What I've Been Up To

Well, it has been like drinking water from a fire hose here lately at the South Carolina Products Liability Law Blog.  As I indicated in a previous post, the last couple of months have been very busy, and my apologies for not having a more consistent blog schedule.  I have finally come up for air, and I look forward to some posts again very soon.

As I indicated in my prior post, I did a presentation on South Carolina tort reform to the Palmetto Paralegal Association on October 7, 2011.  The presentation was well-received, especially when I talked about the entire "Branham" issue that reared its head in the midst of the debate of the bill (and ultimately was not part of the final legislation). 

I am now tailoring this presentation (albeit a much briefer version) for presentation at a breakout session at the SCDTAA Annual Meeting.  I have been working with Frances Zacher and Ashley Cuttino to basically plan a joint breakout session for the products liability and torts/insurance substantive committees.  We plan to include a brief presentation by me on the "nuts and bolts" of the tort reform bill, and then a panel discussion with input from members of our judiciary about how it will affect case administration.  Frances and Ashley are going to lead this discussion and moderate, and we hope that it gives attending members the opportunity to learn more about the legislation and what it means for administration at the trial level (i.e., bifurcation of liability and punitive damages, etc.).

Finally, I attended the Primerus annual conference this past weekend in Charleston, South Carolina.  Collins & Lacy, P.C. is a proud member of the Primerus network of law firms, and the annual meeting included lawyers from all across the country.  There were some interesting presentations, and I was thoroughly impressed by a presentation conducted by Bob Weiss at Alyn-Weiss & Associates, Inc. in Lakewood, Colorada.  Bob presented the results of eight different studies on legal marketing, and some of what he found was very, very interesting.  Specifically, he reviewed some statistics of how counsel is chosen by clients and how it has changed over the years as a result of social media and the internet.  In short, the days of getting mileage out of a yellow pages ad are over (although he gave a caveat that it may still be relevant to a plaintiff's practice).  Surprisingly, studies indicate that "Youtube" and "Wikipedia" are pretty significant tools that counsel -- even in-house counsel -- use to choose counsel.  And as Bob put it, "That's right...youtube and Wikipedia."  Who knew. 

Anyway, thanks for your patience, and I hope to post some new, more substantive, products liability posts here in the next week.