When blog software first showed up, I doubt anyone realized just how big of a deal it would be for lawyers.
Before then, if you were a lawyer with insight—something meaningful to say about the law, about helping people, or even just about what you were seeing in your day-to-day practice—you had very few ways to say it.
Sure, you could try your luck with a law journals or treatises, but unless you were in academia or already known, that door rarely opened. Trade journals? Maybe, if you had the time and the editor’s ear. But for most practicing lawyers like me—especially those outside the biggest firms—publishing was something other lawyers did.
You could know aspects of the law inside and out. You could be doing work that mattered. But you were effectively shut out—or presumed you were. I wrote one chapter for Matthew Bender—there’s a name out of the past—on the use of learned treatises in a trial—but I am not sure anyone read it.
Even the internet didn’t fix it—at least not at first. Early websites weren’t built for publishing. They were static and clunky when it came to writing. Built in tables and cells, they depended on designers and developers. If you wanted to share something with the world, there was no clear path. Web publishing—if you could even call it that—was like using a chisel and stone.
Then came blog software.
Suddenly, a lawyer could sit down, write something worth sharing—an insight, a story, a warning, a lesson—and publish it. Right then and there. No waiting for approval. No gatekeepers.
And lawyers did—or at least a few of them.
Not because they wanted to be bloggers. But because they had something to say. They wanted to help people. They wanted to shine a light on issues that mattered. They wanted to explain the law in plain English, or weigh in on how it could be applied. They wanted to contribute. Now they finally could.
This was publishing—real publishing.
The kind of publishing that had always been reserved for journalists, editors and reporters. The kind that shapes conversations and builds reputations. Only now it wasn’t just happening in newsrooms or on legal publishing printing presses. It was happening at kitchen tables, in offices, in court chambers, through a simple piece of software.
That’s the shift we should remember.
Blogging was the term that caught on, but what was really happening was far more powerful: lawyers were stepping into the role of publisher. And when they did, they didn’t just make their voices heard—they built names for themselves. Reputations. Networks. Businesses.
Of course, over time, the word “blog” got twisted. Some firms started churning out SEO copy labeled as blog posts. Marketing companies and even legal publishers with their Martindale-Hubbells and Findlaws got caught up in the game. Content written for algorithms, not people. That’s not publishing. That’s advertising dressed up as something else.
But real publishing? When a lawyer sits down to share their experience, their take on a new regulation, or their thoughts on where the law might be headed—that still matters.
It’s how lawyers help people—and connect with people. How they advance the law. How they build trust and grow something real.
Maybe it’s time to stop worrying about what we call it. Blog, post, article, alert, whatever.
If you’re writing to be useful—to be honest—to be helpful—you’re publishing.
And that still makes all the difference.