NOT 1st

gaza, israel, sheep, etc.

I am a choreographer. That's what I do. You are cheerleaders. Cheerleaders are dancers who have gone retarded. What you do is a tiny, pathetic subset of dancing. I will attempt to turn your robotic routines into poetry, written with the human body. Follow me, or perish, sweater monkeys.

I like those blokes, good people all.

Percival Pedigree

Cahill is laying off associates today.

Cahill is laying off associates today.

cheers!

I wanna get me a CWT '05 NY female associate - I hear they are SUPER HORNY!!!

Gordo chupapija.

I wanna get me a CWT '05 NY female associate - I hear they are SUPER HORNY!!!

Does anyone speak English anymore?

Elie: Lucy, the fire department called again. They said we need to clear out that bush. You said you'd get Jose to do it.
Lucy: He your gardener, I don't know why you no tell him.
Elie: Lucy, you know I don't speak Mexican.
Lucy: I NOT A MEXICAN.
Lucy: [storms off]
Elie: Great, what was that all about?
Lat: Lucy's from El Salvador.
Elie: So?
Lat: So, it's an entirely different country.
Elie: What does that matter?
Lat: You get mad if anyone thinks you live below Sunset.

Dear ATL,
I am not placing any blame on you, but the comments section has really gone to shit. I used to be able to get substantive information from the comments, but now it is all about sheep, buttcheeks, CWT 05 female associates and other such nonsense. I, and I am going out on a limb here, many of your readers are sick of this tomfoolery. Not sure if you can actually do anything about this (short of hiring someone to delete stupid comments until they dissappear) but I thought I would let you know.
Pls Hndl. Thnx.

@12 - pelotudo chupapijas

CWT NY 05 female associates to 190lbs

Agree with 14. I'm all in favor of a little non-sense but there the comments have lost all substance. Please also remove the Arab / Israeli hating posts as this is not a political blog.

Watch this CBS news video to see the nature of Jews http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ev6ojm62qwA

The Pope calls Gaza a concentration camp. http://www.reuters.com/article/latestCrisis/idUSL8378047

13 - LOVE IT!

can we get news about layoffs at Quinn and Cahill? Thanks...

I agree with 14 and 17! Recently, most ATL comments seriously lack substance!

Cahill is laying associates today.

14/17/21: Yes.

Dear ATL,

What 14 said.

SOYLENT GREEN is made of SHEEP that I NAILEDwhile eating TWATWAFFLES made of SOYLENT GREEN!!!!!

- CWT '05 NY female associate, spreading her buttcheeks so Israel can invade the juicy insdes

I have to agree with 14. There is probably nothing you can do, but it is sad to see anyone fall to such a low level.

I have to agree with 14. There is probably nothing you can do, but it is sad to see anyone fall to such a low level.

They are laying off Jewish sheep? Are sheep even kosher?

Vatican calls gaza a "concentration camp" citing to the genocidal tactics of Israel... UN and Red Cross unite to condem isreal's attacks on children and innocent civilians!

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/09/world/middleeast/09mideast.html?hp

Vatican calls gaza a "concentration camp" citing to the genocidal tactics of Israel... UN and Red Cross unite to condem isreal's attacks on children and innocent civilians!

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/09/world/middleeast/09mideast.html?hp

18,

Perhaps the Muslims in Gaza have ADD and have trouble concentrating. What better way to help them than to send them to concentration camp?

14 is on her period and is bleeding away with no end in sight. Poor tampon(s)!

14/17/21/23 - shut the hell up. I enjoy tomfoolery. In fact I am going to start using that word in all of my posts. And in case you haven't noticed such tomfoolery is generating more comments and thus more hits for ATL. they have no reason to stop it.

Define Irony: People posting about the lack of substance in posts whose posts' themselves lack substance.

Also agree with 14. At the very least, can't we block this idiot posting the Gaza/Isreal crap in every post? Certainly it is the same IP address over and over.

25 - well played!

Agree with 14. Hire a moderator, for god's sake. All he/she has to do is run a ctrl-f search for buttcheeks, sheep, jews, and whatever other assorted filth the trolls are shoveling up that day.

I'm sure one of these 80 Clifford Chance attorneys would spring at the job.

What 32 said.

I heard most of the laid off attorneys were Jews. Can you look into this ATL?

And so the nanny state paternalists rear their ugly, sheep-dampened heads.

33-
Tomfoolery is great when it has something to do with the post or the legal world in general. But have you not taken a look at the comments recently?!?!? Comments that had nothing to do with posts used to at least be somewhat witty/entertaining/funny. Now what do we have? If you enjoy reading through a mess of 'spread your buttcheeks' or 'look at what the jews are doing' or 'nailing sheep' comments then do so, but do not classify that as tomfoolery, that is just stupidity. Apologies for not using the word properly the first time.

-14

Guys at my high school used to enjoy reading posts about spreading buttcheeks, jews, and nailing sheep all the time. It was no big deal.

Re 14/17/21/24. The way to fix the comments is not to complain about the comments, but rather to use the comments to provide useful comments.

My contribution.

The law firm death spiral begins with debt. What are the current debt loads of different firms? My firm, Gibson has no debt. They tell us they have about $100 MM in working capital.

Most firms seem to have about a 50% profit margin. It seems to me that you should have about three months worth of expenses for working capital, since clients don't pay in advance for legal work.

If a firm has $1 billion in revenues, that equates to about $500 million in expenses per year or about $125 million per 3 months.

How much debt is your firm carrying?

MODERATE THIS SHIT!

I cry when I masturbate.

Does anyone beside think that Lat and her cohorts are morons and exemplify why lawyers are largely worthless and unhireable in any meaningful respect other than reading documents and telling us how they'd kill the deal if they were ever asked (and they aren't?). Memo to gay gooks... Nobody cares. Go kill yourselves and improve society.

BITCH SPREAD THE BUTT CHEEKS SO I CAN SMELLS THE JUICY INSIDES!

garchando ovejas

43- Latham is debt free because we (associates) have to rent our office space from the partners. It's okay though, they also gave us these great, no down payment, low interest ARM loans to make the payments. I'm not sure how they work, but everybody's doing it so it must be okay...

.

FIRST

45, there is no shame in crymaxing,

"Some of the measures they've been taking, like pay freezes and reduced bonuses, may just be prudent planning. Better to have a smaller paycheck than no paycheck at all.

When firms were announcing bonuses, Elie wrote that associates had a right to expect their full bonus and that they shouldn't just be happy that they had a job. Now he's quoting yesterday's post, which suggests that such measures are "prudent planning" and that it's better to have "a smaller paycheck than no paycheck at all."

Has it really taken Elie this long to realize that firms are implementing some of these measures because we're in a recession?

Where's the righteous indignation now, you fatso?

14/41 -
Ok I'll give you that the butcheeks and sheep nailing comments are generally annoying but the Israel/Hamas arguing is generally more interesting than whatever topic the post is actually about. If you moderate one out you have to moderate the other too. This is the slippery slope of censorship.

-33

43 - This is the internet. The way to fix the stupid comments is to delete them and ban the commentors if they persist in reposting them. Trust me.

And I agree that someone needs to be hired to delete all these dumb comments and . I typically don't even read the comments to ATL stories anymore because it's not worth sifting through 100 butt jokes to find one pertinent comment from someone at least trying to make a contribution. I really think the "Jew" posts recently have made the need for this more than apparent.

/Forum moderator for years

First

last

54, you're stupid. You should be the featured speaker at a stupid convention and your topic should be "how to be even more stupid."

56 ftw

22 - Is there any truth to the Cahill layoff question somebody keeps asking? I'd heard something vague about that last week, but then yesterday I heard that everything was ok.

Chicago > NYC

Make people register before posting. I bet it would slow down the tomfoolery.

My username is now going to be Tom Foolery, actually.

-unregistered commenter

Yesterday partners at Cahill called those associates being retained and told them of their (half) bonus and salary increase.

Today partners from executive committee called the other associates one by one to tell them they had been laid off.

The laid off associates were told it was because of the economy.

Some associates with low hours were laid off, some associates with low hours were not laid off.

The Chicago School folks probably have something to say about how to get rid of the worthless comments. Look at the incentives to comments here: (1) virtue--you actually have something worthwhile to share and want to help others; (2) shaming--you want to humiliate your firm, creating a predictable consequence for its bad behavior; (3) inquiry--you have a legitimate question; (4) attention--you just want to get a rise out of other users.

The first three are desirable. The fourth may be or may not be. The nice thing about the fourth incentive is it is only fulfilled by reaction from other users. If no one refers to an attention-seeking comment, it dies on the vine. If you don't like the Jew/sheep/buttcheeks comments, ignore them. They will go away. It doesn't help that Elie/ATL glamorizes commenters that are obscene and worthless in contests, citations in other posts, etc. (although the "Partners, spread the wallets, so we can smell the juicy insides." headline on the Clifford Chance post yesterday made me blow my drink out of my nose.) Perhaps the fact that there are so many users who prefer those types of comments makes their removal by market forces impossible, though. Those of us who don't like them should just find another new outlet. WSJ Law Blog is where Elie gets all his stuff anyway...

For better or worse, this forum is about as fluid/efficient a market as they come.

I hate Illinois Nazis.

Despite bonuses at Cahill being lock step, none of the laid off associates received bonuses for 2008.

61 - Thanks for clearing that up; much appreciated.

If Oklahoma beats Florida by less than a touchdown, is Clifford Chance then a TTT?

14 and ATL editors:

If you want to solve the problem, eliminate guest posting and require people to be registered for a week before allowing them to post.

Obviously that would reduce the overall traffic to the website but probably not click-through rates, since I doubt that Mr. Buttcheeks clicks on many ads.

63, you idiot, they are the Illini

63, you idiot, they are the Illini. Big 10 RULES. Go U Penn State.

How many Cahill Associates were laid off?

The only thing more annoying than irrelevant comments are the whiny-ass comments calling for censorship of comments.

I personally think the mostly witty, some crass tomfoolery intermingled with serious conversation is a nice mix. It's kind of sweet and salty, like sweet and salty stuff . . . help me out here . . . like kettle corn or those fucking sweet and salty peanuts, whatever they're called.

As stated by David Lat himself (Jan. 7):

"Clifford Chance leadership to the rank-and-file partnership: 'Partners, spread the wallets, so we can smell the juicy insides.'"

Lat obviously has no sympathy for you whiners crying for censorship on the boards, so you might as well give up the fight.

Details on Cahill layoff here:

http://www.footytube.com/2006/11/13/cahill-set-for-six-week-lay-off/

49 - hilarious.

Where else will the UK axe fall?
- Magic Circle Jerk

what is going on at bakers? any word? i've some good friends there but i am hesitant to ask if they are slow. ta, in advance.

73 ftw

Which classes were affected by the Cahill layoffs? Were junior associates spared the axe?

It's easy, you just rent the side of a double decker bus and put up the sign...

Call 1-800-ABOGADOS

Latham is doing stealth layoffs too.

Layoffs are doing stealth Latham!

Its too bad about CC. I always had good dealings with them, both in NY and London. They are smart and able to be tough without being obstructionists. I hope they find their way back when things turn around. I will definitely pour a 40 on the curb for them.

Too bad about CC. In other firms, cuts are made more quietly.
Howrey has kicked out 16 partners, and seriously cut compensation in an extraordinary review for 35 equity partners, as the firm's below-average profits are expected to drop even further. Desperate to maintaining a sufficiently high profit for their few stars. Some really good partners have also left, taking substantial business (still exists!) with them.
Tough year, probably everywhere.

Lucy, I'm home.

Clifford Chance NY has conducted many, many more layoffs at review time ("performance", but not all knowing the attorneys involved), played with bonuses, etc., which has not been reported on. SO THE NUMBER OF LAYOFFS IN NY IS MUCH GREATER.

85- Any thoughts on the true #s? Any other UK firms slicing their assocs in the US?

- Magic Circle Jerk

86 comments and no links to www.lawshucks.com layoff tracker?

For shame. And smell the juicy insides.

MB Chicago is pure trash.

i know of 5 in a single department (in NY).

- 85

Can anyone shed a little light on the soon-to-happen Clifford layoff in DC and NY of 80 associates?

what is going on at Clifford Chance? I have heard that Corporate associates in NY are worried about layoffs at the same level, if not worse, than the litigation layoffs, going to happen this month - any truth to that?

what is going on at Clifford Chance? I have heard that Corporate associates in NY are worried about layoffs at the same level, if not worse, than the litigation layoffs, going to happen this month - any truth to that?

Yep, it's too bad they failed to mention the numerous other corporate associates that have been recently "let go" in NY under the guise of performance issues.