Jack Newton

I am here at LegalTech in New York where I had an opportunity to meet yesterday with Jack Newton and Rian Gauvreau, founders of Clio, the cloud-based practice management application. They had big news to share: Clio has raised $6 million in financing. This is the first major capital investment in any cloud-based practice management application, so it will be interesting to see where Clio goes from here.

Jack and Rian said the financing will be used to further enhance the Clio platform and add new functionality. Clio also plans to expand its marketing beyond the U.S. into other markets, including Europe, Canada and Australia.

The Series B financing was led by Acton Capital Partners, a Munich-based growth equity investor. Existing Clio investors, including Point Nine Capital, also participated in the round.

Document Assembly

Rian Gauvreau

In news of a more practical sort, Clio also announced that it now offers a document assembly function. I wrote just last week about the new document assembly feature in Rocket Matter, another cloud-based practice management platform. Now Clio customers can also upload templates for common documents and extract information from their matters and contacts to fill out the forms.

One difference with Clio’s functionality is that you can upload templates either from Microsoft Word or in PDF format. Rocket Matter requires the templates to be created in Word. This means that a WordPerfect user could create a template by typing the characters that create the merge field — Clio provides a guide for creating these fields — and then save the document as a PDF and upload it.

Now when Clio users go to their Documents tab, there is a new button, “Create.” From here, you can create a document using a previously uploaded template or start by uploading a new template.

This course is designed to provide an overview of the changes that are occurring in the practice of law today, especially with respect to technology. It will introduce law students for real-world situations that they will encounter in the job market and point law professors to new avenues to cover in their courses.

The course consists of nine weekly one-hour classes, delivered via webcast on Fridays at 2 p.m. ET. Each class will include a 30-minute lecture followed by a Q&A period. Designed for an audience of law students and law faculty, the course is open to anyone.

Read more at the course homepage or register here.

Here is the full schedule:

Week 1
Friday, February 10, 2012 2pm-3pm EST
The Virtual Law Office
Stephanie Kimbro
Attorney and Technology Consultant
www.virtuallawpractice.org
Twitter @stephkimbro

Week 2
Friday, February 17, 2012 2pm-3pm EST
Document Automation
Marc Lauritsen
Attorney and Document Automation Expert
http://www.capstonepractice.com/marc.htm
Twitter @marclauritsen

Week 3
Friday, February 24, 2012 2pm-3pm EST
Technology in the Courts
Guest Speaker TBD

Week 4
Friday, March 2, 2012 2pm-3pm EST
Unbundling Legal Service Delivery
Richard Granat
President of SmartLegalForms, Inc. and DirectLaw, Inc.
http://www.elawyeringredux.com/promo/about/
Twitter @rgranat

Week 5
Friday, March 9, 2012 2pm-3pm EST
Online Legal Forms in Legal Aid
Ronald W. Staudt
Professor of Law
Chicago-Kent College of Law
http://www.kentlaw.edu/faculty/rstaudt/

Week 6
Friday, March 16, 2012 2pm-3pm EDT
Contract Standardization
Kingsley Martin
President, kiiac.com, www.contractstandards.com/

Week 7
Friday, March 23, 2012 2pm-3pm EDT
Free Legal Research Tools
Sarah Glassmeyer
Director of Content Development / Law Librarian
CALI
http://sarahglassmeyer.com/
Twitter @sglassmeyer

Week 8
Friday, March 30, 2012 2pm-3pm EDT
Unauthorized Practice of Law in the 21st Century
William Hornsby
Staff Counsel at American Bar Association

Week 9
Friday, April 6, 2012 2pm-3pm EDT
Social Media for Lawyers
Ernest Svenson
Attorney at Law
www.ernietheattorney.net
Twitter @ernieattorney

Assembling a document from a template in Rocket Matter 2.0.

The Web-based practice management application Rocket Matter today released version 2.0 of its platform. The new version adds two notable features: document assembly and custom fields.

With this release, Rocket Matter becomes the only cloud-based practice management platform to integrate document assembly, according to Larry Port, the company’s co-founder and chief software architect.

The document assembly feature allows users to create templates for legal forms or other documents and then automatically merge client and matter data into a template to create a final document. As the user creates a document, Rocket Matter can also automatically create a billing entry.

The user creates the templates on his or her desktop, using Microsoft Word’s ability to create “merge fields.” Rocket Matter provides a guide for formatting these merge fields to work with its application. For those unfamiliar with using merge fields, Rocket Matter also provides links to guides that explain how to create and use them. As an example, to insert a client name in template, you’d use the fields: “«Client.Name»«Client.LastName»”.

Once you’ve created a template on your desktop, you upload it to Rocket Matter. As you upload it, the application checks it to ensure that you’ve properly formatted the merge fields. If there is an error, the application shows you which field contains the error. If you’ve set up all the fields properly, then the document is added to your template library, available to use for any client or matter.

Then, when you go to the dashboard for a matter within Rocket Matter, you see a new link, “Create from Template.” Click that to see a list of your available templates. Select a template and Rocket Matter automatically populates its fields with information such as party names, docket numbers, opposing counsel and the like. As it displays the final document, it shows the fields in a panel to the right. Click on any field in the panel to jump to that field in the document.

Custom Fields

With the addition of custom fields, Rocket Matter enables the user to customize these templates beyond the standard fields it already provides. Users can create an unlimited number of custom fields, both for matters and for contacts. And any custom field you create can become a merge field in a document template.

To create a custom field for a matter or contact, simply open the item. A portion of the screen is labeled “Data.” For a matter, this Data section includes the case number and county. For a contact, it includes date of birth, gender and Social Security number. Just below those data items are new horizontal columns with two headings, “Labels” and “Values.” Here is where you create a custom field. Click “add another” and simply fill in the label and value. For label, you might put “Secretary” and for value “John Jones.” You can also add custom fields when you create a new contact or matter.

As I’ve previously noted here, Rocket Matter is integrated with Dropbox, allowing you to automatically synchronize documents among Rocket Matter, your desktop and your mobile devices. More recently, the company announced its integration with Evernote. These integrations make the document assembly feature even more practical to use.

To see Rocket Matter’s Port demonstrate the new document assembly feature, view the video below.

A Preview of Rocket Matter 2.0: Document Assembly and Custom Fields from Rocket Matter on Vimeo.

A sample shown on the site

I happened across a website called MyPocketAttorney that says it will let lawyers build their own smartphone apps using templates designed for law offices and legal professionals. As of this morning, a notice on the site says, “Site Under Construction! Launch Date 1-20-2012.” Today being Jan. 20, we’ll see if it launches.

The site describes its service this way:

You can start building your app online using our custom templates. Your clients will appreciate the service as it allows them to contact you faster to access your latest promotions and services. In addition, you can make money between court cases and trips with the consulting fee pay option. You’ll also be able to retain your clients like never before with your app on their phone, respond quicker with a text, provide a monthly news letter and much more. Thus, making your business more efficient and with more clients.

Apps created through the site would let users call your office with one-touch dialing, get GPS directions to your office, and schedule appointments.

However, it seems that the developers of this site are not familiar with the rules of professional conduct that govern attorneys. They tout a feature of the app that would enable lawyers to pay users referral fees when users share the app with others. Here’s how the site describes this referral option:

“I saw a friend of mine using the app one day and got excited about having an attorney in my pocket. She referred me, received a $25 gift card for doing so, and I received a great service.” If you are an Attorney wanting to get your own mobile app for practice at a low-cost and hear your clients have a conversation like this one, sign up for a free account today.

Apart from the creepiness of the “attorney in my pocket” metaphor, this referral program strikes me as blatantly unethical for lawyers. As Roy Ginsburg wrote about referral fees just this week at AttorneyAt Work:

Most attorneys know they cannot share fees with non-lawyers. The ABA Model Rules of Professional Conduct, adopted by most states, are quite clear. Rule 5.4 (a) states that “a lawyer or law firm shall not share legal fees with a non-lawyer.” Rule 7.2 (b) states that “a lawyer shall not give anything of value to a person for recommending the lawyer’s services.” A referral fee is certainly something of value.

In fairness, MyPocketAttorney describes the referral program as optional, but it nevertheless suggests a lack of familiarity with the legal market. No wonder, given that the company already has “MyPocket” app-creation sites for some two-dozen other industries and topics, from MyPocketInsurance and MyPocketRealtor to MyPocketChurch and MyPocketFuneral.

The cost of one of these apps starts at $999 for the first year, after which you pay a monthly fee, according to information posted on the site.

According to the description, the app lets you:

• Browse editions of the Congressional Record by date, from Jan. 4, 1995, to the present.
• Perform keyword searches within individual documents or sections within documents.
• Share documents via email.
• Save documents to your preferred iPad PDF reader.
• Identify the latest bills and resolutions considered daily on the floor of the U.S. House.
• Identify the latest bills, resolutions, treaties and nominations considered daily on the floor of the U.S. Senate.

Read more about the app here.

One clever idea introduced there was iProBono, an iPhone app that allows attorneys to review and sign-up for pro bono cases. The app is being developed for the Arkansas Legal Services Partnership. The developers’ site indicates they would develop the app for other states.

The app will let Arkansas lawyers view a list of current pro bono cases, and search and filter the cases by topic, location and other parameters. Lawyers will be able to accept cases directly through the app, after which the app will show a list of their active and completed cases.

It appears the app has not yet been released, since I can’t find it in the iTunes store. The Arkansas Legal Services Partnership site describes it as “soon to be available.”

Will a pro bono app cause more lawyers to take these cases? Probably not. But it will make it easier for those who are willing. In any event, it’s a good example of how even small-scale technology innovations can help make legal services more broadly available.

The app allows users to search for an opinion by keyword, retrieve it by opinion number, or browse a list of categories such as “attorney advertising,” “concurrent representation” and “non-refundable retainer.” Results show both a digest of the opinion and its full text. It can notify you when new opinions are added.

The free app is available for iPhones, iPads, Android phones and BlackBerrys.

• Read the announcement.
• Download the ethics app.

Also nominated as MBF officers this year are:

• President: Jerry Cohen, Esq., Burns & Levinson.
• Secretary: Lawrence J. Farber, Esq., Law Office of Lawrence J. Farber.
• Treasurer: Janet E. Aserkoff, Esq., Rappaport, Aserkoff & Gelles.

The highlight of the annual meeting will be the presentation of the MBF’s Great Friend of Justice Award to U.S. District Judge William G. Young.