Yesterday we reported on this announcement by Brooklyn Law School:

This semester we have received several warnings from our Internet service provider that copyrighted movies and TV shows are being downloaded illegally via our wireless network. The Information Technology office is now ascertaining who is doing this. Once we have names of the individuals involved, we intend to give them to the copyright holders for enforcement purposes.

This stance proved unpopular with BLS students, as well as ATL readers. In a poll, about 75 percent of readers answered “yes” when asked, “Should Brooklyn Law School do more to protect its students from being sued for illegal downloading?”

It seems that Brooklyn Law School has had a change of heart. Check out the email that went out this afternoon, plus selected reader comments, after the jump.

Apparently so. From a student at Brooklyn Law School:

Today we received this e-mail from the administration, which is causing quite an uproar among the student body.

The gist of it seems to be that, contrary to the practice of other schools, BLS will begin actively investigating [illegal] downloading and proactively providing names of people to media [companies] so [the individuals in question] can be sued.

I believe the typical practice at other schools (graduate and undergraduate) and institutions is to wait for a subpoena and either cooperate or fight the subpoena, not to go out of their way to inform on their students.

The total cost of attendance at Brooklyn Law for the 2009-2010 academic year, for full-time students not living with their parents (God forbid), is a shade over $66,000. Shouldn’t that buy BLS’s silence?

Or is the law school in the right here? Shouldn’t law students, i.e., future lawyers, know and follow the law?

UPDATE: Brooklyn Law has announced a change in this policy.

Read the email and take a poll, after the jump.

If you were hoping for the AutoAdmit lawsuit to result in courtroom drama, with Cheese Eating Surrender Monkey breaking down in tears on the stand, then we’re sorry to disappoint you. The case has ended, somewhat anticlimactically.

Last week, the plaintiffs voluntarily dismissed their case against the remaining defendants. From the Hartford Courant:

Two former Yale University law school students have quietly settled a high-profile lawsuit they brought against about two dozen anonymous authors who the students said defamed and threatened them by posting malicious falsehoods on an Internet message board.

Perhaps plaintiff Brittan Heller felt ready to put down her sword, now that she’s happily married. But note that the dismissal is without prejudice (so check yo self, Pauliewalnuts).

What did the plaintiffs get out of filing their lawsuit?

Our inaugural Law Firm Swag Contest was about quality rather than quantity. We had just four entries, but they were goodies.

Eschewing trinkets and baubles, K&L Gates took the high road, urging recruits to change their world through an innovative website. Perkins Coie went green, arranging for trees to be planted in honor of interviewees. And who doesn’t like a customized iPod, the swag doled out by Dobrowski LLP, the Texas litigation boutique?

But in the end, dear readers, you voted with your feet. Following in the footsteps of the “Sex and the City” gals, or maybe Imelda Marcos, you made it all about the shoes. The customized Nike footwear doled out by Mayer Brown scored a runaway victory, with over 55 percent of the 2,100 votes.

Props to the person in the Mayer recruiting office who came up with the brilliant idea for this Niketown summer associate event. If you’re looking for new running shoes — or, for that matter, the opportunity to do appellate litigation in New York — then sprint in the direction of Mayer Brown!

Earlier: Law Firm Swag Contest: The Finalists
ATL Contest: Best Law Firm Swag of 2009

Perhaps it’s a sign of the times. We received a whopping four (4) entries in our inaugural law firm swag contest. Is law firm swag, like subsidized soda or staff attorney programs, another casualty of the recession?

But if we cancel the contest, then the terrorists win. So, onward!

We realize, of course, that not everyone approves of swag. See, e.g., this comment:

This is fairly disgusting…. I find this article particularly untimely, given that most law students are struggling to find good jobs, and many practicing attorneys are struggling just to keep the jobs they have.

Jeez, commenter 58 — lighten up! Considering that we cover law firm layoffs in excruciating detail, to the point where many accuse us of doomsaying and fearmongering, we are aware of the tough job market. But, even in the Great Recession, some people are still getting offers — along with a little swag to sweeten the pot. So what’s wrong with some fun to balance out the gloom?

In defense of law firm schwag, here’s a trend worth noting: “going green.” Firms are trying to be environmentally conscious in their swag selections, as well as more socially responsible in general. This may make schwag less “disgusting” to its critics.

A second theme of swag this year: customization. In this age of individualism and/or narcissism, firms are letting swag recipients have a say in what gets given away. Just as firms are moving away from lockstep in terms of pay and promotion, so too are they allowing for greater tailoring in terms of swag.

Check out the finalists, and vote for the best law firm swag, after the jump.

It’s been a long time coming, but Bloomberg is finally ready to unveil its new legal research tool. It will compete with Lexis and Westlaw for the hearts and minds of law students and junior associates across the land.

Bloomberg Law will have its launch party at the end of the month at the west side offices of Willkie Farr.

It is way too early to tell if Bloomberg Law will truly offer an innovation in case law research. But we already know the company has put a metric ton of money into the product.

And we know that they’ve been hiring former attorneys for at least two years. I found out about the Bloomberg Law project way back in early 2007, when I was freelancing and looking for work (I declined to follow up on the opportunity). More recently, if you know a New York attorney who was laid off at the end of 2008 who didn’t interview with Bloomberg, then you know a New York attorney that wasn’t really trying that hard to get a job.

Click here (PDF) to check out Bloomberg Law’s initial offerings.

We’ve learned how to Shepardize, we’ve learned how to KeyCite, will we all soon learn how to Citator?

Last year, we wrote about retired Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor entering a new field: video game development. She’s spearheading a project called Our Courts, which seeks to improve civic education in middle schools. The Our Courts website officially launched in January of this year.

The first two games, “Supreme Decision” and “Do I Have A Right?”, went live this summer. The Washington Post contacted us and asked us to review them. We played Nintendo, Oregon Trail, and Carmen Sandiego growing up, and we spent a recent Friday night at Elie’s playing Rock Band, so we were willing to give the Our Courts game a go.

Check out our review of the games, along with additional reflections on civic education and public access to the courts, in this Washington Post piece: Educational? You Be the Judge.

While Lat was in D.C., he swung by the Washington Post’s offices to talk about the games. Check out his star turn in the video after the jump.

Back to our series of open threads covering small (or smaller) law firms, focused on different practice areas. We’ve already written about small law firms in general, insurance law, personal injury law, trusts and estates, immigration, and real estate. Some of those discussions are still active, so feel free to look back at them.

Today we turn our attention to what’s widely viewed as a hot field: INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY. The reader who requested IP law as a subject offered an overview of the field:

IP is a very variable, different, and often forgotten practice of law that is mostly inhabited by engineers and science geeks who have no problems wearing Cosby sweaters and bad shoes around their workplaces.

More serious reflections, plus some questions, after the jump.

We’re getting mixed messages from the mainstream media. Just last week, Bloomberg told us Facebook and social networks are good for lawyers:

“Online networks are a fantastic tool for identifying expertise in the fields in which general counsel are looking to rein in outside counsel,” Eugene Weitz, an in-house attorney at Paris-based Alcatel Lucent, said in an interview. “Experts bubble up who have the ability to show their knowledge online.”

Some lawyers show a little too much online, though. That can get them into trouble. It can get them reprimanded by the bar, fined, or fired. This weekend, John Schwartz of the New York TImes did a nice round-up of lawyers’ Facebook fiascos.

Some “no-nos” when it comes to online behavior, after the jump.

This is a blind item, since we don’t know the identity of the attorney. Yesterday, this unknown attorney sent an employee a text message. It wasn’t to wish the employee a happy Labor Day. From Reddit:

“Sexting” was the latest hot cell phone trend. Maybe the new trend will be “diSMSing.”

Dear Reddit. It is 10:40 PM, on a Holiday, and I was just fired via text. [Reddit]

When we delivered our talk yesterday at Santa Clara Law, discussing various trends sweeping through the legal profession and what they mean, we were honored to have Professor Eric Goldman in the audience. Professor Goldman is one of the nation’s leading scholars in the areas of internet law and intellectual property. (We especially appreciate his continuing coverage of derivative liability and Section 230, a statutory section much beloved by blog operators.)

Professor Goldman’s excellent recap of our remarks appears here. We were especially interested in his thoughts, as a former corporate general counsel, on the billable hour and fixed-fee arrangements. Check out his post at the link below.

David Lat Talk Recap [Eric Goldman / Goldman’s Observations]

Are you a laid-off lawyer who has been spending way too much time on Facebook? Here’s a way to turn that “résumé gap” into job experience:

Director of Social Media

Medium-sized Atlanta law firm seeks candidates interested in a part-time or full-time social media position. The primary responsibility of the Social Media Director will be to actively promote our growing law firm using a variety of social media such as Twitter, Facebook and our existing web-site. Projects include: managing the firm’s Twitter, Facebook and web-site account, research current and relevant legal stories in the news and republish to social networks and firm web-site on a daily basis, communicate through social web-sites about all specific practice groups and their developments, update marketing team on a weekly basis with web-site content.

Managing a professional presence on Facebook, Twitter, and other social networking sites felt like a full-time job to me. But I didn’t know you could draw a salary for it.

So what are the qualifications for this position — and, more importantly, the salary?

Life happens fast. This morning we reported that Thomson Reuters had revoked free printer access to law schools in Puerto Rico.

It seems that the policy has now been reversed. A message from University of Puerto Rico law professor José Julián Álvarez González, after the jump.

Update (4:15): After this post went was published, Thomson Reuters reversed course and reinstated the free printer access to Puerto Rican law schools. Click here for our coverage.

Thomson Reuters owns Westlaw and is one of the two major gatekeepers to legal research in the modern world. Recently, the company made an economic decision that some claim unfairly impacts law students in Puerto Rico. A tipster reports:

It seems Westlaw has decided to cut their free printer service to the four Puerto Rico Law schools for economic reasons, while keeping the service in all US law schools.

Why would Westlaw only discontinue free printer access to Puerto Rican law students? One Westlaw user wrote to Thompson Reuters, asking the company to reconsider its decision. But he also seems to have figured out why Westlaw made this decision.

Back when we worked at a law firm, one partner was obsessed with the concept of the “paperless office.” He wanted to have as many documents as possible scanned and stored electronically, in order to eliminate any unnecessary use of paper. It was a bit OCD of him, and his jihad against paper was viewed with mild amusement around the firm.

Perhaps this partner was ahead of his time. Back in 2006, law firms were described as the “last frontier in going paperless.” But now the trend is moving strongly in the direction of a paperless world. These days it seems that everyone wants to go commando.

Back in March, we reported on stealth layoffs at Davis Polk & Wardwell. Stealth layoffs are usually seen as an effort to maintain high attorney utilization rates — and high partner profits. But at genteel, WASPy DPW, long known for its passive-aggressive kinder and gentler firm culture, profits come second to pulchritude.

Everything is beautiful at 450 Lexington — the offices, the stationery, and yes, the attorneys. DPW has long been known for hiring based on beauty as well as brains. So we suspect that their recent stealth layoffs were just an “office beautification” project: lay off the less attractive associates, to increase the average hotness of the remaining lawyers. (Lord only knows what the denizens of the recently closed Frankfurt office looked like.)

A few years ago, we wrote about Davis Polk’s reputation for hiring aesthetically appealing attorneys in the New York Observer:

Bar Belles: According to Rob, a 2L at NYU, one firm that’s in demand this season is Davis Polk & Wardwell. Why? “I’ve heard they have good-looking associates.”

Some things never change. When I interviewed a decade ago, Davis was already known as a bastion of beauty on aesthetically challenged Lexington Avenue. It was the firm of choice for the prom queen and king of my law school class — the editor in chief of the law journal, a luminous doll-like beauty with a vast family fortune, and her Abercrombie-handsome future husband. They were joined at Davis by enough comely Asian females to cast Memoirs of a Geisha.

And hotness matters more at Davis Polk these days, now that their redesigned website features attorney photos (for some, but not all, of the lawyers — perhaps it was an “opt in” regime?). From an observant tipster:

Have you noticed that Davis Polk’s new website has pictures of attorneys? Weren’t they once afraid of stalkers? Glad they’ve gotten over that. Or perhaps their associate corps is simply uglier now.

We think not. If you visit the Davis Polk — er, DavisPolk — website, and surf through the attorney profiles, you’ll still find hotties to spare.

Evidence of hotness, plus additional analysis, after the jump.

Someone’s July 4th weekend is off to a good start. Chief Judge Alex Kozinski, of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, has been cleared of misconduct by the panel of Third Circuit judges that was tasked with investigating him. As you may recall, Chief Judge Kozinski called for an investigation of himself, after it was revealed that he had a “website” — which wasn’t really a website, for reasons previously explained by the judge’s wife, Marcy Tiffany — containing some sexually explicit material.

The Third Circuit Judicial Council’s unanimous opinion, authored by Chief Judge Anthony Scirica, is available here (PDF). It was actually filed on June 5, but only made public today. It’s thorough and lengthy, weighing in at 38 pages, and describes in detail the extensive investigation conducted by the council (with the assistance of outside lawyers, from Dechert and Morgan Lewis, and a technology consultant).

To those with a deeper familiarity with the facts of the case, as opposed to just the headlines, Chief Judge Kozinski’s vindication is not surprising. The judge violated no law; rather, the “website” — actually just a private family file server, although imperfectly secured for a period of time, as explained in the opinion — was a personal matter unrelated to his judicial duties. To the extent that the (overblown) public controversy created a problem in an obscenity trial that Judge Kozinski was presiding over at the time, any problem was obviated when the judge recused himself. And let’s not forget that the whole controversy was originally kicked up by a disgruntled litigant, Cyrus Sanai, who tried peddling the story for months before someone finally bit — and who “has been targeting Kozinski for years,” as noted by Ted Frank.

So congratulations, Judge Kozinski, on putting this matter behind you. We look forward to catching up with you at the Ninth Circuit Judicial Conference later this month.

A few updates and links, after the jump.

The second panel we attended at the recent convention of the American Constitution Society (ACS) focused on a topic near and dear to our heart: free speech on the internet.

The panel, The Internet Revolution and Its Effect on the First Amendment, featured the following participants:

These days, it seems like the Blackberry stranglehold on Biglaw is loosening. Purely anecdotally, we’ve been seeing many office-pale fingers making use of iPhone touch screens to check for partner e-mails over the weekends.

Let’s move beyond the anecdotal though. Which do you prefer as your Biglaw ball and chain?

Richardson’s top 10 iPhone app picks, and a couple more polls, after the jump.

We regularly receive tips about free events that might interest our readers. Because we don’t have the ability to give shout-outs to all, and to ensure equal treatment, we direct everyone with events to promote to mention them in our Community section. If your event is more commercial in nature, you can advertise it on ATL; if your budget is limited, consider a quicklisting.

Our rule against event promotion admits of exceptions. We will mention events featuring significant participation by Above the Law editors (e.g., a speech by one of us). We’ll also mention selected events sponsored by our advertisers (like the happy hour sponsored by Major Lindsey & Africa, and the launch party of Practical Law Company).

If you’ll be in or near Morgantown, West Virginia — which isn’t far from Pittsburgh, and which happens to be one of the few cities that’s doing well in the downturn — you might be interested in this event, featuring your above-signed editor (see the 9:50 a.m. panel):

DIGITAL ENTREPRENEURSHIP: INCENTIVES AND LEGAL RISKS

When: Friday, March 27, 8 a.m. to 5 p.m.
Speakers: Various. Check out the full schedule of events.
Where: Marlyn E. Lugar Courtroom, WVU Law Center, Morgantown, WV
Cost: Free and open to the public.

Hope to see you there!

Digital Entrepreneurship: The Incentives and Legal Risks [West Virginia University College of Law]