Legal Blogging Is Part of Being a Lawyer

Legal blogging

As of Tuesday, Dave Winer, aptly described by the Guardian as the inventor of the blog, has been publishing his own blog, Scripting News, for 25 years.

Leading up to 25 years, Winer shared,

“There were times I took as much as a couple of weeks off, but I usually blogged when I was traveling. I have observations, things I want to write down, basically all the time. I don’t see the blog as work, to me it’s more like a part of living.”

I don’t see the blog as work, but more like part of living.

The same concept applies to thousands of blogging lawyers. The lawyers don’t see their blog as work, their blog is more like part of being a lawyer.

A blog, as widely defined on the web, is a “regularly updated website, typically one run by an individual or small group, that is written in an informal or conversational style.“

Winer sees a key element of a blog being the unedited voice of a person.

Blogs were originally called weblogs. The reason being that those maintaining a weblog were logging their reading and observations from the web along with their comments and take on what they read.

What better way than blogging for a lawyer to share their observations and take on what they are reading and observing in their niche.

Seems superior to post-it notes stuck to pages of magazines, journals and CLE outlines laying on one’s credenza. Post-it notes and the credenza may have been replaced by computer and net storage, but their value to a lawyer is close to the same.

Enabling peers, clients and potential clients to see your observations and analysis enables greater learning through engagement and establishes a lawyer’s learning, analytical skill, care and expertise.

In the world of “content marketing,” SEO and web traffic, legal blogging may not be part of being a lawyer. Rather than reading, observations and a brief take, something close to an an article, good or bad, is supposedly needed.

Sure, lawyers may enjoy longer posts and find them rewarding, but legal blogging can be part of being a lawyer, as opposed to hard work.

Comments

LexBlog Con Can Provide Legal Companies and Law Firms an Opportunity to Connect With Influencers

Imagine a “LexBlog Con” where leading legal brands from startups to traditional larger players to law firms are offered the opportunity to connect with legal bloggers. After all, legal bloggers are quickly supplanting reporters and traditional media as the influencers of our legal community. From a blogger attendee, today, at BlogHer19 in Brooklyn. Day 1 of @BlogHer was wonderful. So many amazing brands to connect with #blogher19 #blogherpro #blogherlife #blogherstyle #blogherhealth19 #womenslifestyle #lifestyleblogger #lifestyleblog pic.twitter.com/IIcVrg9apz — Mademoiselle Skinner (@guestlistblog) September 18, 2019 There may not be a better way for legal industry companies to connect with the biggest influencers in legal than a conference of legal bloggers, ala LexBlog Con. LexBlog Con could start as simple as BlogHer did years ago and, as we had discussed for this last year, as a larger meetup of legal bloggers for a day of blogger education and networking. But ...

Job security is a myth for lawyers without a personal brand

I talked with a highly respected legal professional last Friday who was recently let go by his law firm. He had been employed by the firm for four or five years and employed by similar large law firms for a couple decades before. A couple weeks ago I heard of veteran lawyer who joined a large firm with a major client, but whose employment status was now at risk with the general counsel’s leaving his client. These stories pale in comparison to all of the lawyers who have been the victim of downsizing caused by the collapse or merger of their law firms. With the changes in the legal services market, very few lawyers have job (or stable income) security writes Dan Lear, Director of Industry Relations at Avvo. Lawyers need to build a strong brand or a business, and to do so now, Per Lear, the job security once held by law firm partners and in-house counsel who had reached the the ranks of Assistant General Counsel or Deputy General Counsel is gone. There’s the former gener...

Election Coverage Now Comes From Blogs

Election coverage now comes from blogs. Whether they be blogs run by the mainstream media, blogs that have the status of mainsteam media, such as FiveThirtyEight , blogs published by legal commenators, or citizen bloggers, blogs dominate election coverage. In addition, what Americans read on social media is often a report originally published on a blog. This was not the case not that long ago. Sixteen years ago, the Boston Globe’s Teresa Hanafin , reporting from. the Democratic National Convention shared the following: They don’t have space in the media pavilion, and are forced to pay exorbitant prices for lunch at the press café – unless they are willing to wait in long lines at McDonald’s in the FleetCenter or bring their own food. The crowded workspace they do have is in the rafters of the convention hall, which they would be sharing with pigeons if this were the old Boston Garden. Who are they? They are bloggers: Those who write weblogs, online journals of sorts with regu...

Michael Ferguson

Search This Blog