Kevin O’Keefe, a fellow blawger, proposed in January that lawyers have a duty to blog. Alex Barnett, a leading Microsoft blogger, agreed with Kevin’s sentiment in a recent posting to his blog (See Do lawyers have a moral oligation to blog? Yes.."). The essence of the argument is that lawyers have a moral obligation to provide public interest legal service. Kevin argues that blogging is the perfect way to fulfill this obligation, as it is a convenient way to inform and educate the public. I couldn’t agree more – and I can give you a few additional reasons to blog:
1. Blogging will Inform You. Publishing InhouseBlog has introduced me to a wealth of information that I would not ordinarily read. While I get dozens of legal publications at work, they are hard to fit into my daily work schedule. I usually cross my name off the list and drop the publication into inter-office mail. I now find out about the latest legal developments when they occur. I’m subscribed to dozens of blogs (see the blogroll in the lower right hand column of this page) through the Bloglines service. I also have moved my legal email list subscriptions to Bloglines so that I can read them there. In a half-hour each morning over a cup of coffee I am able to scan through hundreds of articles to find what interests me. This was simply not possible before the advent of blog technology.
2. Blogging will Help You with Your Job. I hope that InhouseBlog helps you perform your job more efficiently. It certainly has helped me – I’ve found a number of great links that I’ve shared through InhouseBlog. And I’ve read a number of articles that have helped me provide better legal advice to clients. In one recent case, I was able to save a client a lot of time and money on a trademark matter because I had recently read of a similar fact pattern in a blog post. This is the power of blogging.
3. Blogging is Easy. You don’t need to be a geek to blog. It’s a piece of cake. Honest. If you are patient and can use a web browser, you can have a blog up and running in no time. Did I mention that it’s inexpensive? InhouseBlog is hosted at TypePad – the annual charge is $130 or so – and this includes the ability to have many blogs.
4. People Want to Hear From You. If you know a particular area well and can express yourself in writing, people will line up to hear what you have to say. Are you the nation’s foremost authority on archery law? With a blog you can spread your knowledge to the precise people who need it. All with a few clicks of the mouse.
5. Why Not? Do you have an excuse not to blog? You can do it anywhere you can get Internet access. At your leisure. By the pool. From your cellphone. At 3:00 AM when you can’t sleep. They’re calling it the Web 2.0. Figure out why.
Enough said for now.
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Hallelujah – finally a voice of reason in the recent “blogging will only get you fired!” waves of paranoia. Yes, blogging will help you do your job more effectively for many reasons – I’d add for the in-house staff attorney, it also helps with KM and getting out of “fireman mode” (you know – putting out one fire after another) and into a place where a slightly more global and loftier perspective can be had.
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