Interested In Writing For Above The Law? Here's How To Apply

If you'd like to write for Above the Law, here's how to apply.

As we’ve mentioned before, last year was a great year for us here at Above the Law. In 2013, we experienced record traffic and revenue, for which we thank our readers and our advertisers.

We have big plans for 2014. In March, for example, we’re hosting Attorney@Blog, our first-ever convocation of leading legal bloggers. You can get more details — and tickets — over here.

We are also planning a major expansion of our content offerings, by dramatically increasing the ranks of our outside columnists. If you might be interested in writing for our pages, keep reading to find out how to apply….

At the current time, ATL stories are generated by four full-time writer-editors — David Lat, Elie Mystal, Staci Zaretsky, and Joe Patrice — and about a dozen columnists. Over the next year, we could end up doubling the number of our outside contributors, depending on the level of interest we receive.

(By the way, we don’t tend to run one-off guest posts, so there’s no need to send them our way — our outside contributions generally come from our columnists. But we’re happy to consider linking to stories published elsewhere on the web; just send us the link.)

Why would you want to write a column for Above the Law? If you know any of our current and former columnists, ask them about the experience. We expect they’ll tell you about how enjoyable and gratifying it is to share your insights with thousands of readers; how they’ve developed new personal and professional relationships, sometimes including client relationships, through their ATL writing; and how fun it is to be a celebrity of sorts in legal circles. (They probably won’t mention the pay, which is modest — if you care about the pay, this probably isn’t the right job for you — or our commenters, who admittedly can be a tough crowd.)

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Here are the general columnist guidelines:

  • We are looking for columnists to write once a week, on a mutually agreed upon day of the week. We have some contributors who write for us on a case-by-case basis, but we’ve found that lawyers work best with deadlines.
  • You can write under a pseudonym or your real name. We prefer that writers use their real names — it’s easier to do reporting or interview people when you’re not working behind a pseudonym — but we recognize that sometimes pseudonyms are necessary.
  • You should write about a particular subject matter or area — e.g., the in-house world, small firms, legal technology — or from a particular perspective. We aren’t looking for columnists to offer their random thoughts about the legal world at large.

Speaking of beats, here are some possible columns or subject matters that we’re looking to staff. We might even add multiple columnists in a given space, again depending on the number and quality of responses we receive.

1. Biglaw partnership: Now that Anonymous Partner has stepped away from the keyboard, we’re looking for a current partner at a large law firm — think Am Law 200 or NLJ 250 — to speak to the partnership segment of our readership.

2. Supreme Court: Our former SCOTUS writer, Matt Kaiser, has moved over to the white-collar beat. So we’re looking for a D.C.-based correspondent who can cover key Supreme Court arguments in person. It would be helpful for this person to be a member of the Supreme Court bar, which would facilitate getting access to the arguments. (As Mike Sacks has explained, it’s a pain in the neck for mere members of the public to get in to watch SCOTUS proceedings.)

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3. Small law firms: As we’ve mentioned, the world of small firms is one of our most popular segments right now, and we always welcome more voices in the space.

4. In-house counsel: The in-house space is where it’s at right now in the legal profession. With two of our corporate-counsel columnists, Susan Moon and David Mowry, on hiatus, we’re looking to provide Mark Herrmann with some company.

5. Government / lobbying: We’d like to expand our coverage of government lawyers and lobbyists. This can be a tricky area to cover, especially if you’re currently working for the government — just ask our managing editor David Lat, who knows all about that — but we’re open to ideas.

6. Overseas markets: We’ve covered foreign legal markets before — e.g., Letter From London — and we are open to column pitches from lawyers working abroad (e.g. Europe, Asia, or the Country of Africa).

If you’d like to apply for any of these opportunities — or pitch a column concept of your own — please apply by email (subject line: “Columnist Application”), sending us the following items:

1. A current résumé or bio (a link to an online bio like a firm website profile is fine).

2. A short description of your proposed column, ranging from a paragraph to a page, setting forth your editorial ideas or vision.

3. A sample post or column, ideally from 600 to 1000 words in length, showing us what you’d like to write for us.

Please note that we don’t send emails confirming receipt of applications, and we don’t send rejection emails. If you haven’t heard from us within one month of submitting your application, you can assume we’ve gone in a different direction.

Thank you in advance for your interest and your application. We look forward to hearing from you!