This post continues my public service outreach on a program developed by the Connecticut Bar Foundation.

As I mentioned earlier this month, I am chairing what I expect will be a terrific educational program on April 9th at UConn Law School on how technology is changing the practice of law. Full details to this free program are available here.  We hope this symposium will sell out, so please register today (did I mention it includes breakfast and lunch and is FREE?). 

We’ve spread the word through conventional means (ads, e-mails, mailings) but there are still many others who we think will benefit from this (particularly for those out-of-state who would like to see the webinar). Thus, we’re going to try to use the power of social media to do so.  We need your help.

Here’s how you can help:

Everyone knows (or should know) of at least one U.S. Supreme Court case.  It could be a favorite case, a notable one, or even an obscure one.   We thought it would be fun to try to summarize, comment on, or write something pithy on that Supreme Court case.  But there’s a catch.  Can you do so in 140 characters or less; in other words, in a "tweet" that you can post to Twitter? 

What do we mean? Take these examples:

  • Brown v. Bd of Ed: Remember Plessy v. Ferguson? We don’t know what we were thinking. Yes, separate schools are inherently unequal #cbftech
  • What would Law & Order be without its most common phrase "You Have the Right to Remain Silent"? Thank you Miranda v. AZ #cbftech
  • Roe v. Wade: The decision that determined how George Washington got across the Delaware River #cbftech

Ok, so the last one might not pass muster, but hopefully you’re getting the idea (and we’ll explain the hashtag below).  In essence, we’re asking you to come up with your favorite Supreme Court summary tweet.  We’ll be asking all of our presenters at the symposium to come up with their favorite "tweet" of a Supreme Court case and will share them with you as well. I’ve already seen a few and you have your work cut out for you.

So how do you participate? A few simple steps:

  • First, using any Twitter account, just "tweet" or post your summary.  It can be serious, funny, pithy, cute, whatever you wish.  But it has to be on Twitter. No e-mails or comments to this post will be included in the contest though you are welcome to add one. (For tips on how to get started on Twitter, click here.)
  • Next, and this is critical, you MUST use the hashtag (or symbol) of #cbftech for your tweet. This hashtag is being used to promote the Connecticut Bar Foundation symposium and is the official tag for the conference. In addition to spreading the word about the free educational conference, it will also allow us to keep track of the tweets.
  • You can enter as many tweets as you’d like. In fact, we hope to spread the word about this contest so tweet early and often!  But only tweets made by midnight of April 2, 2010 will count towards to the contest.  We will announce the winner at the symposium on April 9, 2010. 
  • By participating in this contest, you allow the Bar Foundation to re-tweet or publicize or use, in any way, without any compensation or further permission, the tweets in any future publication or for any other purpose.  Of course, we will attempt to link each tweet with the Twitter user name (for examples of this, David Pogue did a Twitter contest as well.)
  • A winner (or winners) will be chosen in the sole discretion of myself and members of the symposium committee. Our decision is final and we reserve the right to modify the rules as necessary to ensure that this runs smoothly.
  • The prize or prizes are still being finalized.  But it won’t be an iPad or anything close; this is a non-profit educational foundation we’re talking about. Besides, shouldn’t just being named the "winner" be a prize enough? (Scratch that, we’d probably want an iPad as well.)
  • If you’d like to track all the entries, you can search on Twitter for the hashtag #cbftech. This should also work on Google!

Sound fun? We think so. So, take a minute to spread the word about this great contest and tweet away! And don’t forget to register for this terrific program on April 9th.