Washington, D.C. (July 7, 2010) — Legal publisher Fastcase debuted its free mobile legal research app for the iPad yesterday in a preview for industry professionals. Like Fastcase’s award-winning iPhone app, the new iPad edition is a free download, and gives free access to the company’s nationwide law libraries of state and federal case law and statutes.

And like the iPhone app, Fastcase’s iPad app is the first of its kind for legal research on the go. The app will be available to the general public in the iTunes App Store in a few days.

The new iPad app is similar to the popular Fastcase iPhone app, but it also provides users with additional features made possible by the larger screen. Among other new features, the iPad includes new results lists on a side panel in the document screen, as well as a new navigation environment for browsing statutes.

Fastcase, the leader in mobile legal research, continues to provide smarter tools for legal researchers. Fastcase for the iPad is a “universal” app, which doubles as an update for the iPhone app and an all-new app for iPad, all in the same application. When opened on the iPhone, it will be an updated version of the iPhone app. When opened on the iPad, the application detects the different hardware and opens the iPad version of the software.

Fastcase’s iPhone app was the first legal research app for iPhone, and was recently awarded the prestigious 2010 New Product of the Year Award by the American Association of Law Libraries. In its launch month, Fastcase was featured on the Apple App Store home page, and for several weeks was a more popular download in the App Store than Microsoft’s search engine Bing.

“The future of legal research is mobile devices – ubiquitous computing and access anywhere.” said Ed Walters, CEO of Fastcase. “The mobile platform is what’s next for legal research, and Fastcase is going to be a major player in this emerging market.”

Legal technology experts who recently previewed the iPad app are praising Fastcase for the latest mobile addition. “Legal research on the iPad could be a game-changer and Fastcase has set the bar exceptionally high,” said Joshua Auriemma, founder of LegalGeekery.com. “In a time where many legal companies are slow to adopt new technology, it would have been completely understandable for Fastcase to have rushed this app out the door in order to be the first legal research app for the iPad. Impressively, this app doesn’t feel rushed at all. No corners have been cut, no major features seem to be missing, and still, they’re the first on the market. Kudos for that.”

Attorney Jeff Richardson of iPhoneJD added in his review “I don’t own an iPad yet, but apps like this push me closer towards getting one.”

Fastcase for the iPad will be available in the iTunes store in early July (search for Fastcase), or you can find more information at www.fastcase.com/iPad.

About Fastcase
As the smarter alternative for legal research, Fastcase democratizes the law, making it more accessible to more people. Using patented software that combines the best of legal research with the best of Web search, Fastcase helps busy users sift through the clutter, ranking the best cases first and enabling the re-sorting of results to find answers fast. Founded in 1999, Fastcase.com has more than 380,000 subscribers from around the world, and the company recently launched the Fastcase Public Library of Law (www.plol.org), the world’s largest free legal research site for consumers and lawyers alike. Fastcase is an American company based in Washington, D.C. For more information, visit www.fastcase.com, or Fastcase’s legal research blog at www.fastcase.blogspot.com.

What’s more, it’s completely free to download and use as much as you’d like.  It harnesses the full power, functionality, and extensive database of the Web-based Fastcase platform that our users depend on (click here for more information about our Web-based platform).   Full functionality means searching cases and statutes with Fastcase’s smarter tools and intuitive interface.

When searching cases, you can specify the jurisdiction, narrow the date range, limit the number of results, and choose to sort your results by relevance, date, short name, or by the number of times a case has been cited by others.  In addition to sorting results, you’ll also be able to choose how your results appear with three options—display ‘Title’ only for quick browsing, ‘Title + First Paragraph’ to see the beginning of the case, or ‘Title + Most Relevant Paragraph’ to see the portion of the case that refers to your keywords most often.

Other features include the ability to browse statutes, pull up a list of later citing cases with Authority Check, save a case for later, view recent searches, and change a document’s font size to small, medium, or large.

We’re proud to offer Fastcase for the iPhone with no strings attached.  If you are already a Fastcase subscriber or have signed up for a free trial with us in the past, then you are already registered to use Fastcase for iPhone.  Just click here to download the App from the App Store.  If you have forgotten your password, click here to retrieve it and have it sent to the e-mail address you used to register with Fastcase.

We are also proud to report that so far, the reviews have been very positive.  But we are eager to hear your impressions.  So check out Fastcase for the iPhone today and send us your comments via Twitter or e-mail.