This month I had the pleasure of reviewing www.lawlink.com, a new, free, online social Web site that connects attorneys from one end of the country to the other.

Oakland, California-based civil attorney Steven Choi founded Lawlink.com, the online social network exclusively for attorneys. It already has more than 1,500 nationwide have signed up on the site. Choi said he anticipates those numbers will pick up once more attorneys become aware the site is available.

What are the benefits of the site for attorneys? The major benefit is LawLink is foremost about giving and getting legal business, he said.

The LawLink setup is a lot like LinkedIn, where users can invite people to be in their network, and can contact people in their friends' networks. These networks give users a sense that contacts are re-screened, in a way, by their friends.  In addition to serving as a place where attorneys can post information about themselves, the LawLink site has forums and classified ads where attorneys can post legal questions and get referrals for different kinds of legal work.  Of major importance is building relationships in which attorneys can get outside help for a particular case they might be working on, or to find out about job opportunities and to refer clients to attorneys who may be outside of their own specialty areas.

So, it is important for attorneys to have a place where there's a pool of lawyers from all over the country. Choi likens the new site to social networking sites such as MySpace and FaceBook, with the exception that Lawlink is exclusively for attorneys. Choi has put procedures in place to make sure that when someone visits the site and applies for membership, they are, in fact, an attorney.

"We've had, and I don't know why, but we've had more than 20 fraudulent applications," he said. "You would think that people have better things to do. But, that's why we take the identifying information from the application and we contact that person offline to verify that they did apply."

Even before an attorney receives a call verifying his or her desire to become a member of the site, measures are taken to verify that the person who applies is a licensed attorney in good standing with appropriate professional associations.

"It's actually quite tedious," he said. "But we think it's an important part of the site."

Currently, only attorneys in the United States can sign up on the site, but Choi  received e-mails from attorneys practicing in Canada as well as other areas outside the country who want to become members.  There are already a number of ways for attorneys to network with each other, but  having a place on the Internet is much more powerful along with having a site that helps to facilitate building professional relationships adds to that power.  For attorneys who might be seeking to form a legal partnership with attorneys outside of their states a tool such as Lawlink allows attorneys at least a minimal relationship with attorneys from all over the country.  Like other social Web sites, attorneys who belong to Lawlink have a profile, photos and other career-related information.

Belonging to a site like Lawlink can help attorneys advance their careers.

"I don't know any attorneys that don't know other attorneys," Choi said. "It's a very tight-knit profession."

I'd say "check out lawlink.com"  but you can't. Let's leave that one to the lawyers.

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