Do large law firm blogs evolve?

Couldn’t help asking myself that question when reading the comments of Anil Dash, a blogger and VP at Six Apart, which makes blogging software, in a New York Times story on Walmart’s recent blogging efforts.

You start with this total lockdown, suits read everything, one post a month model. Then you evolve. A year later, you get one that is more open. A year after that, they start to do something that is far more authentic.

Don’t know that large law firm blogs are that bad, but blogs do intimidate the management of a lot of large law firms we speak with. I do think large law firm blogs evolve over time though. We definitely see a loosening of the reigns as firms get to understand blogs, get comfortable with them, and see the positive results on more than one front.

At LexBlog we tell firms launching blogs on behalf of the firm, i.e., a practice group, as opposed to an individual lawyer, to start slowly. For many firms repurposing content already being distributed in email newsletters and alerts is a start. Then proceed to more timely and brief commentary & insight on legal developments as well as items lawyers read in the news and in blogs, preferably from RSS feeds. Finally, engage in ongoing conversations with other thought leaders – blog to blog.

And if it took Walmart, guided by a sophisticated PR company like Edelman, a couple years to overcome their fake blog fiasco, maybe we ought to cut large law firms some slake in their blogging efforts.

What do you guys think? Do large law firm blogs evolve?