Archive for August 2010
Huh? Lawyer’s Overbilling Blamed on Law School’s Failure To Teach Practice Management
Law schools today get a bad rap, often deservedly so. From outrageous tuition to to ineffectual, elitist law professors to fraudulent post-graduation employment statistics to failure to teach practical skills, law schools have become the scapegoats for everything wrong with the legal profession. Including theft over-billing. Yes, you read that right. Lawyer coach Rjon Robins…
Read MoreWould You Advise Your Child to Take on $150k in Debt to Go to Law School?
Yesterday, I received a call from one of my blog readers, somewhat out of the blue. A rising 2L at a top tier school, the student explained that he was interested in learning more about the feasibility of starting a law practice right out of law school. Yet as we talked more, however, it seemed…
Read MoreMy Shingle Fashion: Awesome Black Flats
Flats are complicated, ladies. Okay, no, they’re not, but writing “flats are so easy that even monkeys can wear them” wouldn’t make for much of an exposition. Really, where do you go from there? Everyone is thinking of monkeys wearing shoes, and the gravity of the moment is lost. Flats are pretty fool-proof, it’s true,…
Read MoreMyShingle Fashion: More Work Pumps – In Technicolor!
A few posts back, I shared a bunch of high heels to wear to work. However, they were a tad on the boring side: black, and…black. That’s pretty much all there was. This time, I’m opting for a much needed injection of diversity, and sharing with you a couple of work appropriate heels that aren’t…
Read MoreYet Another Reason Not to Use Canned Content
Courtesy of Professor Eric Goldman, here’s yet another reason to avoid canned content or ghostwritten materials in law firm newsletters, and by extension, blogs: it’s a sure-fire way to convert ordinary, First Amendment protected content into regulated advertising. Holtzman v. Turza (N.D. Ill. August 3, 2010) serves as a cautionary tale of what happens to…
Read MoreABA $5000 Legal Rebels Essay Contest
Though I’m not an ABA member, I’d be remiss in not informing those readers who are ABA members of this year’s $5000 Legal Rebels Essay Contest, open to ABA members and solos, defined as “a lawyer practicing alone with no partners.” To enter, submit an essay, not-to-exceed-600-words, in response to the question, “What innovation will…
Read MoreGet Jargon, Get Rid of Jargon
If you’re an aficionado of legal jargon (and come on, aren’t all of us lawyers, at least when we’ve had too much to drink?), why not indulge yourself with two free e-books of jargon on project finance and corporate finance, courtesy of Latham & Watkins, with an H/T to Three Geeks & A Law Blog.…
Read MoreBiglaw to Yourlaw: A Trend, But Nothing New
Earlier this month, both Slate and Crains New York carried articles describing the recent trend of biglaw attorneys starting their own practices. Summarizing these articles, an Above the Law post called the biglaw to yourlaw move a “new trend.” Not. Well, not if you’re a regular reader of this blog, anyway. I’ve been documenting the…
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