Article on Social Media’s Role in Legal Practice

Michael H. Rubin (Attorney, Louisiana) & Kathy Gutierrez (Attorney, Texas) has recently published an article entitled, The Social Media Thicket, Surviving and Thriving in the Tangled Thorny Issues, 59 Prob. & Prop. July/August 2012. The introduction to his article is provided below: 

When more than half of all in-house counsel report using social media for news and information, when 81-year old Rupert Murdoch uses Twitter, when the fastest growing cohort on Facebook includes those over the age of 50, when the Association of Corporate Counsel has a user group on LinkedIn, and when bloggers regularly break important stories and appear on television and radio news broadcasts, you can be sure that social media permeates society. No lawyer can afford to ignore social media. 

Lawyers and law firms are increasingly using social media today to build their reputations, to inform existing clients, and to reach potential clients.

Can the use of social media create ethical problems for attorneys? Can lawyers inadvertently back themselves into ethical corners? Let’s consider four examples, all of which are based on real situations. The purpose of these examples is not to scare anyone into abandoning social media; rather, the purpose is to make us more aware of the issues involved and to think through why and how we use social media. Further, this article does not answer questions but rather poses issues to be considered by those who use (or who are thinking about using) social media.