Lexis-Nexis

At least in the case of junior reporters, noncompetes are now out.

Law firms are chasing RFPs at unprecedented rates, yet industry data shows these new business efforts may not pack the profitability punch law firms want or need.

A round-up of the top statistical tweets from the ILTA conference.

Small-firm columnist Keith Lee looks at how widely courts are citing Wikipedia.

Years before Philadelphia’s National Constitution Center built the forty-foot high “Tower of Law” (or, as Stephen Colbert called it, “the building blocks of boring”) out of unused legal reporters, Lexis started the books’ march to obsolescence when it debuted on April 2, 1973. “Lexis,” a term the company’s president coined by combining the Latin word […]

How can law students and young lawyers best prepare themselves for success at a small law firm?

If the estimates are accurate, LexisNexis laid off enough people to staff a sizable law firm.

* USDA requiring a magician to develop a disaster plan for his rabbit. I don’t think this is such a bad idea — have you ever seen Bullwinkle? [Lowering the Bar] * The Middle Class is disappearing in the country. Why can’t we get a disaster plan for them like we have for that rabbit? [Lawyers, Guns & Money] * Patton Boggs is rebooting. Just like when a TV show adds a long-lost cousin in season 8, this isn’t a sign of weakness at all. [Politico] * President Obama, speaking of the Trayvon Martin case, notes: “There are very few African-American men in this country who haven’t had the experience of being followed when they are shopping at a department store. And that includes me.” See, he was uniquely prepared for the job of being followed by security guys EVERYWHERE. The difference, of course, is he knows these guys aren’t going to shoot him. [NBC Politics] * A Miami firm is suing LexisNexis for “deceptive” fees. If they’re going to litigate this case, they’d better hope their Westlaw bill is paid in full. [Miami New Times] * The reporter’s privilege had a bad day. After all that’s been revealed in the last couple months, let’s all agree it’s only newsworthy when the reporter’s privilege has a good day. [PrawfsBlawg]

These plaques are just kind of embarrassing.

A former Dewey & LeBoeuf associate started a company that just received $15 million in venture capital financing. But can it compete with Westlaw and Lexis?

While billing is an awful experience, small-firm attorneys need to do it better, according to columnist Valerie Katz.

* Paul Clement is a beast, is basically what it comes down to. [The Daily Beast] * This is probably the grossest, most pornographic employment discrimination/sexual harassment/defamation lawsuit I’ve seen. Maybe fans of 50 Shades of Grey (affiliate link) might find it compelling. The writing in the lawsuit is probably better… [Courthouse News] * Predictive coding is good. Now it’s bad. Now it’s good. Make up your mind! [Law Technology News] * A touching obituary about a first-year Reed Smith associate who recently took his own life. [Pittsburgh Post-Gazette] * Elie was on Fox News late last night (video embed after the jump). He brought the funny. The hosts of the show… not so much. They did bring the racist, though. [Red Eye] * If you ever get in trouble for tweeting or blogging about jury duty, Davis Oscar Markus is the guy to call. [Miami Herald] * LexisNexis recently unveiled its new, ginormous legal e-book library. It’s just like a normal law library, except you don’t have to ask the pesky law librarian for help. [LexisNexis] (Embedded Elie, after the jump.)

Where would lawyers be without open (and absurdly expensive) access to Westlaw and Lexis-Nexis for legal research? They’d have to trudge down to the closest law library and read real books made of paper. They’d have to head over to the courthouse and pull actual files with non-electronic documents inside of them. In a time where legal texts are used solely for decorative bookshelf purposes, that is just too much to ask. But that is the behavior that two lawyers would expect of their professional colleagues. Do they have any chance of winning their class action copyright suit?

* And now another reason for lawyers to hate other lawyers (even more than they already do): Westlaw and LexisNexis are being sued for copyright infringement for selling access to publicly filed legal documents. [WSJ Law Blog]

* MGA Entertainment’s antitrust suit against Mattel has been dismissed. In celebration, attorneys from Quinn Emanuel will buy themselves hot pink convertibles while singing that “Barbie Girl” song. [Thomson Reuters News & Insight]

* Yesterday in the Golinski case, a federal judge ruled that the definition of marriage under DOMA is unconstitutional. Come on, even a Bush II appointee knows what’s up. [Poliglot / Metro Weekly]

* After finally realizing that he was a lawyer and not an agent — and that his most infamous client wasn’t worth as much as he thought — Jose Baez dropped Casey Anthony like a bad habit. [Miami Herald]

* Former University of Virginia lax player George W. Huguely V was found guilty of second degree murder in the death of Yeardley Love. UVA students are instructed to pop their collars at half-staff. [Bloomberg]

The great thing about free stuff is that it is free. Nobody cares what kind of plastic junk they’re getting as long as it’s free. Why do sports fans go nuts over t-shirt cannons, even though the shirts are ugly as hell and always XXL? Duh, because they’re free. To me, it seems logical that […]

Over the last few weeks, I’ve written about some über expensive and embarrassing examples of lawyers making technological mistakes. Those stories involved sexily scandalous blunders, but they were relatively extreme scenarios. (If turning over thousands of privileged documents happens regularly at your firm, may God help you.) More frequently, firm employees deal with little technological […]

Daniel de Juan, a sales engineer from Mitratech, summed up perfectly what LegalTech was like for me this year: “Being at LegalTech is almost like being at a casino, in the sense that you lose all track of time.” Two years ago, I found the conference to be pretty intimidating, and that was when the […]

Last week, we reported on a questionable offering in the Lexis-Nexis Rewards Program store: an “Asian Angels” calendar. Shortly after our post went up, the calendar came down. It seems that legal research companies respond well to media coverage. But the calendar, despite being quickly withdrawn from the Lexis swag offerings, still incurred the ire […]

LexisNexis has a rewards program that allows loyal users to accumulate points for certain research activities and then to use them to “shop from millions of items.” One of the items makes us want to give LexisNexis an “ex” rating. An ATL reader and loyal Lexis-Nexis user pointed the item out to us, writing: Search […]

Did a number of you LexisNexis users receive this disturbing notice in the mail from LexisNexis? Seisint (not to be confused with Skynet) is a data-mining company that LexisNexis bought for $775 million, back in 2004. The company created “the Matrix” which gave state and federal governments the ability to analyze records after 9/11. Back […]