Recent work by lawyers both in New York and California are leading to changes in those states’ ethics rules. Experts in the field talked about those changes during a Sunday Annual Meeting program.

Blogger Heather Armstrong knows first hand about the legal issues involving social media and the workplace. At a Friday program of the American Bar Association Annual Meeting, “Legal Issues From the Social Media Explosion: The Workplace,” Armstrong shared how posts criticizing her boss and co-workers on her blog, Dooce.com, got her fired.

Highlights from “A Conversation with Larry Tribe, Senior Counselor for Access to Justice, U.S. Department of Justice” at the ABA Annual Meeting in San Francisco.

Legal process outsourcing may be a flashpoint in the profession, but outsourcing legal processes is not a new concept, Michael Ford, executive vice president of UnitedLex Corp., told the American Bar Association Commission on Ethics 20/20 at a public hearing during the 2010 ABA Annual Meeting in San Francisco.

Last year’s economic slump left some new graduates holding deferral notices instead of paychecks; and for many of them, deferred start dates provided the perfect opportunity to cut their legal teeth by providing pro bono services to those in need. The trend was explored yesterday during “Law Firm Legal Aid: Where Are We One Year Later?”

The U.S. Senate, on opening day of the ABA Annual Meeting, confirmed Elena Kagan as an U.S. Supreme Court associate justice. Still, approximately 100 federal bench vacancies remain open. In a letter sent Thursday to the White House and leading senators on both sides of the aisle, ABA President Carolyn B. Lamm wrote that in many jurisdictions, “Persistent vacancies make it impossible for the remaining judges on the court to give each case the time it deserves.”

The delivery of legal services is shifting to the Internet, yet only 52 percent of solo practitioners have a website, said Richard S. Granat, a Palm Beach, Fla., lawyer and chair of the American Bar Association e-Lawyering Task Force, sharing that lawyers have a long way to go in meeting the expectations of today’s legal consumer.

Speaking to attendees at the Legislative and Governmental Advocacy Update session, ABA President-Elect Stephen Zack outlined a number of issues on which the ABA Governmental Affairs Office has been active. Specifically, Zack mentioned funding for the Legal Services Corporation, the Red Flags Rule and judicial compensation. Without the ABA, there would be no LSC, he noted.

Wisconsin Supreme Court Chief Justice Shirley S. Abrahamson has been named recipient of the American Bar Association Justice Center’s 2010 John Marshall Award in recognition of her exemplary lifelong commitment and dedication to the improvement of the administration of justice.

“Being out is one of the biggest political statements one can make,” according to Brent E. Adams, acting secretary of financial and professional regulation for the State of Illinois. “Being out has a snowball affect,” he added, “a positive one.”

In the more than 60 years since World War II, there have been several genocides around the globe. The pledge of “never again,” so far, has come up short. Experts recently gathered to discuss an emerging declaration called the “Responsibility to Protect “ doctrine – endorsed by the U.N. General Assembly in September 2005 and by the U.N. Security Council in 2006 – and to advocate for its implementation.

It seems everyone has an idea about how to make education better. The federal government thought it nailed the formula when No Child Left Behind was enacted in 2002. We can all agree that no child should be left behind. But, as a panel of education experts determined at the ABA Annual Meeting in Chicago, after seven years, we’re still leaving some kids behind.