STOEL ALUMNI AND
LAWYERS RE-CONNECT
In late September, approximately 200 Stoel Rives alumni and current partners and associates attended the firm’s first-ever "alumni reunion." All in attendance once worked in the firm’s Portland office. Guests were greeted by old friends on arrival, and were soon enjoying lively conversation, good music, tasty treats and a martini bar on the rooftop of Jax Bar & Restaurant in downtown Portland.

"The reunion was fun and spirited," said Stoel Rives Portland managing partner Ruth Beyer "It was invigorating to reminisce and reestablish camaraderie with past co-workers."

Representing a broad range of talent and backgrounds, many Stoel Rives alumni have successfully positioned themselves in the business community. These alumni included judges, in-house counsel, government attorneys, educators and associates and partners at other law firms.

According to alumni program director, Scott Jensen, the program will continue to expand, and communication among alumni will be encouraged.

LAWYERS TURNING TO WIRELESS
The percentage of lawyers using wireless technology to connect to the Internet away from the office has more than doubled since 2003, according to the results of the 2004-2005 American Bar Association Legal Technology Survey.

Currently, 19 percent of lawyers surveyed are using wireless technology to access the Internet away from the office, up from 8.3 percent in the previous survey. There has been especially significant growth among solo lawyers, of whom a full 25 percent report using a wireless Internet connection away from the office, compared to 8.7 percent in 2003.

Among other results:

Consistent with previous surveys, 98 percent of lawyers who responded to the survey use computers at work; most of those who don’t are age 60 or over, while 100 percent of lawyers up to age 49 do.

Lawyers are becoming progressively more mobile. Eighty-eight percent of those who responded to the survey have Internet access away from the office. Almost a third are using cable modems, followed by DSL users and dialup modem users with 24 percent each. Connection from public terminals or kiosks has also seen an increase, from less than 10 percent in 2002 to 19 percent in the current survey.

While antivirus software availability has remained consistent with past surveys at 92 percent, firewall software availability has risen to nearly 66 percent from 43 percent in 2002, reflecting heightened concerns about hacking and distributed denial of service attacks. Availability of encryption software has increased to 24 percent, but about half of respondents are not using encryption at all.

The legal profession remains document-centric, with word processing software available at 97 percent of law firms, although it’s used personally by only 69 percent of the responding lawyers. Microsoft Word continues as the leading word processor in law firms, in use by 70 percent of respondents, with 28 percent using Corel WordPerfect. Microsoft Excel dominates the spreadsheet market, with 84 percent of respondents citing its availability in their office, trailed by Quattro Pro at 6 percent.

For more information, visit www.lawtechnology.org.

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Many OSB members have expressed concern for the victims of Hurricane Katrina and Hurricane Rita. In addition to an immediate desire to help the thousands of citizens in crisis, members have expressed concern for the long-term impact on the justice system, and on colleagues in the Gulf Coast region.

The Louisiana State Bar Association and Louisiana Bar Foundation have established LSBA/LBF Disaster Relief Fund. The fund was created to help rebuild the state’s legal infrastructure so that lawyers can provide needed legal services to their clients and restore damaged offices and records. Members of the legal profession are invited to make a tax-deductible donation through the fund’s website, www.lsba.org/foundation/lbf/
foundation hurricanefund.asp.

Here are some other places the legal community can help:

New Orleans Bar Foundation: 228 St. Charles Ave., Suite 1223, New Orleans, LA 70130; website: www.neworleansbar.org.

Hurricane Katrina Legal Relief Fund: c/o Baton Rouge Bar Foundation, 544 Main St., Baton Rouge, LA 70802; website: www.brba.org.

Louisiana State Bar Association: 601 St. Charles Ave., New Orleans, LA 70130; website: www.lsba.org.

Be advised that postal service has not been fully restored to parts of Louisiana. If mailing, check first with the postal service, or use a delivery services such as FedEx or UPS.