Technology Upgrade

I love gadgets.  I'm not particularly tech savvy, but I love anything that lets me work on the road.  As you may know, my main office is in Olney, Maryland and I rent office space in Frederick, Maryland.  My physical office is in Olney, so that means when I am in Frederick, I am virtual.  I have a MacBook that I love, and although it is compact, fast and really easy to use.  It is, however, somewhat bulky (Such a silly thing to say, as it only weights 5.3 lbs), and when you are carrying files, and maybe a small printer, every pound counts.  So, long story short, I had a mobile hotspot that I used with the MacBook, but I lost it (yes, the woman who loses nothing, not even pens and sunglasses, lost her mobile hotspot).  It turns out that to replace the hotspot, I would have to increase my data plan by $20 a month.  Over the course of 24 months, that would be as much as a........tablet with the old data plan.  I am now the proud owner of a Droid tablet.   I love it.  It weighs just 1.3 pounds, a full 4 pounds lighter than the MacBook, it's no bigger than a small stack of paper, and it does everything I wanted it to do do.  I love it.  Today, I went to court, and before I left, I loaded a first draft of a proposed order on the Droid.  At court, we negotiated, I edited, then sent it off to a printer, and there you are - done.  Plus, if I want to use my MacBook, it's still a mobile hotspot.  I'm still exploring, as I've only had it a week, but so far I have lots of apps useful to the Trenches loaded on it (and maybe a few games to play while I'm waiting for a judge).

Let's contrast this to my opposing counsel from today.  He jokingly refers to me as the high tech lawyer, with my bluetooth headset and lap top computer (heaven only knows what he would do if he saw some of my truly techie colleagues!)  He almost never uses email.  He also has a Droid, one he has had a few months longer than I have.  While I was typing the Order, he was playing on his Droid ( he said he was typing his version of the Order, but as he doesn't know how to type, I doubt it was a successful venture). I emailed the Order to him for review, and he.....called his secretary at the office to open my email, download the attachment, print it out and walk it over to the courthouse to him.  Really?  It took over 45 minutes for that to occur.  At $295 an hour, that's $221.25 of billable time spent waiting for the delivery person.  Over in my camp, I was working on a letter for another client so I didn't have to bill my client for waiting.

Technology can be real boon to our clients here in the Trenches.  Today, it saved our clients from having to come back to court at least two more times, because we had the ability to memorialize their agreement and affix their signatures.  It also saved my client from paying me to wait on the other attorney's secretary.  Other times, we can access a client's court files, or do legal research on an important issue.  Life moves fast here in the Trenches.  Business as usual isn't what it used to be, and we need to keep up in order to keep our clients satisfied.  Technology can be fun and it can be a useful tool; here in the Trenches, it needs to be both.  Otherwise, it's just an expensive toy.