I’m presenting at two of the nine days of the MSBA’s “Nine Days in June” convention (check out the details of the unconventional convention here). My topic– shared on one day with Todd Scott of Minnesota Lawyers Mutual — is “Reasonably Priced Technology.” Given that “reasonably priced” is in the eye of the pocketholder, I slyly changed my part of the presentation to “Free, Cheap & Easy,” and highlighted a few of the software applications or services that I think could make a difference in your practice.

I then turned it into a presentation on yet another free cloud-based application, called SpicyNodes, which I’ve had a lot of luck using in presentations, as it has a nice way of giving the viewer an overview of all the parts contained in the whole. The presentation is embedded below but is also available in full technicolor here. Click on the various topics and it will expand out into subtopics and so on and so on. The point is that you’ll get a quick overview of the various technologies that have impressed me over the last year or so. I’ve also listed them below (and will add more as I can) for a more sane and linear way of tracking them down. Have fun, and let me know any of your favorites that may not have made my list.

The Free:

• Firefox (you’re not using this? Egads!)
• Jureeka (Firefox add-on that catches legal citations on the web. Available for Google Chrome but I cannot seem to get it to install at the moment)
• Fastcase (legal research, free for MSBA members)
• practicelaw (hey, I’m biased, but who can resist 600+ free legal forms?)
• Dropbox (my top favorite at the moment)
• Evernote (my newest discovery. Move over bookmarks, this is the way to go.)
• Google (includes Google Apps, Google Profile, Google Analytics, and Google Scholar) Need to find one of these? Google it.

The Cheap:

• LogMeIn (access your computer from anywhere, even your iPhone)
• mnfindalawyer (where else can you establish a legal profile for $40 per year?)
• mndocs (again, my bias, but twenty-five bucks for a document assembly system? It’s a steal.)

The Easy:

• RocketMatter (in my mind the better of all practice management solutions, topping Clio)
• Clio (see above, but this one’s just a step below)
• FreshBooks (by far the best invoicing system on the web, even mailing out snail mail invoices to your clients with return envelopes, all for a buck seventy-nine a shot)