Ed. note: Gabe Acevedo, who covered LegalTech for Above the Law earlier this month, will be writing for these pages about legal technology.
Recently, Steven C. Bennett, the chair of Jones Day’s E-Discovery Committee, published an article [PDF] in the Northern Kentucky Law Review entitled “The Ethics of Legal Outsourcing.” In his article, Bennett relied heavily on a six page ethics opinion [PDF] issued by the ABA in August of 2008. When the ABA Formal Opinion 08-451 was released, many legal process outsourcing companies (LPOs) — the companies that hire overseas attorneys to do the work of American attorneys at a fraction of the cost — lauded it as an “endorsement” of their work. As Bennett noted in his article, the opinion even referred to outsourcing as something that was “salutary,” in that it would reduce costs for clients.
Those LPOs had a right to be celebratory about ABA 08-451. After all, never in the history of the United States was there ever an ethics opinion of any Bar Association that had done more to undermine the standing of both American attorneys and our practice of law.
Continue reading “Legal Olympics Update: Outsourcing E-Discovery Sliding Down Slippery Slope, at Record Speed”
If a professional organization wants to protect the incomes and job opportunities of its members — and if it wants to ensure the quality of the services being provided, thereby preserving the profession’s reputation — it needs to exert some control over who enters the field. A professional association should arguably do whatever it can, within the bounds of antitrust law, to protect its turf and to preserve a certain amount of exclusivity in the profession.
(Please note that we’re proceeding based on two assumptions: (1) professional organizations should act in the self-interest of their individual members (as well as the profession as a whole), and (2) there will be some regulation of entry into a profession. We set aside the libertarian vision of a world devoid of professional licensing schemes and regulation, in which anyone can practice a trade or profession, and the market weeds out the bad apples.)
Some commentators — like our very own Elie Mystal, currently on vacation (so we’ll attempt to fill his shoes in this post), or Mark Greenbaum, in a widely-read Los Angeles Times op-ed — have accused the American Bar Association (ABA) of not doing enough to regulate entry into the legal profession. As a result, the nation is flooded with lawyers — or, perhaps more accurately, law school graduates — who can’t get jobs (or jobs that pay well enough to cover gigantic student loan payments).
These critics point to other professions and professional organizations that have done a better job of preserving exclusivity. Take medicine. Historically, if you could survive the rigors of the cutthroat pre-med world, four years of medical school, and the underpaid toil of a residency, you’d be set for life. As noted yesterday by a commenter:
The average doctor is at least twice as [well] compensated as the average lawyer. And doctors do not know the meaning of unemployment.
But is that about to change? Are new medical schools going to flood the market with doctors, making them just as useless vulnerable to income deflation and unemployment as their lawyer counterparts?
Continue reading “Will an M.D. Soon Be as Worthless as a J.D.?”
We’re big fans of Craigslist here at Above the Law, especially the ridiculous job postings and lawyerly missed connections. But the site has a dark side too. A “forced connection” in December has led two men to be charged with rape.
Ty Oliver McDowell, a medical technologist, thought he was fulfilling a Wyoming woman’s “rape fantasy” after responding to her ad on Craigslist. In reality, Jebidiah Stipe, the woman’s ex-boyfriend, had posted the ad in a twisted act of revenge on his ex-girlfriend. From the Associated Press:
Blonigen’s office has charged Ty Oliver McDowell, 26, with three counts of first-degree sexual assault, one count of kidnapping and one count of aggravated burglary. Jebidiah James Stipe, 27, a Marine based in Twentynine Palms, Calif., is charged with conspiracy to commit first-degree sexual assault.
We’re not sure if this was posted in Women Seeking Men or Casual Encounters, but it wasn’t in Erotic Services, which no longer exists. The ad sought “a real aggressive man with no concern for women,” and included the victim’s photo. The woman saw the ad two days after it was posted and asked that it be taken down, but not before McDowell saw it….
Continue reading “A Reason Not To Respond To Rape Fantasy Ads on Craigslist”
* Bloomberg files a lawsuit to crack the Fed’s secrecy. “It’s like what it was like 30 years ago. Back in the days when journalism was exciting — really exciting,” said Amanda Bennett, Bloomberg’s investigations editor. [New York Times]
* Perhaps under pressure from Mike Ghaffary and his BarMax iPhone app, BarBri changes its policy. You can take the course again without paying. [TechCrunch]
* Revenue is down but profits are up at Shearman & Sterling. The firm says that the deferrals and sabbaticals of 90 associates helped it stay on target, and claims that it did not have to resort to lawyer layoffs. But…? [AmLaw Daily]
* Student suspended for creating a “Ms. Sarah Phelps is the worst teacher I’ve ever had” Facebook page can sue. That’s not cyberbullying, that’s free speech, according to a federal judge’s ruling. [New York Times]
Continue reading “Morning Docket 02.16.10″
* Once again, First Amendment crusader Marc Randazza — who successfully represented Above the Law in Jones v. Minkin — comes to the defense of a besieged blogger. [Simple Justice]
* Kevin Smith v. Southwest Airlines: the film director (pictured) and the airline duke it out in the court of public opinion, concerning Smith’s getting booted from a flight for being “way fat” (in Smith’s words; or a “Customer of Size,” in Southwest’s). [Dallas Morning News]
* Marin Feldman to law firms: when it comes to public relations, you can run but you can’t hide. [Technolawyer]
* Professor David Zaring on L’Affaire Lewinsky (the subject of a new book): “one interesting constitutional crisis.” [The Conglomerate]
* The Wire gets a shout-out at a Third Circuit oral argument. [Twitter / Christopher Soghoian]
* Mike Leach isn’t the only lawyer turned football coach. Meet Derek Dooley. [Mr. College Football]
We should worry about too many lawyers.
– Dr. Robert M. D’Alessandri, president and dean of the new Commonwealth Medical College in Scranton, Pennsylvania, responding to the suggestion that opening more medical schools might lead to a glut of doctors.
We heart Kenneth Starr. Aside from his platinum-plated résumé — Supreme Court clerkship, D.C. Circuit judgeship, service as Solicitor General — Starr brought us the most entertaining political scandal ever: the Monica Lewinsky affair.
Don’t you long for a return to the pre-9/11, pre-Iraq / Afghanistan War, pre-Great Recession days, when our nation’s greatest worry was whether a White House intern was s’ing some d in the Oval Office? Sigh….
Sorry, we got lost in nostalgia for a moment. Back to the present. Today brings big news about our beloved Ken Starr. He’s leaving Pepperdine University School of Law, where he has served as dean since 2004, for a new and even more distinguished post.
So, where’s he going?
Continue reading “Musical Chairs: Ken Starr Stepping Down as Pepperdine Law Dean”
Last year witnessed a Valentine’s Day Massacre in the legal profession. Over 800 lawyers and staffers lost their jobs in the week leading up to V-Day.
This year, the week before Valentine’s Day was comparatively full of sweetness and light — totally appropriate for the holiday of love. In fact, it looked like last week was layoff-free at the nation’s large law firms (as discussed over at Law Shucks).
But not quite. We can now report that layoffs took place on Friday at Drinker Biddle.
Continue reading “Nationwide Layoff Watch: Drinker Biddle”
Happy Presidents Day. We’ll be on a reduced publication schedule today. (And Elie is on vacation this week.)
* The KSM trial is forcing attorney general Eric Holder to adjust his “political antennae.” [New York Times and The New Yorker]
* Law students like mock trials but don’t want to get involved in the real thing. A Michigan State University College of Law 3L got the state to change the law after he was called for jury duty. [Kalamazoo Gazette]
* Worst security guards ever. [New York Times]
* Judge says e-cigarettes are not a drug-delivery device. [American Medical News]
* Nationwide hiring watch: media companies? [New York Times]
Last year at this time, I took a winter break to visit sunny Las Vegas. Everything went well until a drunk Irishman pushed all in with A-Q, against my A-K wired. He flopped a queen, two days’ worth of winnings evaporated, and I tried to commit suicide via the MGM Grand lion enclosure.
This year, I’m taking no such chances, and staying away from the City of Sin. Instead I’ll be heading to a much more wholesome place. With casinos. And strippers. But no lions.
I’d tell you where, but a recent subway experience has me gun shy about giving out my GPS coordinates on the internet….
Continue reading “Vacation Memo: Elie’s Annual Winter Gambling Extravaganza”
Some students at Brooklyn Law School seem a bit frustrated by their job prospects.
So they constructed this, outside one of the residence halls….
UPDATE: We’ve added a second, better photo of what the BLS students built, also after the jump.
Continue reading “Talk About a Frozen Job Market”
Ed. note: Above the Law has teamed up with Law Shucks, which has done excellent work translating all of the layoff news into user-friendly charts and graphs: the Layoff Tracker.
In celebration of this law-firm-layoff-free week, we’re taking a break from reporting on the US government’s published unemployment numbers.
We found something far more interesting and relevant: a report on unemployment among the affluent [PDF]. Serendipitously, “affluent” coincides with Biglaw starting salaries – this study uses $150,000 annual income as the cutoff for the top decile.
Notwithstanding the more than 5,641 lawyers laid off over the past two years, the affluent are doing much better than the general population on the unemployment front as well, according to the report, which we found on the Wall Street Journal’s Wealth Report.
Continue reading “This Week in Layoffs: 02.13.10″
The legal blogosphere has been shot in the heart with Cupid’s arrow.
Here at Above the Law, we’re turning into matchmakers. The Texas Lawyer is telling us about lawyers in love. Am Law Daily is profiling Biglaw power couples. And Avvo has a guide to dating lawyers, claiming that you lawyerly types are a hot commodity on the meat market:
Surveys show lawyers are among the most datable professions.
Here’s one of Avvo’s 10 tips for pleasing a lawyerly lover:
Make love notes long and confusing
Brevity and clarity make lawyers feel uncomfortable and agitated, much like normal people feel at the DMV. For example, don’t say, “Let’s head back home early for some fun.” Instead say, “Let’s return early to the domicile for some malfeasance.”
Your Above the Law editors have dated plenty of lawyers, and one of us even married one. We’ll share our lawyer-dating backgrounds and offer upsides, downsides, and advice, after the jump.
Continue reading “Valentine’s Day Advice from Above the Law”
* Dr. Dre is suing Death Row Records. I wish Eazy-E were alive to see this. [Pitchfork]
* Lanny Davis, who recently moved from Orrick to McDermott Will & Emery, has started a crisis management blog. I have a question: “Dear Lanny: There’s an intern here at the Above the Law offices, and, well … ” [Legal Crisis Strategies]
* Should you let a Biglaw partner cop a feel? [Sweet Hot Justice]
* Whenever I start feeling really down about the rampant corruption in New York politics, Illinois is always there to brighten my day. [Blackbook Legal]
* Another NBA player learns about the perils of taking naked photos of himself and then sending them around. [Huffington Post]
* Some people are surprised that Westlaw is rolling out its new service to law students, when it has yet to be adopted by many law firms. I’m not. As the Catholic Church taught me, get ‘em while they’re young. [3 Geeks and a Law Blog]
* Digital dictation. The past meets the future. [Young Lawyers Blog]
Semifinal voting for Legal Eagle Couple of the Year is over, and we’re frankly stunned by the couples you picked to move on to the finals.
In Pool One, two Harvard Law grads — the number-three seed — beat two sets of Yale Law grads, one with twin Supreme Court clerkships.
In Pool Two, you were so charmed by the Kennedy mystique that you picked the Kennedy GULC student over a White House associate counsel and a couple with five Harvard degrees.
Finally, in Pool Three, the lowest seed — a Mayer Brown associate and his med-student bride — trounced both Donald Trump’s smokin’-hot daughter and a Stanford Law valedictorian who clerked for Antonin Scalia.
These aren’t the three couples we’d have picked. But they’re our readers’ clear favorites, and we’ll of course respect the results. Now, it’s time to determine which one of the final three will earn the year’s biggest legal wedding honor: ATL’s Legal Eagle Couple of the Year.
See which three couples made it out of the semifinals, and cast your vote for Couple of the Year, after the jump.
Continue reading “Legal Eagle Wedding Watch: Couple of the Year Finals”
Sidley Austin associates, never underestimate the power of flipping out. Earlier today, we reported that Sidley Austin associates hit the proverbial roof (“proverbial roof” = hit send button on emails to Above the Law) when Winston & Strawn announced its salary structure (which we reported even earlier today). The Winston announcement, coupled with the fact that Sidley associates received another frozen paycheck last night/this morning, made associates at the firm very angry with Sidley’s reluctance to communicate the 2010 salary scale.
Well, Sidley associates, your complaints have been answered. Sidley just announced its 2010 salary scale, and the firm will be making a true-up raise. The raises will be retroactive to January 1, 2010.
Yay? Not quite. Some Sidley Austin people are still annoyed that the firm will evidently not be giving out a make-whole bonus, as other firms have done.
Details and the memo after the jump.
Continue reading “Update: Sidley Austin (Finally) Announces Salaries”
Ed. note: Have a question for next week? Send it in to advice@abovethelaw.com.
ATL,
With Valentine’s Day coming up, do you think there is any merit to the argument that people should settle when they are trying to find a mate? Is there particular merit to this claim as to (busy) attorneys?
Litigate or Settle
Dear Litigate or Settle,
[Background: Lori Gottlieb, a 40-something hag, has been recently making the rounds promoting her book, "Marry Him: The Case for Settling for Mr. Good Enough" (based on her controversial article in The Atlantic). Her argument: "Educated ladies in your 20s and 30s, your ovaries are rotting. Stop being picky. Settle for some mediocre dude NOW before you get old and no one wants you." Gottlieb was later revealed by her ex-boyfriend to be a megalomaniac, borderline-personality-disordered shrew.]
People settle for a variety of reasons: they’re too lazy / busy to go out and find someone better, they’re scared that there IS no one better, or they feel like everybody else is changing their relationship statuses on Facebook and they’ve got to marry whomever they’re dating so as not to be left out.
That being said, lawyers settle for mates more readily than do other professionals. They’re risk averse and want to lock shit down early regardless of whether it’s “right.” They’re tired after billing 14 hours and just want to jackhammer someone, anyone, for 30 seconds, then pass out. On a subconscious level, many of them want sad-sack mates to match the resignation their feel in their own careers. If they’re gonna do this whole intercreditor agreement and soy sauce stained-life thing, they need the zitty husbands and lumpy wives to match.
However, if you’re a lawyer who’s unwilling to settle in your career (i.e., you genuinely enjoy your job or you’re taking steps to GTFO), you shouldn’t be willing to settle for a life partner, either. I know that’s easier said than done, especially when friends send “& Guest” wedding invitations on purpose to destroy you. Believe me, I am just as scared as you that I’ll spend the winter of my life training my dog to change my bedpan. But the rest of your life is a long time to spend resigned to a mediocre mate or career. Before you accept that date with a guy in mandals or a girl with a weak chin, I urge you to go to the gym have a little faith in your ability to attract a mate without settling. As my ex-shrink Dr. Laikin once said to me: If God made someone as awesome as you, surely there are others.
Happy Valentine’s Day!
Marin
Continue reading “Pls Hndle Thx: A Life Settlement”
After we published news of Winston & Strawn’s salary freeze, our Sidley Austin tipsters went apoplectic. A Facebook message I received moments after publishing the Winston news seems to sum up the mood of Sidley associates:
My firm [Sidley] is more like Winston than it is like a good firm. I should have gone to Kirkland.
Ouch. Why the sadness? Well, today is payday, and Sidley people have just learned that, as of now, their salaries are still frozen in place.
Details after the jump.
UPDATE: After this post went up, Sidley decided to announce its 2010 salary structure. Click here for our updated coverage.
Continue reading “Another Frozen Pay Check from Sidley”
Way back when, in 2008, we talked about starting a little something called ATL Courtship Connections. We know there are a lot of lonely lawyers out there, and we wanted to do our part to throw you together and see what happens.
Unfortunately, over the last year, we’ve been more focused on lawyers getting laid off than lawyers getting laid. Although we had many responses (over 200), it was a logistical nightmare trying to pair people up, as we had lawyers from across the country looking to be matched. When we did reach out, some people responded and some didn’t.
In other words, it was a bigger disaster than Biglaw’s attempts to figure out what to do with the Class of 2009.
With Valentine’s Day looming, we decided to revisit Courtship Connections. This time we’re going to roll out the project more slowly. We had the biggest response from lawyers in New York — said to be the best city for singles — so we’re targeting the Big Apple bunch (at least for this first round).
If you’re New York-based, single, and interested in being set up with a fellow legal eagle, read on….
Continue reading “Getting Back Together with ATL Courtship Connections
(Calling all single New York lawyers….)“
