Google + AOL = What for the Law?
December 20, 2005 | Filed Under Law 2.0, General
Over the last two weeks, some thoughts on West and Lexis/Nexis possibly declining and Google apparently ascendent.
The great thing about technology is that nothing stays still for long.
The business world is all agog over Google’s proposed $1 billion investment in the AOL unit of Times Warner. Press reports, such as this one from the New York Times, note that a novel part of this pending deal is AOL’s ability to put graphical images on Google search results (both its own and those of other interested advertisers).
I’ll leave it for tech and finance experts to explain this deal. I initially thought it was intended to get Carl Icahn off the back of Times Warner CEO Richard Parsons. Apparently not. John Battelle thinks this deal may be a precursor to an AOL IPO.
If I was at eBay and in the process of digesting Skype, I might pay a bit of attention to Google/AOL. Why not integrate Google Talk with AOL’s IM application for a fast ramp up of a rival to Skype? Google has just opened up Talk to third party developers.
But heading back to the law, it would seem that a deal with AOL is all about the business-to-consumer market, and Google home page search results may get clogged up more with ads, sponsors and graphics. Which is why I see Google/AOL as a further sign that over time that Google will “go vertical” and expand into discrete markets such as the law.
This development may provide an opportunity for West or Lexis/Nexis to sharpen their legal search market positioning while Google is focused on AOL. If I were them I’d do at least three things right now. Like today.
What are they? I ain’t tellin’. Yet.
P.S. Happy Birthday to The Wired GC. One year ago today, a launch to no fanfare and 3 hits. Now I have about 13.
Thanks to all readers and the law.com network (with its stellar editor). A special tip of the cap to those who provided feedback.
What was interesting as I looked back on this first post, is that it included “offshoring” and “disintermediation.” Foreshadowing?
Blawg Review #37
December 18, 2005 | Filed Under In the News, General
First some music to set the mood (right click; open in new window):
That’s more like it.
And now, with apologies to Clement Clarke Moore (and
the RIAA):
************
‘Twas the Blawg Review before Christmas,
with no clicking of mouse,
Not a blawger was stirring, not even Althouse.
The banners were placed by the text box with care,
In hopes that ad revenue soon would be there.
The associates now expect their bonus to thrill,
Their visions of partnership still impel them to bill.
And Harriet in pumps, and Sam in his cap,
Had just settled in for a nomination flap.
[…]
With an Infamous old driver, too erudite to mock,
I knew in a moment it must be Volokh.
More rapid than eagles his cursors they came,
And Kerr notes the NSA can call them by name!
“Now Bashman! now, Reynolds! now, Bainbridge and Ribstein!
On, MacEwen! On, Howell! On Lamb and on Svenson!
To the top of the rankings! to the top of the law!
Now blog away! blog away! blog away all!”
As dry tobacco leaves that before the verdict take flight,
after an appellate victory do you roll over and light?
So up to the house-top the Blog Awards then flew,
A Law Dork done won it; wait for next week now, too.
And then, in a twinkling, I awoke from my siesta,
To the prancing and pawing of a Patent Barista.
As I drew in my head, and was turning around,
when suddenly TypePad crashed into the ground.
Prof. Solove was writing, an observer with heft,
With blogging copyright would there be any copy left?
Ask Dennis about this, he’s taken aback,
For sploggers RSS is their own form of crack.
[…]
He was chubby and plump, not like my friend Rees,
who hasn’t accounted for blogging GCs!
A wink of his eye and with nary a knock,
He gave Lexis and Nexis a turn back of the clock.
He spoke not a word, but went straight to the Matt,
And filled all the stockings, proving the world is flat.
As gifts were removed, he kept a countin’,
Tom says the sleigh may now clear Brokeback Mountain!
He called to his team to start the long trip home,
A true classic holiday post comes from one Giacalone.
But I winced as he forgot to separate the church from the state,
“Happy Christmas to all, the First Amendment is great!”
***********
To all readers, human and otherwise:
Blawg Review has information about next week’s host, and instructions how to get your blawg posts reviewed in upcoming issues.
Wired GC — Unplugged: Show #4
December 16, 2005 | Filed Under Unplugged - Audio, Technology, New Services
“Trusted Neutrality Driving Improved Business Legal Services”
An interview with Forrest Morgan, Vice President and General Counsel, the Law Department Purchasing Consortium.
Today’s show is here (just click on the “mp3″ link):
mp3 (9:56 min; 4.5 mb)
Show Notes:
– Law Department Purchasing Consortium is here.
– Forrest Morgan bio.
– Some of the Consortium’s technical tools.
– Consortium Advisory Board.
The Strategic Value of Legal
December 15, 2005 | Filed Under Tactics, Organization
The corporate legal department as a strategic weapon?
Harvard Business School Professor Constance Bagley thinks so. In a recent interview in HBS Working Knowledge, Professor Bagley argues that companies should proactively use the law, and by extension, their in-house lawyers.
Professor Bagley’s interview coincides with her recently published book, “Winning Legally: How Managers Can Use the Law to Create Value, Marshal Resources, and Manage Risk.”
The Professor notes that management, up to the CEO, needs to understand the legal dimensions of operating the modern business. In addition, she has some thoughts on the lawyer’s role as well:
“Lawyers advising firms or acting as in-house counsel need to learn enough about the general practice of management that they can communicate effectively with the management team. A lawyer who can’t read an income statement or understand the rudiments of strategy is far less able to help the non-lawyers on the team consider alternate goals or ways of achieving them.
“Our law schools need to do more in this area by offering courses in accounting, internal controls, and strategy. They are as important for a business lawyer as courses in civil procedure and evidence are to litigators. Practicing lawyers need to read the business press more widely and take advantage of executive education opportunities to increase their business acumen.”
I find Professor Bagley’s comments about law schools in this context particularly noteworthy. The Professor is in the minority of law professors in that she has experience in a corporate private practice (with the law firm Bingham McCutchen). Most law schools have nothing like a “corporate practice” class akin to trial practice or moot court.
The entire interview is definitely worth a close reading. I’m going issue a rev. 2.0 of my list for Santa to include Professor Bagley’s book (that move may bump this from the list–darn).
Any effective use of law as a strategic weapon would require alignment between in-house and outside counsel. Doing this effectively under the reigning billable hour model is a perennial challenge for today’s general counsel. Tomorrow, an interview with a leader behind a new initiative that applies technology to this challenge in an innovative and cost-effective manner when the Wired GC again goes…
IP and Sarbanes-Oxley
December 14, 2005 | Filed Under Technology, Regulation, Compliance
Intellectual property is yet another area caught in the SOx net.
In an article at the Sarbanes-Oxley Compliance Journal website, Hogan & Hartson partner Kenneth Hautman describes some of the issues that arise when examining the controls surrounding how a company maintains its IP portfolio. While the method described by Mr. Hautman is directly applicable to SEC registrants, it also forms a best practices checklist that is helpful to all companies with material IP assets.
Here are Mr. Hautman’s five steps:
Step 1 – Inventory Intellectual Property Assets
Step 2 – Determine the Value of Each IP Asset
Step 3 - Establish an IP Protection Plan
Step 4 – Implement the Plan and Audit/Monitor Compliance
Step 5 – Establish Internal Procedures to Ensure Material Changes to IP Assets Materially Affecting Financial Performance are Reported
Mr. Hautman’s conclusion is familiar to any attorney seeking to comply with regulations before they have been adequately explained by an agency or extensively interpreted by the courts:
“… [I]n the absence of any clear direction from the Act, the courts or the SEC, the prudent course for a public company to follow is to adopt IP “best practices,” including implementation of adequate disclosure controls and procedures, and assume reporting responsibility to the company’s management regarding material changes in the value or other features of IP Assets that could materially affect the company’s business and financial performance.”
Outside the regulatory arena, IP issues can also arise when certain employees are terminated. Attorney Caroline Horton Rockafellow describes some of these issues here in IPFrontline.
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