This is good news for Apple, not so much for Microsoft: large law firms' chief information officers are supporting their lawyers’ use of Apple and Android personal devices for firm business, as 88% expect to provide less BlackBerry support over the next 12 months.

However, only 7% of technology managers plan to migrate their enterprise systems to Microsoft’s touchscreen-friendly Windows 8 operating system in the next year.
This is according to the annual survey of law technology in the November issue of ALM’s "The American Lawyer" and online at americanlawyer.com. Other highlights in The American Lawyer’s new issue include:

While allowing personal phone, tablet and other device use, law firm CIOs are still wrestling with the security issues they present, according to the survey. Nearly two-thirds of the firms prohibit lawyers from using cloud storage and synchronization services on mobile devices, and a similar number use mobile device management (MDM) software to exercise some control over them. On the other hand, 80% place no restriction on mobile apps that can be downloaded to personal devices used for work.

° At the enterprise level, however, cloud computing is becoming more widely accepted, with 50% of CIOs reporting increased usage compared to last year; only 3% are using it less. Still, opinions diverge dramatically on which applications should move to the cloud.

° Social networking technology is being used to some degree by 75% of responding firms. Among them, LinkedIn is used by 90%, Twitter by 64%, and Facebook by 61%. The survey is based on responses from 83 Am Law 200 firms between mid-July and mid-September.

-- Dennis Sellers