Law And Tablets

Why Does Electronic Discovery Cost So Much?

2008-09-04T14:05:00.002-05:00

When business managers get the bill for electronic discovery costs, they almost always ask, "why does this cost so much?" I believe the secret to understanding the cost lies in understanding how we got here. Let's use a library analogy, libraries as they existed before the introduction of computers.

Before computers, libraries were effective because of librarians. The librarians performed two important functions that kept the library running. First, they kept the card catalog current and accurate. Second, they made sure the books were returned to the proper physical location in the shelving system. Companies once stored business records like a library stored books. Clerks and secretaries kept lists of files that worked like card catalogs. They were also responsible for seeing that the files and records were returned to their proper location.

Enter the personal computer. With computers, it was possible for anyone in the organization to create and add large amounts of data to the repository without updating the card catalog or adhering to a standardized physical storage scheme. Imagine trying to use your college library if every student and staff member on campus could create books at will and just toss them anywhere in the library. As companies expanded the availability and use of computers to the entire employee population, they made cost reductions by eliminating the positions that once had responsibility for maintaining the integrity of manual file indexes and storage schemes.

We now have an exponentially larger and rapidly expanding volume of information, virtually unlimited storage, and few requirements for welding documents or e-mail to any intelligence about their origin, purpose or life cycle. Moreover, these data objects are most often stored without regard to any particular scheme or strategy for retrieving them. Rather than spend some incremental dollars in labor and technology to identify and organize information as it goes into these repositories, business has chosen to spend much larger amounts of money to find the needle in the haystack after the fact.

Case Studies and Testimonials

2006-12-21T20:11:00.000-05:00

Are you considering a Tablet PC? I thought it might help you to see how other lawyers and judges feel about Tablets. Below is a list of case studies and testimonials I have gathered across the Net:

---Tablet PCs used by court personnel.
---Testimonial from a judge.
---International Law Firm Weil Gotshal's implementation.
---A day in the life of an attorney with a Tablet PC.
---The Greatest American Lawyer's testimonial (thats the name of the blog)
---One from Toshiba.
---Law Schools and Law Reviews.

If peer tech envy doesn't get you, remember our clients. Our clients are using Tablet PCs at a rapidly increasing pace. Here is a long list of case studies by industry.

The fact that our clients use tablets means two things. First, they understand the productivity and will eventually expect us to understand it too. Second, to the extent it impacts where their documents and records are found, it creates a new place to look for data and a new type of data (digital ink) we need to search for in discovery.

Wielding the Red Pen

2006-12-17T15:05:00.000-05:00

One of the great productivity advantages to the Tablet PC platform is the ability to edit documents on screen. This is true whether you email your notes to others to implement your corrections, or make your own corrections. I want to point out a few great tools in this area.

Keeping Associates and Secretaries Busy
If you have the luxury of sending work to associates and/or secretaries to make your changes, you have several options depending on how you receive documents.

Documents that come to you in Microsoft Word are easy to handle. Word 2003 allows you to ink directly on the page. I suggest first going to the View menu and selecting Print View. Word 2003 gives you a Reading View option, but that does not always align the ink with the text for others who subsequently view the document. If your document opens in Reading View, just click Close in the toolbar.

To begin inking a Word document, either turn on the Ink Annotations Toolbar (View menu, Toolbars item, select Ink Annotations) or the Insert menu, Ink Annotations item. Click on the red pen icon, adjust the size and color of the pen, and you are marking up your documents. Save the document with your changes and email to whichever lucky person makes your changes.

If you get your documents as PDF files, Adobe Acrobat is just not pen friendly enough to use alone. You do have a couple of options. I prefer Grahl Software's PDF Annotator. Another option is Bluebeam PDF Revue. Both these apps allow you to open a PDF file, and write on it like you would a sheet of paper. Saving the PDF puts your ink on the page just like you wrote it, scanned and emailed it back to the sender. This is especially helpful in negotiations when you do not control the original source document and the author won't send it to you in a file you can easily edit.

These apps also support a highlighter type ink stroke. It is a powerful way to annotate documents you plan to use in depositions or negotiations.

Are You Your Own Word Processing Department?
Ink functionality is great, but not well suited to creating large passages of text from scratch. You're still better off on the keyboard. When you need to make a relatively small number of changes in a Word document, you can do it with just the pen and the built-in Tablet Input Panel (TIP), the small keyboard or writing line that pops up when you hover your pen above a text input area on the screen.

The better option is Jumping Minds Software's InkGestures. It allows you to use traditional editing strokes to capitalize, select, delete and insert text with your pen. Take a look at the demo on their site. It makes immediate sense. It takes a little practice to get used to making the gestures, but it is well worth the effort. When I am sitting on a plane or in a meeting, I always win converts to the Tablet PC platform when they see it work. It is also a great tool when you are in a negotiation that is very close to being complete but need a few slight changes.

Send your law office Tablet PC experiences, practices, and tips to tabletpc (at) tpbishop (dot) com to be included in future articles. Products and vendors mentioned here are or may be the copyrighted property of their respective owners. No endorsement or warranty is given or implied in connection with the discussion of particular products or vendors.

Tablet PCs and Forms

2006-12-02T16:41:00.000-05:00

“Forms more real than living man,
Nurslings of immortality!”
Prometheus Unbound, Act I
Percy Shelley
Forms are a fact of life for lawyers. Shelves in every law library sag under the burden of form books. Rooms stacked with towers of drawers spill folders filled with forms. A lawyer who figures out a complex process turns the work into a form just as Henry Ford turned repetitious patterns into modern production lines. I won’t mention doctors, hospitals, insurance companies, governments, or the Internal Revenue Service all of which blame their forms on us lawyers.

Tablet PCs create a tremendous advantage for the form dependent practitioner in two immediate ways. First, you can store thousands of forms in a device about the same size as a couple of legal pads. How many different forms do you fill out in your practice? Do you always have the right form with you? Who makes your copies? How do you handle forms when you are out of the office? Second, imagine having all your forms with you at all times. Imagine filling out forms and sending them instantly and electronically without printers, copiers, fax machines, and without buying paper, toner, ink cartridges, postage or paying overnight delivery services. Imagine carrying all those filled out forms with you on the road in the same package already in your hands. You can’t get these exponential efficiencies in labor, equipment and supplies with your current paper legal pad and Bic pen.

“I’m against vice in all forms.”
Sen. John F. Kennedy, D. Ma., 1960
There are several good solutions that help a Tablet PC meet your form needs. Getting the right solution requires that you understand how you and your office staff use forms. Ask yourself this question: Are most of my office forms (a) just copied and filed or (b) used as the source for records typed into databases? I’ll refer to type (a) as “Presentation Forms” and type (b) as “Data Forms.”

Presentation Forms need the particular layout and boxes of the paper form to appear on the screen; they do not require any innate intelligence in the form itself. Windows Journal, which ships with all Tablet PCs, is a ready tool for such forms. Take your paper form and scan it. Then print the image from the scan using the Journal Note Writer printer driver, also installed on your Tablet PC. When Journal opens with the document you just printed, click on File, Save As, and in the drop down list at the bottom of the dialog choose Journal Template (*.jtp). Close the document and click File, New Note From Template. The document is now the background for the notes you take. You can accomplish the same effect using Microsoft OneNote. I highly recommend OneNote 2003 (with Service Pack 1, or SP1)and 2007 for lawyers.

Data Forms are about providing information to software systems. In order to eliminate or minimize the step of re-keying hand-written data, intelligent forms on the Tablet PC can convert the handwriting into text or databases on the fly. Forms of this type have to be created and linked to the databases they feed. There are several good packages that accomplish this. I will not attempt to present an exhaustive list, and the mechanics of the programming are beyond the scope of this article. I will point out a couple of packages just to get you going. Active Ink Software is a good example of this technology; the demo that appears on their website should get you thinking about how you could turn ink into data records. Omniform is another package that combines scanning and intelligent form creation. Omniform makes it equally possible for your office staff to use the keyboards to fill in forms.

“The time will come when the evil forms we have known can no more be organized.”
Ralph Waldo Emerson
The health care industry moved into tablets in a big way early on. Several solution providers now offer front and back office tablet systems including patient charts, prescription preparation and other similar capabilities. Patients fill out their own office intake data that is downloaded to the office computers. The nurses and practitioners check boxes and fill in forms on Tablet PCs that push the data into the patient’s record without further transcription. I am told a number of insurance companies and police departments deploy tablets with field investigators.

Legal solution providers are still developing. One early vendor of customized legal solutions is www.AbletFactory.com. Their Legal Toolkit shows how a client database can be linked to forms and presented in OneNote. Their Real Estate Toolkit is also of interest to attorneys in that field. Several websites maintain lists of Tablet PC capable software; I frequently use www.TabletPCPost.com. If you know of any legal solution providers, please send me an email so I can follow up for future articles.

Send your law office Tablet PC experiences, practices, and tips to tabletpc (at) tpbishop (dot) com to be included in future articles. Products and vendors mentioned here are or may be the copyrighted property of their respective owners. No endorsement or warranty is given or implied in connection with the discussion of particular products or vendors.

How To Choose (3)

2006-11-27T19:29:00.000-05:00

This post is third and final in a series about picking the right equipment. If you haven't already, please see How To Choose Between Tablet PCs or UMPCs , and How to Choose (2) .

If you are a number 1, your tablet is your desktop substitute. You are mostly indifferent to size and weight and want a built-in keyboard and cd/dvd drive. Battery life is also lower on your list because you're never far from an outlet for long. You need a convertible. The 14 inch screen models are nice and weigh in between 6 and 8 pounds. The 12.1 inch screen models weigh in between 4 and 5 pounds. Pick based on performance.

Number 2s don't need to replicate a desktop. Since you can type at your desk if you need to, you are in a great situation to use either a slate or a UMPC. For you, weight and size are a major factor. You can pick between devices based on how much screen real estate you need. Moving around your building on WiFi is a great experience.

The lower row (3s and 4s) are especially sensitive to battery life. You should either pick your unit based on battery life, or go ahead and buy a second (and maybe a third) battery.

3s should focus 12.1 inch convertibles or slates. You are sensitive to weight but also need certain performance levels. This is a tipping point. I would choose between convertibles and slates based on how you work. Do you (a) frequently need to create large documents for yourself or others from scratch; or (b) usually edit and comment on documents created by others? If you answered (a), you need the convertible. Ink is great, but it can take a while to create a long document from ink. If you answered (b) you should look at the slates. Ink is superb for editing. Applications allow you to mark on an electronic document just like you would paper and then email the results.

If you are a number 4, you don't have to duplicate the full power of a desktop. Weight and size are a close second to battery life. Again, what you work on while travelling can help you choose. If you use your device on the road for web surfing, light email and simple note-taking, look at the UMPCs. Heavier editing, complex notes and research probably needs a slate. The smaller touch-screens (e.g. the new Fujitsu P1610) is also a good option for 4s that need to type a lot on the road.

You'll love giving presentations and inking on your slides for the jury for emphasis. They'll think you've got a John Madden telestrator. It is also great to be in a deposition with indexed and searcheable images of all your relevant documents in a 3 to 5 pound package instead of shuffling 20 buckets of folders in a 30 pound litigation case.

I'm a 4. I am extremely tempted by the UMPCs, but the applications I use on the road need more screen real estate. That's why I travel with a slate. Still, I can resist anything but temptation. Time will tell.

How to Choose (2)

2006-11-26T15:33:00.000-05:00

(Disclaimer: Unless otherwise indicated, my statements about hardware are generalized observations. Specs vary widely among manufacturers and devices. I have no relationship to any vendor or manufacturer. Your mileage may vary.)

Once you've defined where and how you would use a Tablet (see the previous post), you need to understand the strengths and trade-offs of the available devices. For purposes of this article, I'll cover convertibles, slates, and UMPCs. For a more extensive discussion of convertibles v. slates, see my article at TabletWiki.com http://tabletwiki.com/TabletWiki/index.php?title=Getting_Started:_Choosing_A_Slate_or_Convertible .

In order to have a common frame of reference, I'll use three comparison points: performance specs (including processor speed, RAM, HDD speed, graphics), weight/size (including size of screen, integrated optical disc drive), and battery life.

As a general rule, convertibles will have higher performance specs. They are made with fewer compromises to meet weight/size goals. Their weight/size varies widely with screen sizes from up to 14 inches, down to 10 inches. Bigger screens mean heavier weights. Battery life also varies from as little as 1.5 hours up to 4 on models with a single battery.

Slates will be better in the weight/size category. They are more likely to be middle of the road on performance. The design is intended to manage heat and battery life challenges. Most are 12.1 or 10 inch screens. Battery life runs 3 to 4 hours, Electrovaya's Scribbler being the standout at over 5 hours.

UMPCs are hands down the best in the weight/size category. All models offered at the moment are 7 inch screens. To put that screen size in context, it's about the size of most of those portable DVD players. They are also middle of the road on performance, but many are comparable in performance specs to the current slates. This will be less true as I expect the slate manufacturers to refresh their lines with Core Duo processors beginning Q1 2007. Also, UMPCs use passive digitizers. Passive digitizers are touch-screen devices; you can use your finger to tap buttons, etc. This can be a challenge depending on how you write. The standard stylus is thinner (think a Palm Pilot, Pocket PC or Treo stylus), and some models have problems filtering out the pressure of your hand on the screen. Battery life is a real challenge for the current generation; most get less than 2 hours.

The two most important things you can look for to improve the performance of your device are RAM and HDD speed. You can get by with 512MB of RAM, but the improvement is significant with 1GB. (I think for Vista those numbers may be 1 and 2 GB, but that is another article.) Most standard hard drive offerings are 4500RPM speed. You would be amazed at how much more quickly your device boots up with a 5400RPM HDD, and blown away by the 7200RPM. The additional RAM and faster HDDs (when available) run up the price, but are often worth the price.

Next, we'll match the devices and trade-offs to your useage quadrant from the previous post.

How To Choose Between Tablet PCs or UMPCs

2006-11-25T14:26:00.000-05:00

I believe the trick to finding the right machine is thinking through where and how you plan to use it. The diagram at the right is a very basic quadrant diagram that asks you to decide where you usually work, and whether your Tablet is your primary computing device.

Answer those two questions, and you'll be in one of the four boxes. I'll use the numbers in the grid as reference points for discussing the trade-offs in the next several posts.

By the way, I consider "at the courthouse" to be "on the road."

Law & Tablets: Back to the Future with Ink

2006-11-24T17:10:00.000-05:00

This article is second in a series exploring the opportunities the Tablet PC platform brings to the practice of law. Previously, we covered how the evolution of legal practice followed the evolution of writing and writing tools through the growing dominance of word processors, PCs and laptops.

Why is ink still relevant?
While typing is an extremely efficient means of turning large passages of text into digital files for formatting, reproduction and distribution, there are important forms of text and information that keyboards can’t create. These include signatures, diagrams, diaries, handwritten notes (including abbreviations) and anything created by someone who can’t type.

Handwritten notes made in margins, taken during interviews or trials are an important part of an attorney’s work product. Arrows, lines, circles and stars applied on top of text convey a great deal of emphasis and insight that is beyond the bandwidth of text. Many law review editors still handwrite proofreading corrections on galleys before the book is released for printing. Connecting these types of data to PCs was challenging. The scanner helped, but you can’t OCR a drawing or highlighting strokes.

Another trip to the (ink)well.*
Several attempts were made to keep handwriting viable as a data entry method before the Tablet PC arrived.** None reached critical mass. Ergonomically, PCs and laptops aren’t oriented in the workplace to receive handwriting. The problem continued to be combining a form factor suitable for writing with highly portable hardware sufficiently powerful to drive software capable of recognizing handwriting.

The Newton may have arrived too early in the life cycle of personal computing. It was highly portable, but was challenged for horsepower and in communicating with existing file formats and applications on PCs. Palm deserves credit for demonstrating that a large group of mobile professionals would use the equivalent of ink strokes to enter data. The resulting PDA revolution signaled that physical diaries, calendars and loose leaf organizer systems – all largely kept in ink – could be improved with digital technology.

Right sizing.
As efficiently as the right PDA handles contacts, reminders and to dos, it still doesn’t handle large documents well. Psychologically, a pocket sized device is very different from the paradigm of a sheet of paper. Try to review a 150 page volume (what lawyers call a “brief”) on a PDA. Now try and provide meaningful comments including page, paragraph and line numbers. I have. It isn’t pretty. Enter the Tablet PC.

The footprint of most Tablet PCs is roughly that of a legal pad in a nice leather folio. For the same space, an attorney can carry the equivalent of tens of thousands of pages of handwritten notes and reams of documents without boxes and hand trucks. It is on the same OS as your desktop, your secretary’s desktop, and that of most of your colleagues in the profession. Documents and spreadsheets don’t have to be converted to strange formats and back. You can even send your notes as PDF files.

Using ink as an input method for the same applications as traditional PCs allows the Tablet PC to bridge the gap between traditional handwritten processes and digital data. Tablet PC’s are the beginning of the best of both worlds: 2000 AD digital efficiency and 2,100 BC simplicity.

Send your law office Tablet PC experiences, practices, and tips to tabletpc (at) tpbishop (dot) com to be included in future articles.

*With apologies to Sawyer Brown.

** Some of these included the Newton, PenWindows, the Clie, the CrossPad. (All items mentioned have been and may be trademarks of various companies and individuals.)

Law & Tablets: The Investigation So Far . . .

2006-11-22T16:24:00.000-05:00

This article is first in a series exploring the opportunities the Tablet PC platform brings to the practice of law. Many of the profession’s habits result from the inherent limitations of our legacy tools and the length of time we’ve been using those tools. It will be helpful to start with a brief overview of those tools.

The historical development and expansion of formal legal systems closely follows the development of writing in human societies. Stone, clay, papyrus and bark all served as early media for recording legal matters. Exodus makes Moses the first to use tablets for the law.
Scholars estimate that mankind began writing some 6,000 years ago and that ink appeared about 4,000 years ago. Quill pens came into use during the Roman Empire, probably around the fifth century A.D. Steel tipped pens appeared after the year 1800, and the fountain pen followed later that century.*

Ink applied by pen remained the principal data recording method for almost 20 centuries. Thanks to Gutenberg, printing presses eventually provided forms and bound pads of paper. While these additional tools provided more places to write less, the basic requirement of applying pen and ink to paper went unchanged.

That opportunity came with development of the typewriter in the early 20th century. Most lawyers continued writing by hand leaving the task of keying to what was then perceived as lesser skilled labor: the typist. Oral dictation to stenographers and even dictaphone recordings (beginning circa 1950) were reduced to handwriting or shorthand before being typed.

By the 1970’s, a combination of dictation equipment, typewriters, “mag cards” and word processors became common law office equipment. That began to change the manner in which most legal documents and records were created. The keyboard created most legal documents by the late 80’s. Despite their pervasive presence, keyboards still haven’t replaced pen and paper completely. A lawyer’s most personal impressions and analyses including interview notes, research and outlines continue to fill stacks of legal pads and folders.

The appearance of the PC divided lawyers into two groups: Those who typed for themselves and those who did not.** Even for those who typed, the PC captured only a fraction of their data. Most interviews don’t take place with the lawyer behind his desk. Laptops never worked well in interviews either; the social interaction suffered. The screen between the attorney and the interviewee acts as “barrier” resembling half a game of battleship.

For the non-typists, the technology revolution did little to reduce their dependence on support staff. The keyboard literate lawyer spent even more time transcribing notes from legal pads to computer files; one foot in each world. Enter the Tablet PC.

Next time: Back to the Future with Ink.

Send your law office Tablet PC experiences, practices, and tips to tabletpc (at) tpbishop (dot) com to be included in future articles.

*Forty Centuries of Ink, David N. Carvalho, 1999, http://www.worldwideschool.org/library/books/tech/printing/FortyCenturiesofInk/toc.html

**The Blackberry from Research in Motion and other small scale PDA’s with keyboards have subdivided this second group into those who type on Blackberries only, and those who type on nothing at all.