Law Technology

Answering Simple Questions

By Bryan

I just read a great article by Jim Calloway. He points people to an article that he recently wrote for the Oklahoma Bar Association explaining how to answer simple questions by searching the internet. I can think of several people off the top of my head who would benefit from reading this article.

Jim explains that the genesis of his article is the fact that he often sees people publish questions to list serves that they could easily answer themselves. As Jim explains:

So today I propose an answer to a question that has troubled me for years. Why would that person send that question to hundreds of people via e-mail when they could simply find the answer online themselves?

The irony is that they probably find it themselves as quickly as they can type the question and send the e-mail. So why bother hundreds of others? I have determined that part of the answer to my question is narcissism and laziness. It doesn?t bother some people to force hundreds of others to reach for the delete key if they can get what they need.

But, I now believe that most people simply don?t know they can now get instant answers to almost anything online or they don?t know how.

Many lawyers who can do superb digital legal research for their clients seem to not know how to do other online research. They can easily find precedents and cases, but cannot easily find the flash point of kerosene. (Oh, wait, that?s in 25 Oklahoma Statutes § 34 and the Oklahoma Constitution; bad example.)

I recommend that you read the article and pass it around to “those people” who never bother to answer their own questions.

If you are curious, as I was, about why the flashpoint of kerosene is in the Oklahoma constitution, a Goggle search will lead you to the answer.

Full post as published by The Connected Lawyer on April 23, 2008 (boomark / email).