Kirby, Nicolas --- "Technology in practice" [2017] PrecedentAULA 19; (2017) 139 Precedent 20

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TECHNOLOGY IN PRACTICE

By Nicolas Kirby

Technology is inescapable. It permeates our lives. Lawyers’ practices are not exempt from this rule.

Everyone uses technology in different ways. In this article, I share some of the ways I use technology in the hope that you, dear reader, may discover something that will assist in your practice.

I should say up front, lest it be thought that I am some kind of technological zealot, that I love paper. I yearn for its tactility. I do not strive for paperlessness. I find that I only really absorb information as my highlighter glides over it. I like to scribble my thoughts over the documents that provoked them.

‘It is questionable if all the mechanical inventions yet made have lightened the day's toil of any human being.’

John Stuart Mill

It is difficult to say whether technology has made my life any easier: late nights in chambers argue against that proposition. I have, however, found ways to make my bag lighter, my desk cleaner and my work more efficient.

MY DEVICES

I am an Apple user. I have an iMac in chambers, an iPad, an iPhone and a MacBook Pro for when I am on the go. This does not, however, make my experience irrelevant for those using other platforms. Most programs are designed for multiple operating systems and devices.

CAST OFF THE HEAVY BURDEN OF BOOKS

It is no exaggeration to say that the iPad has revolutionised my practice. I no longer take Ritchies to court because I have an eBook containing Thomson Reuters’ NSW Civil Procedure Handbook which has 2,000 pages of annotated legislation and rules. And it’s searchable. I purchased the hardcopy and eBook bundle. The bundle costs about 30 per cent more than buying the hardcopy alone.

Thomson Reuters offers its own iPad app called ‘ProView’. It acts as a library for all the eBooks they publish. In addition to the Civil Procedure Handbook, I also have Odgers’ Uniform Evidence Law, various annotated Acts including corporations legislation, and Miller’s 35^th edition of Competition and Consumer Law. The practical effect of having so much information on my iPad is that I seldom take any textbooks to court.

LexisNexis has its own app called ‘Lexis Red’, on which you can subscribe to many of its looseleaf services – with no manual updating required. Lexis Red also sells its textbooks with eBook bundles. I have often found it very convenient to have a searchable Cheshire & Fifoot’s Law of Contract available to me in the luncheon adjournment.

CLOUD COMPUTING

Another giant leap forward has been the relatively recent advent of cloud storage. Apps (short for ‘applications’, meaning ‘programs’) like Dropbox mean that you can store large amounts of data ‘in the cloud’ and access it from anywhere you have an internet connection (including on your phone or tablet). In Dropbox’s case, ‘the cloud’ is a series of physical servers run by Amazon in various locations in the United States.

Dropbox stores your documents simultaneously on your computer and in the cloud. This means that you can work on documents even when you don’t have an internet connection. It also means that once you do come back online, amended documents will be ‘synced’ (short for ‘synchronised’) with the old versions in the cloud and can be accessed from any of your devices.

I don’t know about you, but I get many – if not most – documents these days via email. I print small documents myself and add them to my brief. I ask for large documents to be sent in hard (as well as soft) copy. Document organisation is paramount. Folders are the key. Within my Dropbox folder, I have separate folders for each brief. Each brief has sub-folders for pleadings, correspondence, interlocutory matters, research, advices, etc. Information is useful only if it can be readily accessed. It can be readily accessed only if it is organised.

In order to access documents, I apply a standardised file-naming practice: [date in reverse order – matter name – document description] (for example, 17.02.14 – Sample – Offer of compromise). Using date in reverse order means that the documents will be sorted chronologically in your folders.

Having all my documents accessible means that I can be more discriminating about what to take home to work on. I no longer bother taking documents on the off chance that I might need to refer to them: they’re all already there waiting for me on my computer at home. When I work on documents at home, I do not need to email the amended version to myself. My computer in chambers updates the document instantly so that the amended version is waiting for me upon my return.

Recently, when appearing before Lindsay J of the Supreme Court, the court file did not have an appearance from my client. His Honour asked me if I had one. I did not have a hard copy in my brief. I did, however, have one in my Dropbox. I accessed it from my iPad and said: “I hand up my iPad.” His Honour rejoined: “You’re altogether too modern, Mr Kirby.” I, of course, did not dare disagree.

My Dropbox contains over 50,000 documents. I can pull up any one of them as I sit on the train on the way to Parramatta District Court. I pay about $100 per year for 100gb of storage (plenty more than I need).

Lawyers, being a cautious (I didn’t say paranoid) bunch, are, well... cautious of the risk cloud storage may pose. We are holders of our clients’ secrets. While Dropbox encrypts all the data it holds, it is conceivable that it could be the victim of successful cyber-attacks. It is also conceivable that being the subject of legislation such as the Patriot Act^[1] may increase the likelihood of another person being able to access clients’ documents. I try to console myself with the belief that this is a little far-fetched. If I, like some of my friends, was involved in high-stakes technology warfare (such as Apple v Samsung^[2]), I might choose not to store confidential intellectual property on Dropbox. But the fact is, I am not involved in that litigation, nor any against the US government generally or the CIA in particular. Still, I have introduced a disclosure on my costs agreement in which I say that I will store documents on Dropbox unless the client objects.

CREATING DOCUMENTS ON THE iPAD

While the iPad (or other tablet) is a valuable tool in court and for working remotely, it does have its limitations. It is great as a repository of large texts and finding cases and legislation, but is more limited when it comes to creating documents.

For starters, there is no separate keyboard. The touchscreen keyboard on the iPad is fairly good – particularly in landscape mode (that is, when the iPad screen is orientated on its side) – but it is slower to type on and less accurate than a physical keyboard. Many people have cases for their iPad with built-in keyboards. I have one made by Belkin. These are useful as the cases can be folded in such a way as to prop up the iPad as if it were a laptop screen. Apple’s own wireless keyboards also connect to your iPad via Bluetooth.^[3]

Since this article was first published, Microsoft Word has belatedly made its Office suite available for iPad (with a Microsoft 365 subscription). Alternatives to Word, however, are still popular. CloudOn is an app which links to your documents in the cloud (for example, Dropbox, Google Drive, etc) and from which you can create new Word documents.

MANIPULATING PDFs

Many of the documents we receive are in pdf format. You can view pdfs on the operating systems of most smartphones and tablets. But, as I mentioned before, I like to mark documents up as I read them. There are apps that allow you to do this digitally. GoodReader is the one I use.

Let’s say that you have been sent an email with an affidavit attached as a pdf. You can open and view that document simply by tapping the attachment. If, however, you hold your finger down on the attachment, a dialogue box will appear asking whether you want to open the document in various other apps (for example, iBooks, GoodReader, CloudOn, Dropbox, etc). Once you open the document in GoodReader, you can annotate the document by, for example, typing on it, underlining it or highlighting. You can save these mark-ups on to the original file or make a new, annotated version which you can then save in one of your Dropbox folders.

For example, last week, I downloaded or emailed various cases (in pdf format) from Jade, LexisNexis and Westlaw. I opened them in GoodReader. I highlighted them as I read them and saved the judgments in their annotated form. This way, when I print them out, I can print out an annotated copy for me and unannotated copies to hand up.

OTHER USEFUL APPLICATIONS

I still dictate documents occasionally. I don’t have a dictaphone, though. Rather, I use an app called ‘Dictate’ (formerly ‘Dictamus’) which turns my iPhone into a dictaphone. It has plenty of functionality: you can record over mistakes or insert lines at any point in the dictation. It also has a built-in workflow. This means that once I have finished a dictation, it automatically sends the file (in mp3 format) via email to a person who provides a (very reasonably priced) remote typing service. After sending such a file, I usually have a document in my inbox within an hour or two.

For legal research, Austlii has an app which is good for finding a case or finding the judicial treatment of a particular section of an Act (you can do this by finding the Act, clicking on the section and then clicking ‘Noteup’ at the top of the page).

Of course, you can use your internet browser to access any online subscriptions you have, including LexisNexis, Thomson Reuters Westlaw, and Jade.

Jade is particularly useful because you can mark-up cases as you read them by adding ‘Jademarks’. You can also add cases to your reading list and arrange cases by topics. The search functionality is Google-like in its intuitiveness and the cross-referencing between cases is very useful. References within cases are hyperlinked and, when you click on them, a small box opens on the page allowing you to read the cited paragraph of the judgment or the relevant section of the legislation. I subscribe to ‘Jade Professional’ which offers certain enhanced features. One of the most useful functions is the ability to upload documents and run them through Jade’s filters. Jade will link all the cases and legislation you have referred to, create lists of legislation and cases and let you know when your citations are wrong. That same function can be used to parse your opponent’s submissions – allowing you to easily check whether the citations indeed support the proposition for which they are employed.

I have recently begun to use billing and practice management software called ‘Bar Books’. While, as the name suggests, it is designed for barristers, it would be appropriate for any sole practitioner. The program manages time-keeping, expenses, tax reports and document templates such as letters, advices, invoices and statements. It also provides a very useful real-time bank reconciliation through a facility whereby it logs into your internet banking.

Don’t forget about your phone camera. Use it like a scanner/photocopier. Rather than write out your consent orders thrice, just take a photo of the copy you’re about to hand up.

SYNCING

One of the easiest and most useful ways to digitalise your practice is to keep your diary in order. Because I operate in the Apple environment, I work with my iMac’s native diary application, iCal. I subscribe to iCloud (Apple’s cloud service), which means that my iPhone, iPad and computers are all kept in sync. As soon as I add an appointment in one of my devices, it immediately appears in all of them. My wonderful clerks (Bob Rymer and his assistant Kate Gooch) subscribe to my calendar from their computers too. This allows them to see my diary and also to add new appointments directly into my calendar from their computers, from where they’ll immediately be transmitted to all my devices.

iCloud syncs all my other apps such as email, reminders and address book on all my devices.

VIRTUAL PRIVATE NETWORKS

Virtual private networks (known by their acronym, VPNs) are something I have begun using relatively recently. They essentially turn your iPad into a portal to your computer. I use one called ‘Parallels Access’. It allows me to access anything on either of my computers. Once I launch the app, I am asked to choose which computer I want to access (my iMac or my MacBook Pro). Once I have chosen the computer, I can work on any program within my computer. I find this particularly useful if I want to find an email which I have stored in an archive folder. It also allows me to use the full version of Word so that I am able to format documents the way I like them. The one drawback with this application is that the computer needs to be on (and not in sleep mode) in order to access it.

ONLY USE IT IF IT HELPS

‘Men have become the tools of their tools.’

Henry David Thoreau

It is important not to adopt technology for technology’s sake. For me, having a physical folder of key documents at the bar table is much more useful than having to find them on my laptop or iPad. I still prefer to make hard-copy affidavits my own by scrawling all over them and plying them with colourful stickies. But there are benefits to be found in readily available technology. There are new and efficient ways of doing things. Some of them are even fun.

I want to make two last points. First, don’t be daunted. To some readers everything I have said in this article will be old hat; to others, it will seem so beyond them that it seems far less trouble to just ignore it and keep doing things the old way. The point I wish to make is that it is not necessary to take an ‘all or nothing’ approach to the technology I have discussed in this article. This technology represents a snap-shot of what I am currently using in an incremental process of technological evolution. Just try one – perhaps purchase an eBook bundle the next time you’re in co-op bookshop – and see how you like it.

The second point is that this is not expensive. Dropbox is $100 per year. iCloud is about $30 per year. Most of the apps are free. Dictamus cost me $12 six years ago. Parallels Access is about $80 per year.

People often remark that it is almost impossible to imagine practice without email. The fact is, however, that email has been with us for only a relatively short time and many of us do remember practice without it. I don’t know which, if any, of the technologies discussed above will – like email – become part of our daily furniture. Technology moves rapidly. Its course is impossible to predict. Luckily, you don’t need to predict it. Rather, you should simply ask yourself: ‘What might be useful to me?’

Nicolas Kirby is a barrister at 12th Floor Wentworth Selborne Chambers, Sydney. PHONE

[phone] EMAIL [e-mail].

This is a reprise of an article first published in Bar News, Summer 2013-14, pp36-9.

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^[1] Uniting And Strengthening America By Providing Appropriate Tools Required To Intercept And Obstruct Terrorism (USA PATRIOT ACT) Act of 2001, 18 USC.

^[2] A series of ongoing lawsuits between Apple Inc. and Samsung Electronics regarding the design of smartphones and tablet computers.

^[3] Bluetooth is a wireless technology standard for exchanging data over short distances (using short-wavelength UHF radio waves) from fixed and mobile devices.