Hello, everybody. Josh King here; Avvo’s General Counsel. What I am here to talk about today is a specific question that comes up a lot from attorneys who are new to blogging, or new to even the concept to finding other blogs to follow. They get the idea that reading blogs from other attorneys is a great thing. They know they can really learn from the dialogue and discussion that goes on in blogs in their practice area or blogs about the practice of law, but they do not really know where to begin. How to you find these blogs? Once you have found them, how do you avoid having to go and look at every single one of them every day? That is what I am here to talk about today: finding blogs and following blogs, specifically with an eye to following and finding legal blogs.
I am actually going to start with the “following”, because I think this is a really important place to begin. I read probably on the order of 80 or 90 different legal blogs. When I have mentioned that in the past to lawyers, I get a little bit of an exasperated sigh. ‘How on God’s green earth am I going to read 80 or 90 legal blogs?’ The fact of the matter is they are not all updated every day, so it is not necessarily that arduous. More importantly, you do not have to go out and look at every single one of these blogs every day. You do not need to create some elaborate system of bookmarks within your browser so that you can go and look and every blog every day and say, ‘There was an update today. No update today.’ There’s absolutely no need to do that. Here is how you deal with it, very simply: Google Reader.
Google Reader relies on something called RSS (Real Simple Syndication), which essentially every blog works through and every blog syndicates out its content to various ways of aggregating and reading that content. There is lots of technology there, but the simple thing to keep in mind is that you have got a free tool that you can use, where all of the updates from the blogs are automatically added. There are other readers out there: free ones and paid ones, but Google Reader is dead simple. It integrates with everything else that Google does, and it is completely free. That is what I have used for years, and it is the reader I would recommend to anyone who is getting started with aggregating and reading blog content. You simply sign up for your Google Reader account, and then there is a very simple process of cutting and pasting the URL from any blog that you want to follow in the “subscribe” box on the left-hand side of the Google Reader pane. Voila, you get updates to that blog. Every time the author of that blog writes a new post, that update automatically appears in your Google Reader. You simply need to set a bookmark for Google Reader, and anytime you want, you can go and see all of the new posts. It archives all of the old posts, so you can go back through there. It allows you to star posts that you like so that they are put into a certain category that you can go back to and review them at another time. It is a great way to stay on top of all of the new stuff that is posted.
Besides simply subscribing, you can also organize it as you get more blogs that you are following. I certainly do this with the 80 or 90 that I read. They are organized into categories. It is a simple folder system, just like you use in an email system, where you can set up folders for, let us say, other bankruptcy law bloggers. Then maybe you have bloggers you want to follow on civil procedure, criminal law, constitutional issues, or election issues, and indeed, even non-legal areas of interest, if you follow bloggers. For those blogs, for instance, bicycle bloggers or running bloggers, whatever the case may be, you can set up specific sub-folders for those so that you can dive in and review them whenever you want.
Reader also integrates with a variety of mobile apps. None of them, unfortunately, are provided by Google yet, but there are free apps provided by others that allow you to view your Google Reader account when you are on the go. Whether it is on an iPhone, Android, or tablet, those all synchronize back to your main Google Reader account so that if you have marked updates as “read,” they will not reappear as unread items. Again, Google Reader is a very simple, powerful tool for staying on top of blogging.
Also, with respect to following, I find it important to follow those bloggers that I am really interested in, who I want to engage with, on Twitter. Simply make sure that if you are on Twitter, that you are following those bloggers. Most people who blog, and who are active on Twitter, will make it easy for you to find their Twitter handle. Follow them and see what they have to say. They will often times, and this relates to my finding concept, point you to other content that you may be interested in.
Finally, always leave comments. I am not saying leave comments in everything you read — that would be ridiculous. But anytime you read something that really resonates with you, that is really thought-provoking, or that you think is wrong, it is a great practice to engage with the blogger and leave your thoughts in the comments. If you are ever torn on whether or not you should leave a comment, I always tell people to err on the side of leaving one. Those who are taking the time to write blogs love seeing the engagement that comes in through thoughtful comments, even if they disagree with you, so err on the side of doing that.
The next issue is how you find all these great blogs to follow; the 80 or 90 that I am following, watching, and looking for updates in Google Reader. I am not going to pretend that it is really simple or that there is a magic bullet. Really, the first place to start is with your favorite search engine. Go to Google or Bing and enter in the type of search that is relevant to where you want to start. Again, I think you would want to typically start with stuff that is relevant to your practice area. If you want to follow bankruptcy law developments, you might enter a search like ‘bankruptcy law blog,’ and I would always add the term ‘law blog.’ You will get page after page of results, in Google or Bing. Then you need to take the time, and again, this is not necessarily something you will do all at once, but maybe in a series of sessions, and read through each of those results. See if there is the type of blog that is at least somewhat regularly updated, if it is a writing style you like, if you think it is cogent and well reasoned. If it looks good, and again, I would err on the side of keeping anything that looks good, drop it into your Google Reader account. It is very easy to add the subscriptions and very easy to delete them later if you decide it is no longer relevant for you. That way you can start keeping a running list based on the results you are finding relevant out of your search engine results.
Next, you can go to lists. I have listed three of the top compilations of legal blogs. One, of course is Avvo’s Top Legal Blogs list. They are ranked according to the Alexa Ranking of popularity of online sites. There are about 450 legal blogs referenced there and a great place to dive in and start looking. Again, this is particularly if you want to dive into a list of more general legal content once you have gotten through the more specific practice area-devoted blogs. Then you can go look at the ABA Blawg Directory. That is a listing of many blogs that the ABA Journal thinks are relevant and well written. Finally, TheLaw.com Legal Blog Watch, a shorter list, but it is somewhat well curated. A bit of mixed quality within those blogs on TheLaw.com Legal Blog Watch, but there are some excellent blogs listed there, and it is another good resource to take a look at.
Very importantly, once you have a core series of blogs that you really like to follow, bloggers that you respect, look at their blog roles. This is simply a list of links, typically in the right-hand column of the blog, that lists other blogs that that blogger likes. These will typically be blogs that are active, well written, and are somewhat well related to content of the blog that you are already reading. Diving into those can provide an additional means of finding a lot of other great blogs that you would not have found otherwise.
Finally, I am just going to give a few suggestions. I always get this question, whenever I’m giving a talk on blogging or the ethics of blogging; ‘What are some great legal blogs to look at?’ Here are just three examples of good places to start. They are all active bloggers, all with good blog roles. One is MyShingle.com from Carolyn Elephant. It’s a terrific blog devoted to all things relating to the practice of law, as a solo practitioner. PopeHat is one of my favorite blogs about liberty and all sorts of issues related to the practice of law. Finally, OverLawyered, by Walter Olson, is a very active, well maintained blog. It is a little bit focused on the excesses of the legal system, but something that will no doubt speak to many lawyers.
That is it. That is my advice for the best ways to both find and follow all the legal blogs you can read. Thank you very much.
