Death and Taxes Blog

for the lack of recent posting. I've been busy working on an article, which I hope to finish (and get published) soon, while also dealing with pneumonia(!) and applying to business school(!!).

I've finally finished Step 1 of my probate project -- posting the Illinois Probate Act in its entirety on my website, here.  Next up:

1. Putting interactive probate forms for Cook County up on my site. [expected completion date: 1/07]

2. Making another pass through the Probate Act, inserting hyperlinks and some analysis, and fixing formatting problems. [expected completion date: 4/07]

3. Posting an in-depth (i.e. book-length) narrative on probate in Cook County. [expected completion date: 12/07]

I'll probably add other statutes related to probate in the future, but I'm not sure when that process will begin.

Blogging will be light the rest of the week, so as not to interfere with my turkey brining, pie making, etc. etc. 

But before I go, let me share my Top 5 recent searches by which people wound up at this blog:

steven+spielberg+cheated+on+amy+irving

health+references+in+shakespearean+plays

federline+prenup+arrangement (and numerous variations thereon)

dumb+laws+in+Virginia

how+can+the+probate+system+be+abused

Chapel Hill, North Carolina-based attorney Gregory Herman-Giddens has started the North Carolina Estate Planning Blog.  Mr. Herman-Giddens' blog looks like it is off to a nice start.

Harrisburg, Pennsylvania-based attorney and teacher Neil E. Hendershot has started the PA Elder, Estate & Fiduciary Law Blog -- you can find it here.  Welcome to the blogosphere!

And I'm not talking about the Agatha Christie-inspired musical that I appeared in as a high school student (I was Geoffrey, the "foxy Oxford coxswain").  Rather, I mean that I have made a decision to try and update my regular site (www.jas-law.com) more regularly.  This is part of my plan (which you can read about here) to establish that site as the go-to place for Illinois probate information.  I'm also working with the good folks who created my regular site (Justia) to see if we can integrate this blog into it.

For whatever reason, there aren't very many Illinois lawyers who blog.  Perhaps that's starting to change, though -- the Illinois Real Estate Blog is relatively new and has a lot of nice resources for people interesting in buying or selling real estate in Illinois.  And I don't say that just because the blog's author, TJ Thurston, has linked to one of my articles!

Just a reminder that this site exists to give general information about probate, estate planning, and real estate matters in Illinois.  Because of professional responsibility rules (and the time constraints that come with a busy practice), I can't give legal advice about any specific situations unless I am formally retained to do so.  In other words, please don't be offended if I don't respond to your e-mail requesting free legal advice and/or opinions. 

In addition, please note that I am only admitted to practice in Illinois, so I can't represent you if you are a resident of another state.

I'll be away from my office starting today.  Blogging should resume on Monday, July 24.

I've written extensively about ghostwritten blogs, most recently here and here.  Evidently the use of canned content isn't just limited to blogs.  In this month's issue of the IICLE Law Office Technology Flash Points newsletter, Alan Pearlman extols the virtues of a product called Custom WebExpress, which is put out by a company called NextClient.com.  Mr. Pearlman describes Custom WebExpress as "a unique product that allows you to instantly launch and manage a custom law firm website and includes practice-specific articles that feed directly into your website every week."  In other words, you are buying website content from NextClient.com.  As Mr. Pearlman puts it, "Like most lawyers, I need to spend most of my time performing billable tasks. However, this does not negate the need to keep my website updated with fresh information. Another way NextClient helps me is by including practice-specific content on my site that updates every week with newsletter articles my clients can understand and appreciate, and believe it or not, is included as part of the basic $99-a-month Custom WebExpress product."

I e-mailed Mr. Pearlman about my concern regarding the use of canned content.  I've said it before, but maybe it's worth saying again:

Simply put, if you are using a website to market your practice, then you are at least in some way trying to convince potential clients of your legal abilities.  Posting articles you have written is one way to do this.  Posting articles someone else has written doesn't accomplish much, although I've heard it argued that you are at least assisting the public by disseminating legal information.  The big problem arises when you use canned content and don't identify it as such -- that strikes me as an attempt to mislead potential clients about your knowledge and abilities.

There are 33 people who subscribe to this blog via Bloglet, which is supposed to send out daily e-mail updates.  Unfortunately Bloglet doesn't work very often, so the e-mailed updated haven't been sent out for some time.  I'd like to suggest that my subscribers switch over to FeedBlitz, and have added a FeedBlitz link on the right side of this page to allow you to do this -- it only takes a minute, and seems much more reliable than Bloglet. 

Since this blog doesn't focus much on real estate issues anymore, visitors with an interest in Illinois real estate may wish to visit the Illinois Real Estate Blog, run by Robert C. Thurston.  Mr. Thurston's blog focuses on both commercial and residential real estate.

It looks like the ranks of blogs about estate planning, probate, and related issues has expanded by two:

Arizona Elder Lawyer, a blog by E. Cameron Pickett; and

Utah and Nevada Estate Planning Blog, which is written by Brian L. Olson.

Last week I stumbled across Taxalicious, a new tax-related blog.  It's worth checking out -- with Taxalicious and Joe Kristan's Tax Updates, you can get your tax information with a nice dose of humor and personality.  A favorite recent post from Taxalicious is "Morans get caught in IRS dragnet" -- check out this link (gotta love that pic!).

Last week I wrote about blogs and ghostwriting.  My post was a response to an article by Edward Poll in this month's Law Practice Today.  Since the issue of ghostwritten blogs is a hot topic these days, I sent Mr. Poll an e-mail, asking if he'd care to share his thoughts on the matter.  Mr. Poll's response to my post appears on his LawBiz Blog, here.

In reply to Mr. Poll's response, I would make three points:

1. Mr. Poll states that "[i]f we had to do everything ourselves, we all would be sole practitioners," and then sets forth a number of situations he feels are analogous to using a ghostblogger.  For me, the question of whether a given type of work may be delegated involves thinking in terms of Expectation, Representation, and Relationship:

Expectation.  Could the client reasonably expect the attorney to do this work?  

Representation.  Did the attorney represent to the client that the attorney would do this work? 

Relationship.  Is the work related to the attorney's substantive law practice, or is it merely procedural?

Let's look at the situations mentioned by Mr. Poll -- I think most of them are distinguishable from the matter of the ghostwritten blog:

"When a rainmaker brings new business into the firm, the work is often done by other lawyers."  The fact that other lawyers are doing the work should be disclosed by the rainmaker, in his engagement letter to the new client and in the invoices to the client (which should show exactly what personnel did what work).  My post made it very clear that, while I think using a ghostwriter for your blog is probably a mistake, my bigger problem is with the failure to disclose the use of a ghostwriter. 

"When lawyers write briefs, frequently those briefs are edited by other lawyers, by secretaries and others."  I would add that associates frequently write entire briefs for the partners who employ them.  Once again, this should be disclosed to the client as discussed above.  If Andy Associate spends 15 hours writing a brief, which Penny Partner then spends 15 minutes reviewing before it's filed, Penny Partner has no business claiming that she wrote the brief.

"When clients pay bills, accounting folks make the deposits."  This is a very strange analogy.  Clients don't care who is depositing their checks -- there's no expectation that the attorney will do this, and it has nothing to do with anything substantive in the representation. 

"When a lawyer or law firm creates a marketing brochure, it is often a professional marketing person or copy writer who develops it --- not the lawyer, but for the approval of the principal lawyer."  This is probably Mr. Poll's best point, but I would argue that there is no expectation that the attorney is writing his or her own marketing copy, and (hopefully) no representation that the attorney did so. 

You could also argue that most marketing has no relationship to anything substantive.  I'd say that's the difference between regular marketing and blogging.  You probably wouldn't ask an attorney to put together a print ad campaign for her firm, but you also wouldn't ask a legal marketer to write blog posts about substantive areas of law. 

2. To me, a more analogous situation to ghostblogging without disclosure would be this one:

Abe Attorney is a solo practitioner who is meeting with an important new potential client.  The potential client asks for writing samples from Abe in his substantive area of practice.  Abe either doesn't have the time or the skills to prepare such writing samples, so he hires Lisa Lawyer to write them for him.   Abe doesn't tell the potential client that the writing samples were written by Lisa. 

I can't describe the above scenario as anything but a fraud perpetuated against the potential client.

3. Having worked at three law firms early in my career, I find it hard to believe that, as a practical matter, "delegating the work doesn't mean abdicating the responsibility."  If an attorney can't spare 15-30 minutes per day to blog, then I doubt the attorney can spare 5-10 (or more) minutes per day to review his ghostwriter's posts before they are put online.  Of course, this goes to the question of how we define responsibility.  Last week it came to light (on Ben Cowgill's Legal Ethics blog, here) that a legal blogger was posting materials supplied by Nolo Press on his blog.  I would presume that Nolo does not allow these materials to be altered or changed by the attorney.  If my presumption is correct, then how can the attorney fulfill his "responsibility"?  Is it sufficient to review (but not alter in any way) the posts he purchases from Nolo?  That strikes me as no different from saying that the attorney's responsibility is fulfilled when he writes the check to Nolo.

Back in August I complained about a number of blog marketing-related issues, including the notion that it's OK to hire someone to write your blog for you.  I hoped this wrongheaded idea would fade away pretty quickly, but it's been reintroduced in an article by Edward Poll (here) in this month's Law Practice Today.  Mr. Poll states the following (the emphasis is mine):

If you do decide to become a blogger, it's important to remember that you shouldn't work for your blog. Making frequent posts and answering dozens, or hundreds, of email comments, can take time. Let's say it's just two hours per workweek....

This is hugely expensive! The logical way to control the expense is hire someone to manage your blog. The expense is far less than the time spent updating (no matter how easy with TypePad or other blogging tools), which will take you away from other marketing activities or even from your practice. Delegation is a principle by which I live. I want to do those things that only I can do, like coaching, consulting and marketing for more work.

Mr. Poll doesn't come right out and say it, but isn't he encouraging attorneys to hire someone to write the posts that appear on their blogs?  After all, I would estimate that the large majority of the time I devote to my blog is spent writing posts -- answering e-mails and comments takes very little time.  But how does this idea fit with what Mr. Poll (or whoever he hired to write this column) wrote earlier?

Ultimately, blogs are a means of face-to-face conversation with a client or prospect when you can't meet them face-to-face. Blogs are informal, conversational, and show that you have something meaningful to say. They epitomize my own definition of marketing. I see it as the process by which we seek to persuade others of the merits of our beliefs.

If I don't write my posts, then a face-to-face conversation may be taking place, but it's between my client or prospective client and my ghostblogger -- that conversation doesn't involve me at all.  I think blogs make for good marketing because they show prospective clients who I am (in terms of both legal knowledge and personality).  If you use a ghostblogger, then prospective clients aren't learning anything about your legal knowledge or your personality.  And if you use a ghostblogger and don't disclose this fact to your blog's visitors, then you are also a liar.

My link for the day is to Grant D. Griffiths' excellent Kansas Family and Divorce Lawyer blog.  I know that seems perverse, given the day, but it's got a ton of useful information.  For those romantics among you, it even includes a recent post on "Secrets to a Happy Marriage."

California Estate Planning Practice Blog started up last month, and I think it's great -- the blog (by the firm of Sawday & Drake) has lots of basic, practical information that you can't find elsewhere (like how to put vehicles into your living trust). 

Since it's a new year, I'd like to practice a little "out with the old, in with the new."  I've removed the links to the left for sites that are no longer updated, and have added a few new ones:

Rule of Law, published by an attorney in British Columbia

California Estate and Business Blog

The New York Probate Litigation Blog

I'm out of the office this week, on a "tour" of rural Michigan, so I probably won't be posting here very much.  I'll be back in the office (and on this blog) on Monday, Sept. 12.