Moderator:
Roger H. Marks, Executive Director, International Affairs, National Safety Council

And, of course, we won't miss this:

Dealing With Gen-Y @ Work
They don’t play by the same set of workplace rules as their boomer parents did. Their sense of entitlement and refusal to follow corporate dictates blindly - not to mention a couple of tattoos or piercings, - make them very different than their colleagues. The flip side is they bring a tremendous energy to their work and are more tuned-in to the world around them than the previous generation was. How do you deal with this new breed, and create an environment in which they can thrive?

Stephanie West Allen, JD, Mediator and Trainer, Author, BrainsOnPurpose blog
Scott H. Greenfield, Attorney At Law, Author, Simple Justice blog
William P. Morelli, EVP & General Counsel, Ingram Industries, Inc.
Marcy Smorey-Giger, Corporate Counsel & Secretary, Wesco International, Inc.
Anthony P. Zana, Corporate Counsel, Intergraph Corporation

Moderator:
J. Daniel Hull, Co-Founder, Hull McGuire PC

Should be interesting, to say the least!

In addition to the InsideCounsel SuperConference Program, there will be meetups and tweetups where lawyers who know each other well online can get together face-to-face, often for the first time.

If you're in Chicagoland next week, even if you can't attend the SuperConference this year, be sure to contact me or any of us who are going to be there, and we'll let you know where we might meet in person. The Cubs and the White Sox are in town. And the Blackhawks are at home, too.

Chicago, my kind of town!

Dance With My Father

John M. Hochfelder hosts Blawg Review #209, dedicated to his father, J. Gene Hochfelder, on his birthday.

After Dad died, I came across a song that reminds me of some of our time together. You may like it (and you may even know of it): "Dance With My Father" by Luther Vandross. In it, the singer remembers how his late father would play with him, spin him around and dance with him (and his mother). Mom was long gone when Dad was dying but whenever I lifted him from his wheelchair he'd pat me on the back and say "John, we're dancing." So I get a little wistful whenever I hear the lyrics: "If I could get another chance, another walk, another dance with him I'd play a song that would never ever end."

A very personal, and poignant, Blawg Review.

Earth Week Blawg Review

Blawg Review #208 on Green Patent Blog celebrates planet earth, with a special focus on all things green and earthy.

The Ottawa Citizen

This week's host of Blawg Review #207 is Jordan Furlong, the Editor-in-Chief of the Canadian Bar Association’s flagship magazine National, a position he's held for nearly ten years. While he's been there, National has won seven Kenneth R. Wilson Awards for journalistic excellence from the Canadian Business Press and an Investigative Journalism Award from the Canadian Association of Journalists.

As Jordan describes his Blawg Review, "this week’s edition has been structured to resemble your local newspaper — the one that showed up on your doorstep this morning — to demonstrate the collective range, depth and acuity of the legal blogosphere. As with all papers, you can read the sections that interest you and simply skim the rest. Check out the “newspaper” that the legal community turned out this week — and keep in mind that this is only a sampling, and all of it was provided absolutely free. (And if you read nothing else, please skip down and read Section K - Editorial."

Editorial

It’s true that the blogosphere, legal or otherwise, often relies upon professional journalists to bring them many of the stories they discuss. Blogs are destined to supplement and integrate with journalism, not replace it. But a surprising number of bloggers do their own original research and report the results to their readers, and the legal blogosphere is especially good at that. We shouldn’t underestimate the tremendous capacity for powerful journalism that the legal community collectively wields — we know more, and are better at circulating that knowledge, than we think. Blawg Review is the best demonstration of that, and deserves to be celebrated.

Exactly four years ago this week, Blawg Review made its debut. Two hundred and seven installations later — stop and think about that for a second, of all the work by Ed, Colin,Victoria and others — it’s still going strong. If you’re a law blogger who hasn’t yet stepped up and hosted this brilliant and critically important example of citizen legal journalism, you owe it — to yourself, to your blawgging colleagues, and most importantly, to the public at large that needs to hear what we know — to sign up now.

In 2010, Canada will host the winter Olympics in Vancouver, where Blawg Review will be hosted by Canadians at the Canadian Trademark blog and Law Firm Web Strategy. It's nice to see more Canadian lawyers, law students, and law librarians hosting Blawg Review, eh?

Tartan Day Blawg Review

May It Please the Court, J. Craig Williams hosts Blawg Review #206 on Tartan Day, and promises to wear a tartan kilt to his law offices this week. If Craig were only 30 years younger, he might just be able to pull it off.

April Fool's Blawg Review

Longtime followers of Blawg Review knew it would be coming April 1st -- April Fool's Blawg Review Appendix 2009 by a fool in the forest.

Really, you didn't think this was all that George M. Wallace would come up with for Blawg Review #205, did you?

Did you see what he did on April 1st in 2006, 2007, and 2008?

If this guy doesn't win an Oscar or a Blawg Review of the Year Award, or something, there's no justice!