Three Ways to Build a Better Contact Database

December 15th, 2014
MMM Tech Law Video Channel

As technology has advanced, so have the tools available to lawyers in the area of contact management—the art of maintaining and managing information on contacts, clients and prospects. The challenge for the lawyer in the digital (paperless) age is to find the most efficient, collaborative and effective way to handle contact information without spending inordinate amounts of time and money.

The goal for lawyers should be to establish a collaborative database, allowing authorized users in the firm or legal department to have access to the permitted contacts of others.

To understand how technology furthers this goal,

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Patents vs. Trade Secrets: Which Promotes Innovation Better?

November 7th, 2014
MMM Tech Law Video Channel

by John R. Harris, Morris, Manning & Martin, LLP patent-or-trade-secret-2

The patent system has been criticized as not actually promoting innovation.  Aside from the fact that the patent system is embedded in the U.S. Constitution (Article 1, Section 8) and cannot be readily eliminated, there is recent evidence that perhaps the Founding Fathers were on to something in creating a system to “promote the progress of science and useful arts” with a patent system.

Patents and trade secrets are two very different forms of intellectual property (IP) protection.  Patents (the word means, in Latin,

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