A Legal Tabloid - News, Insights, and Colorful Commentary on Law Firms and the Legal Profession
Managing Editor: David Lat
Editor: Elie Mystal
Assistant Editor: Staci Zaretsky
Contributors: Kashmir Hill, Marin, Mark Herrmann, Jay Shepherd
David Lat
David Lat is the founder and managing editor of Above the Law. His writing has also appeared in the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Wall Street Journal, the New York Observer, Washingtonian magazine, and New York magazine. Prior to ATL, David worked as a federal prosecutor in Newark, New Jersey; a litigation associate at Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz, in New York; and a law clerk to Judge Diarmuid F. O'Scannlain, of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. David graduated from Harvard College and Yale Law School, where he served as book reviews editor of the Yale Law Journal. David has received several awards for his work on ATL, including recognition as an ABA Journal Legal Rebel, a group of innovators within the legal profession, and inclusion as a member of the Fastcase 50, "the fifty most interesting, provocative, and courageous leaders in the world of law, scholarship, and legal technology." You can connect with him on Facebook or follow him on Twitter.
We hope you enjoyed the Labor Day holiday and long weekend. Alas, now it’s back to work — for you and for us.
We’re still digging ourselves out from an email avalanche, as well as trying to figure out what’s going in the world (and what we should write about today). This may take us a little while, so please be patient.
In the meantime, let’s conclude our series of open threads on Vault 100 law firms. Here are the firms to talk about today:
It’s the Friday afternoon before Labor Day, and we’re ready to pack it in. We might put up another post or two — e.g., Legal Eagle Wedding Watch — but basically we are done for the day. (Our colleagues over at DealBreaker checked out hours ago.)
Before we sign off, we’d like to point out that yesterday was Above the Law’s first anniversary — or blogiversary, as some say. ATL launched one year ago, on August 30, 2006.
During the span of a year, ATL has grown in leaps and bounds. Traffic has been tremendous, far outstripping expectations. Even though ATL is in its infancy, it’s already one of the most widelyread legal blogs. The site has become quite well-known, garnering a number of media mentions.
We thank you, our readers, for making this success possible. Thanks for faithfully visiting ATL (and refreshing your browsers so frequently), for spreading the word about this website, and for sending us great tips and information.
Happy Labor Day! Enjoy the long weekend. You deserve it!
P.S. Are you on Facebook? If so, please join the ATL Facebook group. Yay! Earlier: Letter from the Editor: Welcome to Above the Law
Yesterday we were away from the blogosphere. We had several meetings to attend in the morning. Then, in the afternoon, we did a webcast for ABC News. We spoke with Mary Fulginiti, the former AUSA who now covers legal affairs for ABC News, about L’Affaire Nixon Peabody:
(The last time we did a webcast for ABC News, some of you opined that we looked too shiny. And you were right. So this time around, we stopped at the make-up department before entering the studio. Thanks for the constructive criticism!) Law Firm Celebrates ‘Fortune’ With Odd Song [ABC News] Earlier: Still More on Summer Associates
Position: Fund Formation Partner Employer: A rapidly growing general corporate law firm (New York) Description: A senior-level attorney to build the firm’s fund formation practice. Although portable business is not required, the successful candidate must be willing to work very hard to get the practice started. The firm will provide access to major hedge fund and investment banking clients, but he/she will have take the lead on developing the business. Requirements: The ideal candidate has seven plus years (7+) forming and advising hedge funds and/or private equity funds and wants the challenge of developing a practice group.
To apply for this position, please visit laterallink.com. Earlier: Prior Job of the Week listings
What? You’re still here? Shouldn’t you be at the beach right now, enjoying what remains of the summer? Or maybe at a barbecue (goat head sold separately)?
For those of you who are still stuck in front of computers, let’s face it: you’re not getting any work done today. So you might as well sit around and gossip online about law firms, as we finish up our series of open threads on Vault 100 law firms.
Here are this morning’s subjects:
We’re into the high eighties of the Vault 100 law firms. But even if there may be 85 firms ranked ahead of these next five firms, don’t forget that they are still incredibly prestigious and profitable places to work.
Here are the firms to chat about this afternoon:
In the earliest version of yesterday’s open thread dedicated to discussing Vault 100 law firms, we put up the wrong firms at first. Sorry about that.
So now is the time to talk about Howrey (which was the subject of some brief discussion yesterday, before we corrected the post). Here are this morning’s five firms (with Vault prestige scores in parentheses):
* Some of you have asked for more Larry Craig coverage. Here you go. [Blogonaut]
* The latest developments in the bizarre Gene Plotkin insider trading case. You remember — the one involving “a Merrill Lynch junior analyst, a 63-year old retired Croatian underwear seamstress, an exotic dancer, and two former employees from the Wisconsin branch of a BusinessWeek printing press.” [DealBreaker; NYT]
* Here’s a list of “The Ten Worst U.S. Prosecutors” for 2007. If Alberto Gonzales is #1 and Mike Nifong is #3, who’s #2? (Yes, we realize this link is from last week. But thanks for pointing that out to us.) [Bennett Law Firm]
* Speaking of AGAG, what took him so long to leave? Dan Markel speculates that he didn’t want to leave until we were done with our Shanetta Cutlar coverage. But if she gets promoted to head the Civil Rights Division, to replace the outgoing Wan Kim, expect our coverage to resume. [PrawfsBlawg]
* Why would you want to avoid a circus-like atmosphere? Isn’t that the whole point of a celebrity trial? [Daily Business Review]
We realize that it’s still summer. Many of the justices are still traipsing around Europe (or hanging out in the Hampshire, as in the case of Justice David Souter).
It’s also the last week of August, leading into the Labor Day holiday weekend – traditionally one of the slowest, most dead weeks of the year. As some of you have noticed, we’ve been phoning it in taking it easy here at ATL, too.
But even though nothing is supposed to be happening, it appears that some things are afoot. We’ve been hearing all sorts of cryptic rumors about recent Supreme Court clerk hiring. As former SCOTUS clerk Michael Chertoff might say, we have a “gut feeling” that some hiring has been going on.
Our last open thread on this subject didn’t yield much, but that was over a month ago. Have you heard any Supreme Court clerk hiring news that hasn’t already appeared on ATL? If so, please contact us, by email (subject line: “Supreme Court clerk hiring”). (You can also post a comment, but we prefer email for this subject, so we can pose follow-up questions to you if we have them.)
Thanks for any and all info!
Watch to find out what some of our subscribers received in their May box!
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We currently have a number of active openings for associate roles at US and UK firms in HK / China, Singapore and two new in-house openings. As always, please feel free to reach out to us at asia@kinneyrecruiting.com in order to get details of current openings in Asia, as well as to discuss the Asia markets in general and what we expect for openings later this year. Our Evan Jowers and Robert Kinney will be in Beijing the week of March 25 and Evan Jowers will be in Hong Kong the week of April 1, if you would like to meet them in person.
The US associate openings we have in law firms are in the usual areas of M&A, cap markets, FCPA / white collar litigation, finance, and project finance. The most urgent of our top tier (top 15 US or magic circle) law firm openings in Asia (among many other firm openings that we have in Asia) are as follows:
• 2nd to 5th year mandarin fluent M&A associates needed in Beijing and Hong Kong at several firms;
• Korean fluent 2nd to 4th year cap markets associate needed in Hong Kong;
• 2nd to 5th year Japanese fluent M&A associates needed in Tokyo;
• 4th to 6th year mandarin fluent cap markets associate needed in Hong Kong;
• 2nd to 4th year M&A / cap markets mix associate needed in Singapore.
The last time I flapped my wings your way, I tried to make at least enough noise about your mobile phone to make you more than a little bit uncomfortable. I hope I did. If enough of us become anxious enough about the known and unknown unknowns and knowns in our mobile phones, then we can start making wise decisions about how to manage that information and its resultant investigations.
Today, I’d like to put a finer point on the last installment’s topic by asking a question that seemed to catch most attendees off-guard at a conference panel that I moderated last week: is there discoverable personal information in a mobile app? Our panelists’ answer was a uniform “yes” with one stating that, if he had to choose only one type of data that he could discover from a mobile phone, he’d choose app data. Why? Because there’s simply so much of it and because almost all of it is objective – not just user-created like an email – but machine-tracked like GPS, usage duration, log in and log out times, browsed web addresses, browsed actual addresses. Also, most of us seem to have the idea that data doesn’t actually “stick” to our mobile devices the way it “sticks” to our hard drives. Maybe there’s a disconnect based on the fact that our phones are mobile so we assume the data is mobile to?
The traditional job application and interview process can be impersonal, and applicants often struggle to present themselves as more than just the sum of their GPAs, alma maters, and previous work history. ATL has partnered with ViewYou to help job seekers overcome this challenge. ViewYou NOW Profiles offer a unique way for job seekers to make a personal, memorable connection with prospective employers: introduction videos. These videos allow job candidates to display their personalities, interpersonal skills, and professional interests, creating an eDossier to brand themselves to potential employers all over the world. Check it out today!
It’s the Friday afternoon before Labor Day, and we’re ready to pack it in. We might put up another post or two — e.g., Legal Eagle Wedding Watch — but basically we are done for the day. (Our colleagues over at DealBreaker checked out 
