TheBuzz Erika Engle

Blogs are not just for venting anymore

Certain blog authors' possession of an actual pulse may be questionable, nevertheless, blogging is seen as a viable marketing tool by many people in many industries.

The legal profession, for instance.

Lawyers even have their own iteration of the word blog, which is itself a corruption of the term Web log.

Lawyers' blogs are often called blawgs - they discuss the l-a-w and blog and blawg are pronounced the same, not to put too fine a point on it.

Damon Key Leong Kupchak Hastert, one local law firm, has blawgs by four of its attorneys linked on its Web site. They spell it b-l-o-g-s, however.

Firm director Robert Thomas writes about land-use law, eminent domain and property rights; director Mark Murakami blawgs about maritime and ocean law; and insurance law talk flows from the fingers of associates Robert D. Harris and Tred Eyerly, as that is their area of practice.

A completely unscientific perusal of other large local firms' Web sites didn't turn up blawg links, but Honolulu attorney Philip R. Brown has one. His most recent entry was in February.

The Hawaii State Bar Association Web site does not provide a list of local blawgs, but it did point TheBuzz to the most recent issue of The Complete Lawyer, a magazine that is also posted online.

It features an enjoyable Q&A with Honolulu attorney Jeffrey Portnoy (not a blawg-er, per his firm's Web site).

It also has a primer for would-be blawg-ers.

Writer and professional marketer Dawn Wagenaar indicates that legal blogs sprouted about six years ago and there are now some 2,000 online.

Blog content is becoming admissible as evidence in some court cases, she reported.

It is a good read for anyone considering online authorship as it includes such pause for consideration as, "anything you say in a blog may still be held against you in a court of law or a job interview."

Yikes.

Those undeterred from soldiering on should also read "Web Logs for Lawyers: Lessons from Ernie the Attorney," which shows how a single attorney kicked a 500-attorney firm's Web site in the briefs.