Over 3500 votes are in. Here is our winning caption:

Despite a plethora of non-recession submissions, the economy’s dire straits continues to hold the greatest appeal for our caption contest voters. This is starting to seem like a trend.

We have good news. That is not actually an application-hoarding Biglaw office. Find out the real story behind the photo after the jump.

Welcome back to “The Pile Up” caption contest. We presented ATL readers with this photo and asked for possible captions:

With over 500 entries, we felt as if we were living the horror of the photo. But we waded through the submissions and whittled them down to our top ten. Check out our favorites and vote for the best one after the jump.

It’s time again for ATL readers’ creative juices to flow. We have a new legal-themed photo for a caption contest. As usual, we’ll provide the back story at the end of the contest so as not to influence or restrict your caption creativity.

Here’s the photo:

Same rules as always: Submit possible captions in the comments. We’ll choose our favorites — with preference given to those with a legal bent — and then let you vote for the best one.

(As an aside, the pile up reminded us of a photo from AwkwardFamilyPhotos.com. See The Pile On.)

Please submit your entry BY MIDNIGHT ON TUESDAY. Thanks!

Happy belated Halloween, ATL readers. We hope your holidays were fun and free of criminal activity.

Over 2,000 people checked in over the weekend to vote in our caption contest. The winner after the jump.

We launched our Spooky Services caption contest yesterday evening, giving ATL readers just over 17 hours to submit captions for this photo:

To our horror, you buried us with over 400 entries. We nearly laughed ourselves to death.

See the finalists after the jump. If you dare.

An ATL reader sent along this holiday-themed photograph from the career services office of his top 20 law school. The picture struck us as perfect for a caption contest.

Same rules apply as always: Submit possible captions in the comments. We’ll choose our favorites — with preference given to those with a legal / law school bent — and then let you vote for the best one.

Please submit your entry BY NOON ON FRIDAY, and we’ll bring you our finalists on the eve of All Hallow’s Eve. Thanks!

Thanks to the over 3,000 people who voted in our ATL Caption Contest. We now have a winner. Many of the proposed captions associated the shovels and bare soil with grave-digging, specifically the grave of Biglaw in the current troubled economic climate. But the winning caption tapped into a more evergreen joke in the world of law: screwing the client.

Here’s the winner:

ASSOCIATE: There’s a backhoe right there. Wouldn’t that be more efficient?
PARTNER: F**k that. We get paid by the hour.

Hats off — or not off, rather — to Austin attorney George Lobb (at far right) for crashing this photo of legal dignitaries and giving us caption contest fodder. More on that story here.

Did lawyer crash courthouse groundbreaking photo? [Austin American-Statesman]

Earlier: ATL Caption Contest Finalists: We Dig This
ATL Caption Contest: We Dig This

Last week, we gave you this photo of a bunch of legal types and asked you to submit possible captions:

You did not disappoint. We have chosen our ten favorite captions. Check them out and vote for the best one, after the jump.

When we run caption contests here at ATL, we prefer to withhold the back story on the photo. However, this photo, and the story behind it, has gone viral. We’ve gotten it many times in tips — Thanks, tipsters! — and even our non-lawyer friends have been sending it to us.

We’re running a contest anyway, but we’ll give you the back story now… or after the jump rather. Same rules apply as always: Submit possible captions in the comments. We’ll choose our favorites — with preference given to those with a legal bent — and let you vote for the best one.

Here’s the photo of a bunch of legal types:

Think of a great caption. Write it down. Then check out the real and incredibly bizarre caption for this photo after the jump.

Last week, we offered you this photo of Vice President Joe Biden at Syracuse University School of Law and asked you to give us your funniest caption suggestions. We then asked you to vote among ten finalists, noting that one of the finalists was not our pick. Guess which finalist won.

You guys just love rooting for the underdog, don’t you?

It was a close race, with the winner taking only 18.3% of the nearly 2500 votes cast. Our second place winner captured 17.8% of the votes:

“I hope you like it - the chef was one of our best students.”

A good dig at Syracuse is bested only by a good dig at Washington’s socialist agenda. Thanks for all your captions and for voting!

Last Thursday, we posted a photo of VP Joe Biden enjoying some good ol’ blueberry pie at his alma mater, Syracuse University College of Law. It was up to you to come up with a caption for the picture, and now it’s time to choose the best one. Here’s the photo once again:

After the jump, check out the finalists.

Time for an Eyes of the Law celebrity sighting. On Wednesday, Vice President Joe Biden visited Syracuse University. From the Syracuse Post-Standard:

Vice President Joe Biden talked with Syracuse students, teachers and parents Wednesday about his mission to strengthen the middle class.

Then, he rode in a limousine to a ballroom where people had paid $250 to have lunch and $1,000 to pose for a picture with him. After that, he rode the limousine a few more blocks to mingle with more people who had paid thousands of dollars to spend private time with him.

But staff members at Syracuse Law, the VP’s alma mater, got to meet with him for free. All it took was some homemade blueberry pie.

A picture of Vice President Biden getting his pie on, plus a caption contest, after the jump.

On Monday, we brought you this photo, then asked you to suggest captions for it. Over 4000 votes were cast, and one caption won by the narrowest of margins…
“Firms run a risk of bad publicity when they lay off both labor lawyers and the print shop staff at the same time.”

The runner-up, and the backstory and law firm in question — a firm that has already been shamed once today — after the jump.

Earlier this week, we showed you a photo of a protest before an undisclosed law firm, then asked you to suggest captions. We now have six finalists and would like you to vote for the best of the bunch. To refresh your recollection, here’s the photo:

And here are the finalists:

A. “Laid off associates try a new strategy after their restatement section 90 claims fail.”

B. “Firms run a risk of bad publicity when they lay off both labor lawyers and the print shop staff at the same time.”

C. “So you say they underpay their staff and associates, treat all employees poorly, and offer no medical or retirement benefits whatsoever? … Are they hiring?”

D. “What do we want?”
“Jobs!”
“When do we want ‘em?”
“No earlier than January 2011, economic concerns permitting!”

E. “Shame on Firm X for only laying off 2 employees. Doesn’t it realize we’re in a recession?”

F. “In a classic labor protest rookie mistake, the former associates wasted their budget on a fancy sign and failed to reserve funds for doughnuts, resulting in awkwardly low participation.”

Earlier: ATL Caption Contest: Shame on You

It has been a long time since our last caption contest. In fact, we don’t believe we’ve done one since last year. So it’s time for a new one. The rules are the same as before:

[P]ost your caption entries in the comments. We’ll take our favorites, incorporate them into a poll, and allow you to vote for your favorite.

We present the picture below without comment or back story, so as not to limit your creativity. If you know the back story, please refrain from posting it.

We’ll tell everybody the real story behind the picture when the contest is over.

Please note that we have redacted the name of the firm in question, to prevent this thread from turning into a “Dump on Firm X” thread. So if you know the name of the firm, please don’t disclose it in the comments. When we inform you of the story behind the picture, we will inform you of the firm.

Here’s the photo. It’s a thumbnail, so feel free to click on it for a closer look.

This year, we launched a new feature on ATL: the Caption Contest. We gave you legally-themed photos and asked you to submit potential captions. We thought it was a great idea — let the readers do our work for us!

The contests proved to be widely popular. Wading through hundreds of caption submissions to bring you a top ten list was actually quite time-consuming, but not a terrible chore — lawyers and lawyers-to-be came up with some hilarious material.

Once we narrowed the lists to the top ten finalists, we let ATL readers choose the winners by voting. “Guest” may not win ATL Commenter of the Year, but certainly did come out on top in captioning. Take our most recent contest, Babies in the Corner. Out of 3030 votes, this caption won by a nose (0.8 percent):

A look back at our three favorite caption contests, after the jump.

After two weeks of non-stop layoff and bonus news, it looks like we might finally make it through a whole day without anybody getting fired or jobbed out of their expected year end compensation.

This gives us an opening to bring you the finalists from last week’s caption contest. We’ve read through all 275 comments, disregarded the ad hominem attacks, and brought you the ten best caption ideas. First, here’s the picture again (courtesy of photographer Joshua Landau):

And now, the finalists:

A. Typical day for attorneys in the structured finance group.

B. Don’t move! They can’t lay us off if they don’t see us.

C. We’ll now hear oral argument in the case of Length v. Girth.

D. Too tall. Too fat. Go home, you’ll never be cut out for Project Mayhem.

E. So, I take it you asked about your bonus too?

F. It’s amazing what a CWT guy will do for a few bucks these days.

G. In contrast to the waterboarding at Guantanamo, under the Obama administration enemy combatants will be subjected to much milder forms of discipline.

H. Rather than suffer the negative publicity arising from associate layoffs, BigLawFirms now dress underperforming associates in symbolic black, line them up, and shoot them.

I. In bad job market, law grads meditate to seek enlightenment, loan forbearance.

J. umm did the Kool-Aid taste funny to you?

Vote in the poll below. Once again we ask that you not reveal that backstory for this picture, and we demand that you do not out the contest’s (unwilling) participants.

It’s time for an ATL caption contest! Since there are so many new readers since the last time we ran one of these, here are the rules: post your caption entries in the comments. We’ll take our favorites, incorporate them into a poll, and allow you to vote for your favorite.

We present the picture below without comment or back story, so as not to limit your creativity. If you know the back story, please refrain from posting it.

We’ll tell everybody the real story behind the picture when the contest is over.

Enjoy. And for the love of God, with so many people out there who are sure they can do this job better than me, y’all better bring the funny.

Earlier: ATL Caption Contest: Tighty-Whities
‘Tighty-Whities’ Caption Contest Winner