Tag: Technology

2018 LMA Tech West Conference

Registration is open for the 2018 LMA Tech West Conference on January 31 –February 1, 2018 at the Hotel Nikko. This premier marketing technology educational event will bring together more than 300 marketing and business development professionals from across the country for a day and a half of innovative programming and networking.

Through a variety of session formats, including hands-on workshops, roundtable discussions, TED Talks and panel presentations, LMA Tech West is where some of the most innovative thinkers in our industry provide examples, inspiration and takeaways that attendees of all levels can apply to the challenges and opportunities we face in our roles, in our organizations and in the industry.

 

Keynote Speaker – Scott Brinker

We are very excited to have Scott Brinker as the keynote speaker for the 2018 LMATech West conference. Scott is an expert on marketing technology and how it is changing marketing strategy, management and culture. He is the editor of the Chief Marketing Technologist Blog and the author of Hacking Marketing: Agile Practices to Make Marketing Smarter, Faster, and More Innovative, which aims to help marketers at all levels — even those with no technical background or inclination — adapt marketing management to the wild and wonderful whirlwind of a world now dominated by software. Learn more about Scott.

Baker-Polito Administration Awards $3.7 Million in Grants for Clean Energy Technology

On November 1, the Baker-Polito Administration awarded $3.7 million in grants to increase the adoption of cost-saving clean energy technologies by Massachusetts low-income residents as part of the Commonwealth’s Affordable Clean Residential Energy Program (ACRE).

Launched in April of this year, the ACRE program evolved out of the Administration’s $15 million Affordable Access to Clean and Efficient Energy (AACEE) Initiative, which focuses on coordinating the agencies that serve the energy and housing needs of Massachusetts’ low- and moderate-income residents. The Initiative’s goal is to increase the number of renewable technologies employed by low-income, single-family homes throughout the Commonwealth. To that end, an AACEE working group published a report last year highlighting recommendations to address barriers to clean energy investment by the state’s low-income residents. These recommendations, which included maximizing clean energy market growth in the low-income housing community and structuring clean energy incentives to better serve low-income residents, have served as a guidepost for the Initiative and its suite of programs.

Through ACRE, the Massachusetts Clean Energy Center (MassCEC) is awarding $2 million to Action for Boston Community Development (ABCD), a non-profit human services organization helping low-income residents in the greater Boston region transition from poverty to stability. ABCD will assist in the installation of air-source heat pumps and solar photovoltaic systems, weatherization, and energy efficient lighting as well as appliance replacement for qualifying single-family homes with reported incomes below 60 percent of the State Median Income.

Energy Futures Group, an expert consulting services organization focused on the design and evaluation of energy efficiency and renewable energy programs, will receive the remaining $1.7 million of the Administration’s funding and will focus their efforts on Western Massachusetts residents living below 80 percent of the State Median Income.

The ACRE program will give low-income homeowners access to renewable technologies, allowing these households to reduce energy costs without out-of-pocket investment. In addition to helping mitigate greenhouse gas emissions, the expanded use of energy efficient appliances benefits all Massachusetts’ ratepayers. By increasing the affordability and accessibility of these technologies, Massachusetts continues to affirm its role as a leader in clean energy generation and the fight against climate change.

This post was written by Sahir Surmeli of Mintz, Levin, Cohn, Ferris, Glovsky and Popeo, P.C. All Rights Reserved.,©1994-2017
For more Environmental & Energy legal analysis, go to The National Law Review 

Telemedicine – Are There Increased Risks With Virtual Doctor Visits?

“Telemedicine” or “Telehealth” are the terms most often used when referring to clinical diagnosis and monitoring that is delivered by technology. Telemedicine encompasses healthcare provided via real time two-way video conferencing; file sharing, including transmission of health history, x-rays, films, or photos; remote patient monitoring; and consumer mobile health apps on smart phones, tablets, and devices that collect data and transmit it to a healthcare provider. Telemedicine is increasingly being used for everything from diagnosing common viruses to monitoring patients with serious long-term health issues.

The American Telemedicine Association reports that majority of hospitals now use some form of telemedicine. Two years ago, there were approximately 20 million telemedicine video consultations; that number is expected to increase to about 160 million by 2020. An estimated one-third of employer group plans already cover some type of telehealth.

Telemedicine implicates legal and regulatory issues as licensing, prescribing, credentialing, and cybersecurity. Pennsylvania recently passed legislation joining the Interstate Medical Licensing Compact, an agreement whereby licensed physicians can qualify to practice medicine across state lines within the Compact if they meet the eligibility requirements. The Compact enables physicians to obtain licenses to practice in multiple states, while strengthening public protection through the sharing of investigative and disciplinary information.

Federal and state laws and regulations may differ in their definitions and regulation of telemedicine. New Jersey recently passed legislation authorizing health care providers to engage in telemedicine and telehealth. The law establishes telemedicine practice standards, requirements for health care providers, and telehealth coverage requirements for various types of health insurance plans. Earlier this year, Texas became the last state to abolish the requirement that patient-physician relationships must first be established during an in-person patient/doctor visit before a telemedicine visit.

As telemedicine use increases, there will likely be an increase in related professional liability claims. One legal issue that arises in the context of telemedicine involves the standard of care that applies. The New Jersey statute states that the doctor is held to the same standard of care as applies to in-person settings. If that is not possible, the health care provider is required direct the patient to seek in-person care. However, the standard of care for telemedicine is neither clear nor uniform across the states.

Another issue that arises in the context of telemedicine is informed consent, especially in terms of communication, and keeping in mind that the Pennsylvania Supreme Court recently held that only the doctor, and not staff members, can obtain informed consent from patients. Miscommunication between a healthcare provider and patient is often an underlying cause of medical malpractice allegations in terms of whether informed consent was obtained.

In addition, equipment deficiencies or malfunctions can mask symptoms that would be evident during an in-person examination or result in the failure to transmit data accurately or timely, affecting the diagnosis or treatment of the patient.

Some of these issues will likely ultimately be addressed by legislative or regulatory bodies but others may end up in the courts. According to one medical malpractice insurer, claims relating to telemedicine have resulted from situations involving the remote reading of x-rays and fetal monitor strips by physicians, attempts to diagnose a patient via telemedicine, delays in treatment, and failure to order medication.

A recent Pennsylvania case illustrates how telemedicine may also impact the way medical malpractice claims are treated in the courts. In Pennsylvania, a medical malpractice lawsuit must be filed in the county where the alleged malpractice occurred. Transferring venue back to Philadelphia County, the Superior Court in Pennsylvania found that alleged medical malpractice occurred in Philadelphia — where the physician and staff failed to timely transmit the physician’s interpretation of an infant’s echocardiogram to the hospital in another county where the infant was being treated.

The use of telemedicine will likely have wide-reaching implications for health care and health care law, including medical malpractice.

This post was written by Michael C. Ksiazek of STARK & STARK, COPYRIGHT ©
2017
For more Health Care legal analysis, go to The National Law Review 

FTC Provides Guidance to Social Media Influencers in Live Twitter Chat

Influencer marketing is the popular practice of using individuals with large social media audiences—known as “influencers”—to advertise products and services through their social media accounts. The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has made it clear that influencers must clearly and conspicuously disclose their relationships to brands when promoting or endorsing products through social media. To emphasize this point, the FTC sent letters to 90 influencers and marketers earlier this year reminding them of their obligation to make appropriate disclosures on ads. The FTC has also provided Endorsement Guides with answers to frequently asked questions from advertisers, ad agencies, bloggers, and others.

Most recently the FTC hosted a live Twitter chat to answer questions and provide guidance on influencer marketing. The FTC covered a number of topics during the chat, from the use of the hashtag “#ad” as a disclosure to built-in disclosure tools on popular social media platforms. Key takeaways from the Twitter chat are:

  • Using “#ad” is a sufficient disclosure, as long as it is hard to miss in the post.

  • Even if an influencer posts from abroad, U.S. law still applies if it is reasonably foreseeable that the posts will affect U.S. consumers.

  • Built-in tools such as the “Paid” tag on Facebook and “includes paid promotion” mark on YouTube are not sufficient to disclose that a post is an ad.

  • For Snapchat and Instagram posts, the FTC suggests superimposing a disclosure over the images. For a series of images, a disclosure on the first image may be sufficient, as long as it stands out, and viewers have time to see it.

The Twitter chat followed shortly after the FTC announced its first settlement with two social media influencers, Trevor Martin and Thomas Cassell, for endorsing the online gambling service CSGO Lotto without disclosing that they were the owners of the company, as well as paying other well-known social media influencers to promote the company without requiring them to disclose the payments in their posts.

Click here to read a transcript of the questions and the FTC’s responses during the official Twitter chat.

This post was written by Edward J. McAndrew, Philip N. Yannella, Kim Phan & Roshni Patel of Ballard Spahr LLP Copyright ©
For more legal analysis go to The National Law Review

Using Technology to improve legal services? Submit to the Chicago Legal Tech Innovator Showcase! Deadline 9-29!

Is your firm combining technology and innovation to serve clients? We want to know about it! The Chicago Legal Tech Innovation Showcase, brought to you by the Chicago Bar Association’s Future of the Profession Committee and Chicago Kent School of Law is October 24th.  Submissions are due by September 29th, 2017.

A panel of distinguished judges will choose five “Best in Show” awards in each of the 2 awards categories: Law Firm/Legal Services and Company/Product/Service. Each award winner will present a 5 minute pitch at the Chicago Kent Auditorium on October 24 and have an opportunity to exhibit during the event. All submissions that meet the criteria will be listed in a Chicago Legal Tech Showcase Guide 2017

 

The Chicago Legal Tech Innovator Showcase will promote the law firms, legal aid orgs, and companies that are using technology to improve legal services in the Chicago area and highlight those whose innovations are exceptional. Whether the end result is better legal knowledge management, more affordable legal services, or improved metrics for decision making and analysis—and regardless of how the services are delivered—we want to hear what you are doing and so does Chicago’s legal community!

 

To learn more and submit go to: http://lpmt.chicagobar.org/chicago-legal-tech-innovator-showcase/

 

Collaboration That Works: 2017 LMA Technology Conference Midwest

The event will be held on September 25th and 26th at the University Club of Chicago. Check out more about this years Technology Conference Midwest and LMA!

 

The National Law Review is proud to be this year’s Metabyte Sponsor!

2017 Legal Marketing Technology Conference Midwest

The Legal Marketing Technology Conferences are the largest conferences dedicated to technologies that law firm professionals use to identify, attract and support clients. They provide the premier forum to learn from and network with thought leaders and colleagues. The National Law Review is proud to be one of this years Megabyte Sponsor’s!

This year’s LMATech Midwest conference theme is Collaboration That Works.

The event will be held on September 25th and 26th at the University Club of Chicago.

 

 

For more information on this years conference go to: https://www.legalmarketing.org/page/midwest-tech-2017

Parties Discuss Privacy Issues in Advance of FTC, NHTSA Workshop on Connected Cars

Automated vehicle technology is accelerating, and regulators are racing to keep up.  On June 28, 2017, the Federal Trade Commission and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (“NHTSA”) will hold a workshop to examine the consumer privacy and security issues posed by automated and connected vehicles.  The workshop comes several months after the Department of Transportation and NHTSA promulgated a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (“NPRM”) that would require all new passenger vehicles to be capable of vehicle-to-vehicle (“V2V”) communications by the early 2020s.

The FTC and NHTSA have raised several questions to be addressed at the workshop, including:

  • What data do vehicles with wireless interfaces collect, store, and transmit, and how is that data used and shared?

  • What are vehicle manufacturers’ privacy and security policies and how are those policies communicated to consumers?

  • What choices are consumers given about how their data is collected, stored, and used?

  • What are the roles of the FTC, NHTSA, and other federal agencies with regard to the privacy and security issues raised by connected vehicles?

  • What self-regulatory standards apply to privacy and security issues relating to connected vehicles?

Car manufacturers, tech organizations, privacy organizations, and other parties filed comments in advance of the workshop, responding to these questions and more:

  • The Association of Global Automakers, a group that includes Aston Martin, Ferrari, Honda, Toyota, and others, said that V2V and vehicle-to-infrastructure (“V2I”) communications do not present a significant privacy risk to individuals because they do not collect or store PII or information that can be linked to a particular vehicle. The organization stated that the method of communicating between cars—dedicated short range communications (“DSRC”)—“already has layers of security established into its design.”  The group did acknowledge that privacy and security issues “may be exacerbated” by wireless-enabled aftermarket products connected to on-board diagnostics ports, and said that developers and third parties should therefore take appropriate steps to design and manufacture secure products.

  • CTIA praised the safety benefits that connected vehicle technologies could provide, highlighting how 5G network speed, capacity, and location can improve autonomous vehicle safety and efficiency. The wireless group spoke to both its sector’s experience in addressing data privacy and security across the Internet of Things, and urged the agencies to refrain from imposing vehicle-specific privacy or security regulations which “could be redundant to or conflict with existing privacy and data security protections enforced by the FTC and the Department of Homeland Security.”  CTIA instead said the agencies should promote and expand industry-led initiatives like the NIST Cybersecurity Framework and self-regulatory principles like the auto industry privacy principles.

  • In contrast, EPIC said that “meaningful oversight and enforcement mechanisms” would be necessary to protect consumer privacy. In its discussion of federal policies, the organization stated that enforcement would “require[] a private right of action against companies who misuse and fail to secure personal information.”  The organization also opposed the NPRM’s proposal to create a new Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standard (“FMVSS”) which would preempt state regulations, arguing that historically, while the federal government has enacted privacy laws, more robust privacy legislation has been implemented at the state level.

  • The Future of Privacy Forum, which runs a Connected Cars Working Group whose members include Fiat Chrysler, Ford, General Motors, Hyundai, Lyft, Toyota, and Uber, urged the agencies to focus on transparency around consumer data use, including the provision of resources that are publicly available, accessible before purchase, and reviewable throughout the life of a vehicle as well as the incorporation of consumer privacy controls when appropriate. The group urged the agencies to encourage industry self-regulatory efforts, saying that they can be enforceable when companies publicly commit.

Technology as Opportunity for Law Firms

Business Technology Law FirmsTechnology is both a threat and an opportunity for law firms. On one end, technology has opened the door for market disruptors like LegalZoom and Rocketlawyer who provide some legal services faster and cheaper than law firms.  Some of the low-hanging fruit that law firms and attorneys used to be able to count on is disappearing–or long gone.  In a recent research study by Altman Weil, 21% of law firms surveyed said technology was a threat right now, and 53% of firms described technology as a future threat.  But in many ways, technology is an opportunity for law firms.  The proper technology can help law firms be better and faster, and it can provide law firms with the ability to provide clients with helpful information and analysis much faster than ever before. In our final installment of Re-Envisioning the Law Firm: How to Lead Change and Thrive in the Future, the survey from MPF Insight, the National Law Review will offer an overview of the recommendations surrounding technology in law firms offered in the survey.

Robert A. Young[1] Former Chair, ABA Law Practice Division:

Technology has been increasingly important for today’s law firm with many experts predicting that it will soon surpass rent as your firm’s #2 expense after salaries.  The time has come for managing partners to take a stronger and more proactive role in learning more about this vitally important area.

Having a plan for how technology fits in with your firm’s practice is a crucial part of any leadership strategy.  Additionally, having an effective and robust cybersecurity policy in place is essential in today’s data-driven world.

Law Firms are investing more in technology.  In 2016, firms surveyed increased law firms increased investment in the following areas by the following percentages:

  • Cybersecurity, 23% of respondents increased investment
  • Website, Internet & Digital marketing, 20% of respondents increased investment
  • Case Management Software, 12% of respondents increased investment
  • CRM & Database, 10% of respondents increased investment
  • Competitive Intelligence, 5% of respondents increased investment
  • Legal Research, 2% of respondents increased investment

Circle Graph Law Firm Technology SpendingFor obvious reasons, Cybersecurity is the top area for new investment with law firms. In fact, a Chase Cost Management survey report released in 2015 showed that AMLaw 200 firms spend an average of $8,000 per full-time equivalent on information security.  As a major concern for law firms and their clients it is imperative that firms have all employees trained and all client data safely secured.  Having cybersecurity as a living breathing part of your technology plan can help you reap the benefits of technology safely, and your firm and your clients will benefit.  However, good cybersecurity isn’t simply changing your password every six weeks; it is a vital skill set that must be understood from the top down.

Sharon Nelson[2],  president of a digital forensics, information technology and information security firm says:

If your management mindset isn’t there, you are stuck in technological obsolescence.  Good cybersecurity is good risk management, and better yet, a marketing tool to use with clients.  Don’t just delegate this, that does not work.  Learn it yourself, as much as you can-and lead by being knowledgeable–that’s how you ensure the future of your firm.

Website, Internet and Digital marketing is another area of growth in terms of law firm investment.  Digital marketing tools can help a firm better target their marketing activities.  Re-envisioning says, “The reach is as big or as small as you want it to be and the subject matter can be much more focused, speaking directly to industries and communities through email and social media channels.”  By using the technology and data-gathering tools available, law firms can maximize their digital footprint and reach many more potential clients.

A final recommendation from the survey, “Don’t be held hostage by your technology vendors.”  By embracing open-sourced Customer Management services and web development platforms, your firm can create a product that works seamlessly into your processes.  The time and effort put in up front will pay off with the flexibility available in the end.

Technology is not going away, and the negative elements of technology are already happening.   In order to enjoy the benefits technology has to offer, Law firm leadership needs to find the ways that technology can benefit their firms, their attorneys, and their clients.

ARTICLE BY Eilene Spear
Copyright ©2017 National Law Forum, LLC

This is the sixth article in this series.  Please find the earlier articles below:

Time for a Change in Law Firm Leadership: A Preview of Re-Envisioning the Law Firm

Innovation, Change and Accountability: A Way Forward for Law Firm Leadership

Strategic Planning in Law Firms: Essential Steps for Success

Marketing Legal Services: It’s Everybody’s Job

Recruitment, Retention and Problematic Partners in Law Firms

[1] Former Chair, ABA Law Practice Division and Former Managing Partner of English, Lucas Priest & Owsley

[2] President, State Bar of Virginia and Sensei Enterprises

Register Today for Next Week’s LMA Legal Marketing Tech Conference West – October 5 & 6, 2016

The Legal Marketing Technology Conference is the largest conference dedicated to technologies that law firm professionals use to identify, attract and support clients.

Legal Marketing Technology Conference LMA tech west

Register today!

Join us for the full day conference on October 6, and the half day pre-conferences on October 5. Our pre-conferences include: Technology Workshops and a Lead Marketers’ Summit.

Agenda highlights:

  • Leading Law Firms through a Competitive Revolution (Keynote: Roland Vogl, CodeEx: The Stanford Center for Legal Informatics)
  • How CLOC is Changing Legal Service Delivery Models
  • How Law Firms Can Use Video to Reach New Clients
  • Data Visualization for Law Firms
  • Bringing your CRM Data, Legal Expertise and Pricing Data Together: The Future of Effective Legal Sales
  • Creating Efficiencies Through Marketing Automation: Principles & Practices
  • Dynamic Content via Deep Personalization – the next stage in email marketing
  • Using Livestreaming Video to Tell Your Story, Build Relationships, and Attract Clients
  • Blockchain ID and The Changing Face of Digital Identity