For those not familiar with OpenID, it is:

…a shared identity service, which allows Internet users to log on to many different web sites using a single digital identity, single sign-on,
eliminating the need for a different user name and password for each
site. OpenID is a decentralized, free and open standard that lets users
control the amount of personal information they provide. (Source: WikiPedia)

Where OpenID gets interesting is when you think about taking it beyond social websites and think of it with larger corporations.  It is one thing for Yahoo!, Microsoft, or Google to accept an OpenID protocol, but entirely another with your bank, utilities, and investment websites start to accept it.  Think about all the different online accounts you manage, how many of them can you manage with the same login and password.  I “try” to use the same information for most of my sites, however, it doesn’t work that way always.  Can it be more convenient?  Yes. 

However, it has several impacts beyond just logging in. Security, fraud issues, and framework maturity are still outstanding for other major corporations ot adopt it.  But think about a level of websites beyond blogs, but not quite your financial institutions.  Can associations adopt this and make it work?  Of course!  Can media websites adopt this an make it work? Of course!  Currently over 22,000 websites accept OpenID (including this blog) as a form of identification.  It is projected that this number of sites will reach close to 50,000 by the end of this year.  So if you have a login/register process for your website, why aren’t you looking at something that will make it easier for users to manage their account with your site?  Take a look at offering OpenID as an alternative to your current login procedures.  

This article originally was published in the May 2007 issue of LLRX.

You have worked for a large firm for many years and you have made the decision to either go solo or start a small firm. You were used to having access to all your information via an Intranet, file server, and your desktop. You could practice law and let the IT department worry about when the printer jammed or if you got a virus. Now that you are solo, you are the one that has to deal with all those problems as well as practice law.

It is no secret that one of the largest concerns for new and existing solo lawyers has to do with building an infrastructure for your new firm. Specifically, technology related concerns impact this group the most; computers, office software, security, back-up, billing software, case management, etc. The options are either to invest in all the technology yourself and spend a lot of time, money, and energy keeping all the systems running properly, troubleshooting problems, and performing regular maintenance, or outsource all of this overhead for someone else to manage on your behalf. However, you became a solo to practice law, not troubleshoot technology applications each day.

Alternatives to the two scenarios above do exist. You can invest in Web-based tools to take some of the burden off of you, and let someone else worry about the back-up, security, and maintenance. The benefits allow you to practice law and have fewer worries about issues that may come up regarding the technology itself. The downside is that if your Internet connection goes out, you cannot do much. Even worse is if the hosting company that you are using has severe problems, your data may be lost forever. I’ll cover some of the tools that are available for you to explore as well as raise concerns of relying on such Web-based services for your daily work.

Tools Available

There are many office and support tools available in Web-based formats that can lessen your office overhead.

Google’s Products

Google continues to roll-out new web-based office applications that are worth reviewing. The company started with an email client called Gmail and through acquisitions and their own development teams, have expanded their offerings to include office applications. Currently Google provides the following:

• Google Docs (word processing and spreadsheets)
• Gmail
• Google Calendar
• iGoogle (personalized page)

Google Docs and Google Calendar offer collaborative functions, allowing them to be shared others. Both services are free. Google also has a version of their office tools in a complete package that is fee based.

Google offers a small business package (Standard Package is free, Premier Package is $50 per year per user) includes:

• A customizable Start Page
• Google Docs and Spreadsheets
• Page Creator (basic webpage with a WYSIWYG editor)
• Gmail account
• Google Talk (IM/VOIP)
• Google Calendar
• Control Panel to manage accounts and your domain
• Help and support
• Extensible APIs to integrate with other third party software

This can be a very powerful combination of tools for solos and small firms who are looking to reduce overhead and IT support for basic office functions.

ZoHo’ Products

ZoHo is a brand of AdventNet, a software company. Their free and for pay services offer a wide range of options for solos and small firms who are looking to reduce IT overhead. Like Google, their Web-hosted tools provide a lot of functionality, but not a full suite such as Microsoft Office. Currently Zoho has the following product offerings:

• Writer
• Sheet
• Show
• Calendar and Email
• Project
• CRM
• Planner
• Wiki
• Chat
• Notebook (private beta)
• Mail (private beta)

Tom Mighell recently wrote about the benefits and differences between Google and ZoHo’s products vs. Microsoft Office in the March issue of Law Practice Magazine. One of the biggest drawbacks of using these services has to do with back-up. Tom reports that neither Google nor ZoHo offer bulk back-up to another source. You must download each file individually to your local computer prior to transfer to another data back-up location.

37Signals’ Products

While being able to replicate what a Microsoft Office Suite might offer is important for solos and small firms, there are other tools that will help manage your office. 37Signals based in Chicago, offers a variety of Web-based tools that address needs such as project management (or case management if you want to think if it in that perspective) and Client Relationship Management. Known for producing simple to use tools that offer many features but are not overwhelming, 37Signals products include:

• Highrise (CRM – Customer Relationship Management)
• Basecamp (Project Management)

37Signals’ products also offer many other opportunities as each of their products have APIs (application programming interface), which allow for other software to interact with theirs. A great example is their Basecamp product. This project management tool allows you to collaborate with others on a project by setting tasks, milestones with reminders, and file management for that project. If you purchase their comprehensive package of services it will even do time tracking. One feature Basecamp does not offer is billing or invoicing. That’s where FreshBooks comes in. They use the Basecamp API to allow their web-based billing and invoice software to interact with Basecamp to allow you to create invoices for each project. Of course you would need a FreshBooks account to make this happen, but having those two applications talk to each other makes sending out bills and invoices seamless.

Concerns for Lawyers

As the new generation of Web-based services and software arrives, lawyers will always have concerns. Do you reduce your overhead costs by outsourcing these tools or do you manage all of them yourself? If you do take a serious look at using Web-based tools, then privacy, data security, and copyright of content will be issues with which you will have to deal. This is particularly important if you plan to use “free” versions. Catherine Sanders Reach, Director of the ABA Legal Technology Resource Center, recently wrote on the group’s Site-tation site about the cost of free resources. Ms. Reach stated “…attorney’s must give thought to the potential repercussions of relying on free technology for mission-critical functions.” And she is correct. If for some reason your free web-based email service is down and clients can’t contact you efficiently, that certainly impacts business.

Ultimately, you have to be comfortable with the due diligence you perform in backing up your data, understanding what you are really giving up by using free services, and evaluating how these factors impact your clients and their respective matters.

What Does the Total Package Lack?

At this time I think there are several hurdles that must be overcome before any lawyer or business professional can truly use web-based tools to manage essential office tasks.

Simple single sign-on: Of all the online tools that I use, test, and experiment with, one of the nice things about the Google products is that I don’t have to re-login to use each application. Single sign-on is important for users who use multiple web-based applications from the same vendor. Of course if you decide to pick different products from different vendors this may always be an issue. OpenID may solve this problem (a universal unique identifier many web-based companies are adopting for access).

Access to third party back-up sources: Data security is always going to be on the mind of any lawyer or small business owner. This means that if you want to ship your data off to a third party security/storage center you need to be able to have the ability to do this at any time.

Smartphone access/integration: The world is quickly becoming more mobile. The expectation to have access to all your information at any given time is also becoming more mainstream. If you worked at a larger firm, what was your required response time? I understand some firms require their lawyers’ response to clients must be within 2 hours of receipt. Web-based products need to have the ability to integrate with Smartphones (Treo, BlackBerry, Q, BlackJack, etc.) to allow lawyers access to their contacts, documents, and email directly from their mobile device.

Central Start Center: Finally what would be very desirable is the ability to have a central start center which you can log-in when you get to work, have a portal that gives you access to all these applications as well as the ability to pull in other information like local news, custom search, and maybe even sports scores. Applications like iGoogle (now their name-brand for their personalized page) and NetVibes help do this, but these sites still have limitations, although they are improving continuously.

Ultimately, you can become relatively efficient with current Web-based applications. For the “office” applications, you need to be diligent in using the Web-app as an application, not as a storage facility. If you are finished writing or collaborating on a document, export it out to save in some other location. This does not mean you cannot re-import it and work on it again, but you should think of these as applications only as a tool, not as a complete, final solution.

By using Web-based applications, you can reduce the overhead dedicated to operating your office. Be diligent in checking the terms of use and privacy statements of all “free” applications. Be cautious of using vendors who are still small and have the potential to fold at any given moment (namely anything in “beta”). You do not want to lose your data forever because the lights go out in Silicon Valley. Finally, use the tools you feel most comfortable using. If you are a WordPerfect or Microsoft Word pro and use special features, equivalent Web-based applications will not serve your needs. Be smart about the tools you use and you will find the benefits and efficiencies come with those decisions.

What concerns you most about web-based office solutions replacing traditional desktop applications? Let me know at fred@frederickfaulkner.com.

It is probably the most taken for granted webpage you visit every day—the infamous homepage that appears each time you open your Web browser. Many see it as just another page that they immediately click away from once their browser is open. Others actually change it to something more meaningful or interesting. Traditionally, the homepage, is usually set by someone else at first, but with the expansion of the Web 2.0 era and the greater adoption of RSS you can actually do more with your homepage than ever before.

The problem with homepages is that you only get to choose one page. If you are lucky enough to be able to switch this page (some companies lock down their computers so this feature is disabled) you are forced to make the difficult choice of picking a page that suits your needs. Many choose a search engine, a news site, or another favorite website. With personalized pages becoming more common place, it only makes sense to maximize that experience to get the best of both worlds. At the end of this article I’ll take you step-by-step on setting up a personalized homepage with one of the services I mention below. So let’s see what is available for you to use and how you can get the content you want all in one spot.

Typical Homepages

Common homepages include a company’s homepage, your Intranet, major news sources like CNN.com or NYTimes.com, major search engines like Google or Yahoo!, or an ISP or computer manufacturer branded homepage like Comcast.net or Dell’s homepage. While all of these pages are fine and you can get great content from them, there is still something lacking, and that is the ability to make them really personal to you. If you are like me, you have a plethora of bookmarks from sites you visit regularly, why not have all their content in one organized place? Why not be able to open your browser and not only see information those sources, but also have a To Do list, a sticky note pad, or a preview of your Web e-mail account? Now you can and it is not hard to set up. So where do we start?

Websites You Can Personalize

Companies like Google and Microsoft are providing the ability to create personalized homepages instead of your default browser homepage. Other established portals like MSN and Yahoo! are enhancing their “my” space features to give you more options to add content and add pages to them. Finally, there are Web 2.0 companies building spaces specifically for customized homepages that are tapping into the far reaches of the Web to give you your one custom homepage.

To give you a more personalized portal, each of the examples below provide a standard set of modules that you can customize, as well as access other pre-defined modules to add to your homepage. They also allow you to define content to be filtered into your homepage from other sources such as your favorite blog or website that provides a RSS feed. Each page is has multiple columns so you can keep the modules organized. Modules can be dragged and dropped into different columns, additional pages, or deleted all together.

The first three, Google, Netvibes and Windows Live, are very similar in how they work. Each offer multiple columns and tabbed pages approach. MyYahoo! and MyMSN are more traditional content portals and are laid out differently than the other three. They provide two columns and access to their other services very easily. Depending on your personal taste, one may or may not be better suited for your needs. Personally, I use Google’s personalized page because I use many of Google’s products which integrate nicely into my homepage, but each of these below are top rated in their offerings.

• Google
• Netvibes
• Windows Live
• MyYahoo!
• MyMSN

Adding Content to Your Personalized Homepage

With the ability to add content from almost any source that publishes an RSS feed personalized homepages can be powerful sources of information. Adding the content is very simple. Google, Netvibes, and Windows Live all provide pre-defined "widgets" and "gadgets" to add to your pages. Usually by clicking the "Add Content" link you will be presented with categories for different types of information you can add. Then it is as easy as finding one you want and clicking “Add to page”. If there is a source not available in their listings you can add that source via their RSS feed (if available). Google makes it easy by adding a link by their search box called "Add a source". Netvibes and Windows Live provide similar features as well. Coming up I’ll take you step-by-step on how to create a personalized page with Netvibes and how to add pre-defined as well as custom content to those pages.

How Legal Professionals Can Take Advantage

For many legal professionals, staying abreast of developments in certain industries is critical to cases and overall daily work. The ability to have current awareness tools and other personal interest information available in one source is both powerful and efficient. If you are not using a news aggregator yet to monitor industries or topics, a personalized homepage may be one way to ease yourself into the concept. It can, however, be very cumbersome if you have a lot of modules of feeds on one or two pages. With that in mind, personalized pages are a better choice when you are looking for quick snap shots of information. A news aggregator is the better technology alternative to track and monitor many sources, such as an entire industry.

For example, I monitor the Web, legal, and marketing industries on a regular basis. While I could set up three separate tabs in my Google homepage for each industry, I have at least 20-60 feeds in each category. Taken together, those pages would be difficult to manage and track, so I still use a news aggregator for the majority of my news feeds.

I use my homepage to monitor the ABA’s reputation online via a few custom search feeds and our own internal RSS feeds which we publish. I also have a few tabs set up for personal items and general news. The main tab is set up with some widgets that help me get things done like a To Do list, a notepad for larger notes and thoughts, access to my Gmail account and my Google Calendar. This allows me to open up my browser, see what is on the agenda for the day, and organize my tasks by priority. I can also quickly see who has been talking about the ABA overnight and what we are publishing out to the world via RSS feeds. For me, it takes less than five minutes in the morning to get up to speed and then start my day.

Making a Personalized Homepage

To help you get started with a personalized homepage, I’ve documented the steps you need to go through using Netvibes. I chose Netvibes for this example because it requires no additional account set-up besides an existing e-mail address. You don’t need to have an account with Google or Microsoft as you would for Microsoft Live or the Google Personalized page. In this example, we’ll set up the account, add content to the main page, and create a new tab and add content. So let’s get started!

Note: If you don’t have access to adjust the homepage of your browser you can still create a personalized page – you will just need to bookmark it and go there every time you start your browser.

Step 1. Starting out. To get started with a personalized page, visit Netvibes, www.netvibes.com. Once there you will need to create an account so you can personalize this page.

Step 2. Sign In / Create a New Account. Click the Sign In link in the upper right corner. A Web 2.0 looking window will overlay the screen with Existing User and New User choices. Select Sign Up Now!. Provide an e-mail address and password. This will be how you identify your personalized page from everyone else’s. Once your account is created you will be able to modify the modules, add tabs, and they will be retained for your own account.

Step 3. Title your Page. You will want to add a page title for your personalized page. The text at the top of the page that says "Type your page title here" is editable by clicking on it. You can name it anything you want. I called mine Fred’s LLRX Start Page.

Step 4. Adding Content via Pre-defined Gadgets. Before we add content to your page, take a look at the pre-loaded items. If you don’t have a Gmail account or don’t care to see the colorful looking pictures via Flickr you can delete the module by clicking the “X” in the module header when you hover over it. Once you have deleted the modules you don’t want to retain click the “Add Content” in the upper left hand corner. A taskbar will appear on the left side of the screen. In that taskbar a series of categories and types of modules will appear. You can hover over any of the links to see more about that particular module. If you click the link an example module will appear. If you want to add it to your page, click “Add to my page.” Fill in as many modules and gadgets as you desire. If you want to see more modules you can check out the Netvibes Ecosystem for more custom modules created by other users.

Step 5. Adding Tabs. You may find that your main personalized page is getting pretty full from the modules you are adding. To help organize your modules Netvibes, just like Google and Microsoft Live, has tabs you can add. To add a new tab click the “New Tab” link next to your General tab. You can then label the tab anything you want. For example if you want to put all your search modules on a second page, you can call the tab “Search.” Once a tab is created you can drag and drop any module on any tab and it will move the module to that tab. To add new content to that tab you would use the same process as Step 4.

Step 6. Adding Content via RSS Feeds. If the modules and gadgets provided by Netvibes and the Netvibes Ecosystem do not provide specific modules of content you desire, you can add your own RSS feeds to your Netvibes page. Say for instance you want to add the LLRX RSS feed to your personalized page to see when the next issue is published. To do this, surf to LLRX.com and click on the orange XML icon at the bottom of the left sidebar. Copy the URL and then go back over to your Netvibes account. Click “Add Content” and select “Add my feed” link at the top. There you will paste the URL for the LLRX News Feed into the top box and click “Add.” A module showing the last five entries in the RSS feed will be displayed in a module on your personalized page. You can edite that module to show up to 9 entries by hovering over the top of the module and clicking the “Edit” link. You can do this for any RSS feed from any Web site. So if you prefer CNN news to MSNBC or WashingtonPost.com you can add any CNN feed to your personalized page.

Conclusion

Personalized homepages give you the ability to create quick snapshots of information that you may visit on a frequent basis. Making a personalized homepage your start page for your Web browser ensures that you can access that information quickly at any time. Adding new content to a personalized page is easy, and you can even drag and drop them to any column you want with the click of a mouse. Now that you know how to create a personalized page, take advantage of your homepage and maximize it to provide all the information you need in one central location. If you are using a personalized homepage, let me know what you like about it and ways in which you find it useful.