A Little Ranting

No. Just Don’t Do. No Googles or Amazons or Siris in A Law Office.

No.

Absolutely not.

Do not do it.

I can’t say it any clearer.

The answer is no.

Don’t do it.

What am I talking about is having Alexa or Google or Siri or any other similar object in your law office.

One attorney I know recently mentioned that it’s very handy to have a Google in his office and that he keeps it there and uses it all the time.… Read the rest

Please, please, please LEARN TO USE EMAIL, Pretty Please

Can we all agree that email has been around for a while? And so has the horrid Reply to All feature. And so has the ability of businesses to just turn off email boxes of employees and not monitor who might be contacting the departed.  Have we learned nothing in all the years email has been a part of our lives?… Read the rest

Really? Software Ignorance Hits a New Low!

Really?

How dumb are they?

I can’t say what I’m thinking, I’m in public.

So after you copy and paste it back to word can you print to pdf again and then copy and paste it back to word? HAHA!

These are real quotes, all in response to the Pa. Bureau of Workers’ Compensation’s latest “Tip of the Month – Copying and Pasting from PDF to Word Document,” an email whose number one piece of advice is so wrong and so… this is mixed company so I won’t say.… Read the rest

Technological Incompetence – It’s Scary

Last night I lectured to the Barbieri Inn of Court – a specialty group of lawyers in the Philadelphia area who primarily handle workers’ compensation cases – about the requirement that lawyers be technologically competent. I discussed everything from cellphone security to ransomware.

But today I realized that for some lawyers the bar for technological competence is much, much lower, perhaps below ground level.… Read the rest

No wonder people hate computers – and dread tech support

People know that I love technology, and use it every chance I get, but sometimes I run into circumstances when something happens and I understand the frustration. That happened to me recently. Oh, and by the way, I later learned that the problem that the support line couldn’t fix was really my fault because I should have known what the company’s trained (?)… Read the rest

Windows 7 – Part II – The Good & Atrocious of Customer Service – Dell

Upgrading to Windows 7 can be an adventure if any of your hardware or software has any incompatibility. It’s worse, however, if you order a new computer and it arrives unbeknownst to you with a bad/corrupted installation of Windows 7. Mine did. Windows 7 Ultimate began as Windows 7 “the pits.”

So what did I do? I trudged ahead, using repairs, trying to make things work.… Read the rest

Ahh, the No Asshole Rule

A few years ago, I reviewed a book, The No Asshole Rule, for The Philadelphia Lawyer, the Philadelphia Bar Association magazine. Written by Robert Sutton, a Professor of Management Science and Engineering at Stanford University, the premise of the book is that no business should hire, tolerate or perpetuate the employment of “certified assholes,” people who are assholes all the time.… Read the rest

I Love Microsoft Outlook – I Hate Microsoft Outlook

It’s everywhere – not quite Chicken Man (for those old enough to remember) – but Microsoft Outlook is used, it seems, in virtually every law office — and the 2007 Version is excellent. The small tweaks Microsoft made really helped improve the product overall (even though some actions remain counterintuitive). I recommend clients upgrade to it, especially any clients who are using Outlook 2000 or (yes) earlier versions.… Read the rest

PC Magazine – RIP

It was with sadness that I read the latest issue of PC Magazine. One of the oldest technology magazine, PC Mag had been reinventing itself for some time. From now on, the magazine announced, it will only be available online/electronically, with no more printed issues.

Surprisingly, despite my love of “less paper,” I will miss the paper magazine, and am not an afficianado of electronic-only publications.… Read the rest

Travel Tips — And My Kindle

I recently traveled to Los Angeles to give my presentation, “How to Do 90 Minutes of Work in 60,” in conjunction with the meeting of the National Association of Bar Executives and the American Bar Association Midyear Meeting. The presentation went well, but I learned some lessons on my way to LA. Among them: Bring a paper clip and a book.… Read the rest