It works by allowing the user to open a pdf and make it the “background” of a drawing. Once the pdf is opened into the program, it is placed into a document manager and may be called up any time for annotation. From the short video introduction show below (cheesy music not ours, highlighting begins midway through), we can see that users can highlight in any color, draw onto the PDF and type notes just as if the file was opened in Acrobat on a computer except instead of using a mouse, you use the touchscreen of the iPad.

This truly is the solo-practitioner’s dream for a trial presentation machine since the iPad has a VGA connector accessory which mirrors the iPad’s screen to a projector. Thus using this app, an attorney could open a medical record or other document, display it on the screen for the jury and, using his finger, highlight, draw and otherwise annotate the document. Since the annotations are not permanent but exist on a ‘layer’ above the pdf, they can be turned on and off with the push of an icon at the top of the screen. The days of having an assistant at counsel’s table trying to figure out where a attorney wants to highlight or zoom on a document with Sanction or Trial Director are over. Give me an iPad and an projector and I am suddenly a self-contained trial machine.

Unfortunately, our iPads will not arrive until April 3. Check back then for hands-on videos.

8:10 AM
Walking out of the store with the new iPhone. Activation took about 10 minutes and is a requirement to purchase the iPhone. All of our previous accessories, save for the docking station all work even though the iPhone 3G is slightly rounded in the back as opposed to the flat back of the original iPhone. This makes the phone contour to your hand and easier to type with one hand.

The 3G feels a little bit lighter in your hand, probably due to the lack of metal backing. The 3G comes with an all black or all white (16GB model only) backing.

8:00 AM
In store getting iPhone!

7:27 AM
Mike Stevens from Kentucky Law Review came to provide donuts and coffee to our fellow line-sitters!

7:07 AM
Line’s gotten a lot longer since an hour ago. It’s already beginning to wrap around the building!

6:41 AM
The line has been allowed to form early! We are happy.

6:28 AM
People are beginning to amass in front of the store despite security’s insistence. Our money is on the group since there’s only one security guard.

6:24 AM -
A group of “late-comers” is disbanded by the security guard. “There shall be no line until 7:00″.

5:04 AM -
Three more people have arrived. Starting to get a good group going now.

4:49 AM -
Starting to pick up on visitors now. Within the past fifteen minutes we’ve had three other people arrive.

4:18 AM -
Third and fourth person have shown up for the iPhone 3G line. Justin and Jared join Technoesq in line. We’re starting a line with lawnchairs. I actually remember one of the guys from last year’s line. It’s a small world!

3:53 AM -
The second person in line has arrived at The Summit. This other gentleman arrived to wait in line for his son who told his father he had to have the iPhone 3G.

11:18 PM -
TechnoEsq has arrived at the AT&T Store located at The Summit. Security is tight on the premises and they have vowed to not allow anyone to line up until 7:00 am tomorrow. So TechnoEsq is camped in the car. There are a few other vehicles in the parking lot, but none with anyone waiting in them so TechnoEsq is first here. To further secure our stake in line, we have placed a folding chair by the door, in case there is any question as to who was ‘first’ here… more to come.

The Mark:

Law firms looking to cut costs by outsourcing their legal support services overseas could be jeopardizing their client confidentiality, according to a recent federal suit filed by a Bethesda, Md. firm.

Joseph Hennessey, name partner at Newman McIntosh & Hennessey, turned to the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia on May 7 seeking a ruling on the outsourcing of privileged client data that may be subject to eavesdropping by the U.S. government.

Hennessey, who in 2005 wrote this column for Legal Times on the Fourth Amendment and privacy rights, says foreign companies have no presumption of privacy because the National Security Agency is free to spy on them without constitutional constraints.

“We are really heading toward a collision between globalized economic interests and the limited extension of constitutional rights,” Hennessey says.

The lawsuit names President George W. Bush as a co-defendant along with Acumen Legal Services of India and its U.S. subsidiary, Acumen Solutions of Houston, Texas.

The firm is looking to the court to rule on whether outsourcing of legal services compromises constitutional rights and whether consent should be required before such data is sent abroad. It also wants the court to order law firms to disclose their use of foreign legal support and to order that the government establish protocols to shield attorney-client information from surveillance.

“It seeks this declaration knowing that foreign nationals who reside overseas lack Fourth Amendment protections,” says the firm’s complaint for declaratory judgment and injunctive relief. “It seeks this declaration having been informed … that the United States government engages in pervasive surveillance of electronically transmitted data.”

Hennessey, who also has filed requests for opinions with the D.C. Bar and the Maryland State Bar Association, says Acumen solicited his company via emails earlier this year.

“It’s not paranoia. It’s just fact,” Hennessey says. “Now that we’re outsourcing services, we have given no consideration to the ongoing practice of the government harvesting information out there.”

He says he’s also concerned that information from his firm, which especializes in personal injury and medical malpractice, could — through discovery — fall into the hands of competitors who employ outsourced services.

District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly, who also is chief judge of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, has been assigned to the case. A representative for Acumen’s corporate headquarters in India had no comment.

Many experts foresee this as Microsoft’s first foray into the SaaS (Software as a Service) method of distributing software much as Google’s last year. Examples of this type of software include RocketMatter and Clio, both practice management services which reside on the ‘cloud’ or Internet servers instead of on the user’s computer.

One thing is for sure, when Microsoft enters into a market, it has shown enough potential to become the ‘next big thing’ and definitely part of what hip people are referring to as Web 3.0.

Adobe Air Acrobat.com. It seems like a great new pdf-conversion, file sharing, screen-sharing, collaboration, video-conferencing tool. Caveat: remember my post only a couples weeks ago regarding how ADrive (online file service) apparently reserves the right to share your metadata with its partners?

Say hello to the new adobe air acrobat.com services agreement, paragraph 5.1 regarding “Your Content”:

…By maintaining your Content on the Services, you grant to Adobe a non-exclusive, worldwide, perpetual, royalty-free and fully paid license under all intellectual property rights to copy, distribute, transmit, publicly display, publicly perform, transmit, and reformat your Content solely to deliver the Services to you. Adobe shall make commercially reasonable efforts to block the uploading of Content to the Services that contains viruses detected by using industry standard virus detection software.

(Attorneys, especially) Yes, that was the hair on the back of your neck standing up. If a file service of any type reserves the right to “copy, distribute, transmit, publicly display” your communications or work-product, please re-consider. As always, a little due diligence goes a long way; read the services agreement.

Thanks Dan for the heads-up on this extremely important issue to lawyers using Acrobat.com.

Rick has actually used the new version, Acrobat 9.0 and one of the most exciting aspects in my opinion is that it is reportedly much faster. The main application loads in a third of the time as previous versions and all aspects of the program are allegedly much ‘snappier’.

Among the new features are (Click the image for a video of the new feature):

Enhanced Redaction



Specific Enhancements including, Redact using Patterns to find Social Security Numbers, Emails, Redact using Word Lists, Redact entire pages, Apply Redactions in batch and Automatically rename files with a suffix of your choosing (_redacted)

Bates Numbering



Easily select entire folders for numbering, Set an output folder so your originals stay untouched, Rename files on output with a prefix or suffix and Rename files to Bate range e.g. 000001-000039.pdf


Enhanced Typewriter Tool



Set Typeface font, Set color of text, Set size of text and Enable the Typewriter tool for Adobe Reader users (Pro only)


File splitting
Split files by, File Size, Number of Pages, Top-level Bookmarks, Rename files with prefix and suffix and Split multiple files


Better Save to Word with flowing text
Save documents with flowing text, Retain most formatting for easier editing and Export multiple PDFs to Word or other formats using Export Multiple feature


Enhanced Form Creation from scanned PDF’s
Acrobat 9 Standard can now create and Reader-enable forms, Automatically find form fields on scanned documents, Easier form authoring which allows you to “Stamp” form fields on documents, Collect form data on Acrobat.com, SharePoint or a network folder


PDF Portfolios (Packages on steroids!)
Look professional using nicely designed layouts which can play Flash movies, Organize files in folders, Built-in preview of Word, Excel, and other Office files, Search non-PDF documents in a package, Sort by date, number or text and Rename files
Direct editing of header fields


More powerful Document Comparison (Completely Rewritten)
Compare all changes in documents including text, images, moved pages, etc., Summarize changes as annotations to documents, Find differences in pictures and Choose what you want to compare— or ignore— including images, headers and footers, etc.

Pricing and Availability
Acrobat 9 Pro Extended, Acrobat 9 Pro and Acrobat 9 Standard for Microsoft Windows®, and Acrobat 9 Pro for Mac OS X, are expected to be available by July 2008 in English, French, German, and Japanese language versions. Acrobat 9 Pro Extended is expected to be available for US$699, and registered users of qualifying earlier versions of Acrobat2 can upgrade to Acrobat 9 Pro Extended for US$229. Acrobat 9 Pro is expected to be available for US$449, and registered users of qualifying earlier versions of Acrobat3 can upgrade to Acrobat 9 Pro for US$159. Acrobat 9 Standard is expected to be available for US$299, and registered users of qualifying earlier versions of Acrobat4 can upgrade to Acrobat 9 Standard for US$99.

If you haven’t checked out Rick’s blog, you really need to, it’s full of great tips on Acrobat.

We have all seen the cost of presentations climb and effectively price themselves out of the ordinary case budget and our goal is to fill that void. TechnoEsq provides high-quality custom presentations for mediation and trial which, though tailored to your specific needs, will be affordable for you and your clients. This will give the digital edge to all of your cases no matter how big or small.

In addition to custom presentations and computer forensics, TechnoEsq provides digitization of almost any analog media, from micro-cassette and VHS tapes to photographs and X-rays. We will also shortly be providing a free resource for those seeking virtual assistants to hire on a contract or per job basis. Be sure to check it out at TechnoEsq Presentations and as we mentioned previously, TechnoEsq’s blog will be moving to TechnoEsq.com/blog and TechnoEsq.com will become the portal for all of the services we offer.

According to University of Pennsylvania professor Matt Blaze, the Justice Department’s Inspector General’s office failed to properly redact data in it’s March report concerning the FBI’s final allocation of the $500 million given to help telephone companies retrofit their old switches to make them compliant with the Communications Assistance to Law Enforcement Act (CALEA).

TechnoEsq has examined the document in question and was able to recover all information ‘redacted’ from the document. This information included amounts paid to Verizon for new switches as well as logs of HelpDesk complaints made concerning the FBI’s online website.

This further reinforces the importance of proper redaction of PDF’s in any office environment dealing with confidential material, as in a law office. To further assist our readers, we will be creating a short tutorial detailing how to properly redact a PDF using Acrobat 8.0. This will be in the coming weeks once TechnoEsq has made the switch to our new location at TechnoEsq.com/blog. Until then, be sure to check out TechnoEsqPresentations.com to get a peak at what will replace our main page here at TechnoEsq and see what new services we are providing.

In the meantime, Finis Price, co-founder of TechnoEsq will be writing about redaction in the next edition of the Kentucky Justice Association’s “The Advocate”.

TechnoEsq welcomes Edward Brutscher as a contributing author to our growing blog. Ed recently became a solo practitioner to assist insurance companies, their insureds, individuals, and businesses with cases requiring a specialized understanding of tort and insurance law. We are proud to have Ed writing for us and anticipate many enlightening articles from him.

This is the first of a series of guest articles on free software that I have incoporated into my solo law practice. Feel free to leave a comment, or if you like, you can reach me at 502.855.3140 or eabrutscher@kytortjournal.com.

Have a document that you want to scan to your computer and save as a PDF file? Simply scan it and save it as a PDF file, right? Perhaps. However, what if your scanner or multifunction printer doesn’t convert to PDF? Many scanners will only convert documents into an image. This image must then be viewed like any other picture. Scan more than one page and you are left with multiple images, which must be saved, stored, and viewed separately. Try to email a multipage document and you must attach each image separately. The recipient must then view each attachment as a separate image. Hardly, the easiest and most professional way of sending documents to your clients.

Adobe has perfected the PDF process with its Acrobat Professional software. However, like most proprietary software (think Microsoft Office) it is big, expensive and resource intensive. It also may offer more bells and whistles than the standard user really needs. Run a search of programs scanning to PDF and almost all require you to pay. I recently incorporated a free program into my office that will convert your scanned images or hard drive images to PDF. It’s called Scan2PDF 1.5 by Softpedia.

Softpedia describes Scan2PDF as follows; “Scan2PDF enables you to scan paper documents and save them to PDF format on your computer for digital archiving or backup. In addition, you can also load images from your hard drive and combine them with a scanned document, or combine multiple documents/images into a single PDF file.” Best of all, its totally free.

I use the program and find it to be a great free alternative that is useful in those times when I need to scan a small number of documents or a multipage document like a pleading. I can then either save it to my file or email it. I can add as many images to the file as I chose. I can also place them in whatever order I want. Save them to PDF and your done. No big and expensive software to buy. Unfortunately, the interface is at times difficult to learn and there is no help file or instruction manual. You’ll simply need to play around with it to get the hang of it. This is not something everyone will want to do. One of the trickiest issues is saving the image in a size that is compatible with a PDF reader such as Adobe Acrobat Reader. It took several tries before I realized I needed to reduce the compression to 600 x 800 to reduce the image to a standard 8.5′ by 11.5′ legal size paper. However, once you get the hang of it, the software does exactly what you want. It scans documents into the PDF format.

You can google the software or you can download Scan2PDF 1.5, here. (Scan2PDF 1.6 is now available, here, but I have not yet used it). Be careful of imitations that offer a free trial, only to require purchase after a limited time. Scan2PDF is freeware. Overall, I give Scan2PDF a positive rating as follows:

Pros:

• Free
• Simple design
• Not scanner dependent
• Not a resource hog
• Does exactly what it says
• Did I mention its free

Cons:

• Interface can be confusing
• No help or instructions

Ed Brutscher

FailSafe offers full disk encryption as well as the ability to remotely disable the hard drive in a laptop “ensuring failsafe protection against data theft and personal information loss”. In addition to allowing the laptop owner to lock-down the hard drive, rendering it useless to a thief, it will also be possible to remotely erase the drive. Further information was not provided on the upcoming Fujitsu FailSafe hard drives but we will keep you posted once any more information becomes available.