Solo Practice

Nolo Releases Plain English Dictionary iPhone App

One of my site sponsors, Nolo has just released a cool new iPhone app - a Plain English Legal dictionary, as described in this  Press Release.  From the Press Release,a description of the dictionary:

Edited by a team of lawyers with expertise in all the vital areas of the law, Nolo's Plain-English Law Dictionary contains nearly 4,000 legal terms defined in everyday, understandable language. You'll find both the legal standards—Latin terms, courtroom jargon, contract basics—and newly minted terms that reflect the ever changing language of the law today. What does it mean to get 'dooced'? Do you need that 'pre-dup'? Had a run-in with a 'patent troll' lately? Nolo is committed to finding and defining the latest twists in legal language that have entered our daily conversations—important words not found in other legal dictionaries. Nolo's Plain-English Law Dictionary is both authoritative and friendly, but it is not your grandfather's law dictionary.

The dictionary is aimed at law students and paralegals, but I can see value for lawyers as well.  For example, we often get so caught up in jargon that we know what a legal phrase means, but can't explain it precisely.  The Dictionary can help us translate that jargon to our clients.  And sometimes, new lawyers, or lawyers practicing in a new field may come across a concept that they're not familiar with.  Rather than have to ask what it means (or even worse, agree to something when we don't understand what it is!), lawyers need only pull out their iphone and surreptitiously find the definition.

I have an iphone so I'll be downloading the app.  Let me know if you do the same.  And thanks, Nolo for making the law more accessible to clients and easier even for us lawyers to understand.

Full post as published by My Shingle.com on July 13, 2009 (boomark / email).