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May 31, 2008
Saturday's Charon: The PM feels your pain.
Charon QC gets a cold call from Britain's Prime Minister in "Gordon cold calls British public…Hello…is that Charon?…".
Posted by JD Hull at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)
Big Dog finally hosts Blawg Review.
Old China Hand, fellow ex-Midwesterner and another guy who travels too much, Dan Harris of China Law Blog and Harris & Moure hosts Blawg Review this Monday. Expect the usual Harris: insightful, innovative, feisty and cosmopolitan. He wants us all to make money in China. And he owes me a one-on-one game of hoops--but I can take this Hoosier.
Posted by JD Hull at 12:26 AM | Comments (0)
Holden Oliver's first trip to Pittsburgh.
Summer Clerkship. I've not lived anywhere but Europe, Massachusetts, Manhattan and Palo Alto. So there were problems.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 12:06 AM | Comments (0)
May 30, 2008
The Paris Blog
The Paris Blog is a group site in English by Americans, Canadians, Brits and Frenchmen, mainly expatriates, who write about "the daily intricacies of life in Paris". It's edited by Laurie Pike, like me a Midwesterner who lived in California for a while. There's a bit of everything/anything about La Ville lumière: arts, politics, neighborhoods, French culture, work (no jokes please). We liked "Cops Bust Gypsies at Notre Dame"--but how could such a thing happen on ground zero for things French?--and "Festival of Pain" (bread, not physical suffering), about an outdoor makeshift bakery and "bread-fest" just across the Seine.
Ille St. Louis, island of dreams
Posted by JD Hull at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)
Corporate Japan closes up.
In "Power Struggles", London-based The Economist reports that Japan is excluding foreign investors and may be "the most closed market in the industrialised world".
Posted by JD Hull at 05:20 PM | Comments (0)
May 29, 2008
Update: Blawgs Abroad--75 more non-U.S. blawgs and sites.
Americans do tend to think that the rest of the world is rather far away and not terribly important.
--Delia Venables, UK legal IT commentator, in UK's Law Gazette, March 2, 2006.
Today at What About Clients? we add another 75 international blogs to our Directory of Non-U.S. Blogs on the left-hand side of this blog (scroll down a little). We started the Directory in early 2006; see here, here and here, a/k/a the World Cup Blawg Review. It now has nearly 300 sites, and the list of course belongs to everyone. Our last update was in August 2007. Since then, we've worked to discover more international legal weblogs, sites and resources. We list the good ones: active, high quality and preferably in English. We'd have done this earlier--but clients and our boss The Timesheet got in the way.
An important thank you is in order to five important sources: pioneer Bill Gratsch and his Blawg.com (US), Diane Levin (US), Dan Harris (China/US), Guy Kawasaki (Universe), and Jordan Furlong (Canada).
The new blogs come from 26 countries, including Belgium, Malaysia, Romania, Sri Lanka and Turkey. Are there more out there?
Argentina: 4
Blog de Mediacion, Daniel Martinez Zampa
eMediacion by AcuerdoJusto, Franco Conforti
Resolución Electrónica de Disputas, Alberto Elisavetsky
Secretos del Meliador Exitoso, Nora Curtis, Franco Conforti and Nora Femenia
Australia: 4
Adelaide Criminal Defence Blog, Simon Slade
Australian Mediation Association, Callum Campbell
Open and Shut, Peter Timmins
Belgium: 1
Réseau Médiation, Dominique Foucart
Brazil: 2
Brazilian Arbitration Law, Pedro Alberto Costa
Gestão de Conflitos Familiares
Canada: 16
bc business law blog, Meldon Ellis
The Bizop News, Michael J. Webster
Class Actions in Canada, Ward Branch
Law Firm Web Strategy, Steve Matthews
A Mediator's Calling, Ken Bole
NALP Canadian Directory of Legal Employers
Perspectives from a Mediator/Arbitrator, Stephen Raymond
Precedent: The new rules of law and style, Melissa Kluger
Vancouver Law Librarian Blog, Steve Matthews
The Work it Out Blog, Allan Revich
Workplaces That Work, Lynne Eisaguirre
Chile: 1
Servicios de Mediacion, Paola Aedo Peralta
China: 3
Chinese Negotiation - Negotiating in China, Andrew Hupert
Go East - Outsourcing to China, Dean Stevens
England: 6
Communication and Conflict Blog
Conflict Resolution Network UK
The Mediation Times, Amanda Bucklow
European Union: 2
The Blog of European Patent Law
France: 3
L'Observatoire du Droit Panameen et du Droit International, Pierre Julie Ivan Alonso
Parliaments Ideas, BsiLi AdeL
Germany: 8
Beckmann und Norda Rechtsanwälte Bielefeld
Die Maschinistin, Kirstin Nickelsen
Institut Sikor, Marianne & Markus Sikor
Kleinblog, David Klein
Konfliktmanagement, Mediation & Dialog, Dr. Simen Joachim and colleagues
Master of Mediation, Christoph Stroyer
Mediation Solutions, Natalia Martin Rivero and Axel JC Brodehl
Unternehmensjurist.de, Stefan Deyerler
India: 2
Legal Process Outsourcing, Rahul Jindal
Technology Law India, George Vivek Durai
Indonesia: 1
Israel: 1
Italy: 1
Malaysia: 1
Malaysian Mediation, Chan Kheng Hoe
Netherlands: 2
Fer Kousen Conflictmanagement, Fer Kousen
ComparativeLawBlog, Jacco Bomhoff
New Zealand: 2
Mediation vBlog Project, Geoff Sharp
My Weblog, James South
Peru: 1
Poland: 2
TogetherResolve, Emmy Irobi
Portugal: 5
Associação de Mediadores de Conflitos
Conflito: uma oportunidade!, David Santiago Pires
Justiça Restaurativa em Portugal
Romania: 1
Singapore: 1
The Negotiation Guru, Jens Thang
Spain: 3
El Blog Derecho Público de Sevach
blog solomediacion.com, Miquel Tort
todomediacion.com, Isabel Medina
Sri Lanka: 1
ICT for Peacebuilding, Sanjana Hattotuwa
Turkey: 1
Posted by JD Hull and Brooke Powell at 08:32 PM | Comments (2)
May 28, 2008
The Greatest Generation interviews the Lamest.
Or, Work much? About a 60 Minutes segment on Generation Y, originally aired in November and updated this past Sunday, Scott Greenfield at Simple Justice has a few thoughts in "Millennials: It's Awesome to be Us". Excerpt:
One of my issues with 60 Minutes is that, while they court controversy well, they rarely challenge the self-serving statements of their interviewees directly. As the video shows, the consultants who are busily earning some very good fees from companies by advising how to make Millennials "feel good" about their work, the only thing that seems to matter to the members of this group, attribute some wonderful qualities to them.
Are Millennials really so wonderful? Let's see: They're well educated, but inherently lazy. They are techno-savvy, but don't see themselves as serving anyone but themselves. They are the most talented generation? Says who? Are they talented in treating your clients with respect? Not that I can see. And they have to be taught how to eat with a fork and knife? They have to be cajoled into showing up for work every day?
Ah, the new Slackoisie.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)
Fun new game: MSNBC's GOP Veepstakes.
Click above to play new VP game with MSNBC's Chuck Todd and David Gregory. Our pick and prediction is lawyer Rob Portman, 53, not nationally known, but a talented Bushie and conservative who goes down well with the "real" GOP rank and file, which has been grooming him for years. With roots in southern Ohio's Republican "Taft country", Portman's been a Cincinnati congressman, and both U.S. Trade Representative and Director of the Office of Management and Budget under George W. Bush. That's an exemplary resume for a relatively young guy. Long-term weak point: he has hardly any enemies, which makes you wonder about him.
Posted by JD Hull at 11:59 PM | Comments (1)
International Dispute Negotiation: Asian Tiger Singapore
Listen to IDN's latest podcast, No. 27, "Mediating from Singapore: An Interview with Christopher Lau". In this segment, GE's Mike McIlwrath and Lau talk about how to find the right mediator in Singapore. And they talk about critical cultural and historical traits that may make Singapore different--different from, say, South Korea, Hong Kong and mainland China. Lau is a senior counsel in the Singapore office of the London-based barristers' chambers of 3 Verulam Buildings.
Posted by Brooke Powell at 11:52 PM | Comments (0)
May 27, 2008
Veni, Vidi, Venti
Stephen Albainy-Jenei at Patent Baristas is hosting this week's Blawg Review #161 in honor of "those who have fought and died for our freedoms." We think BR #161 is among the most comprehensive, thoughtful and quality Blawg Reviews presented this year.
Posted by Brooke Powell at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)
"Do work that changes the way clients think about lawyers."
That's Rule Four from our 12 rules of client service.
Let's not kid ourselves. Why "try to exceed expectations" when the overall lawyer standard is perceived as low to mediocre? Why not overhaul and re-create the whole game?
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 12:55 AM | Comments (0)
U.S. still most competitive economy.
For 15th year in a row. AP: "Swiss survey: US maintains edge in competitiveness". Excerpt:
Asian tigers Singapore and Hong Kong ranked just behind the U.S., as they did last year. Switzerland jumped two places to fourth, while Luxembourg rounded out the top five most competitive national economies, said the Lausanne, Switzerland-based, IMD business school, publisher of the World Competitiveness Yearbook.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 12:30 AM | Comments (0)
Warren Buffett on recession: "Long and deep".
According to Reuters:
BERLIN - The United States is already in a recession and it will be longer as well as deeper than many people expect, U.S. investor Warren Buffett said in an interview published in German magazine Der Spiegel on Saturday. [more]
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 12:00 AM | Comments (0)
May 25, 2008
Saturday and Sunday's Charon
London's Charon QC, a man with a velvet voice, was kind enough to interview a Paris-bound WAC? last year in London near the Marble Arch, aided by his stunning 26-year-old sound assistant, and we've been intimate friends ever since. I've grown close to Charon as well. The lawyer-prof-writer does take time away from interviews and lengthy stays at The Bollo and The Swan to write his well-known blog. He generally writes a review of the past week in his Weekend Review and recently introduced Charon after dark... Tonight he nods to London's new eccentric young mayor, Boris Johnson, an Etonian*, and muses on "The Thirteen Horsemen from Eton".
*An Etonian is a person who attended Eton, which is a boarding school for young men in Britain and has produced English statesmen for nearly 600 years. Eton is a bit like the fine American private boarding schools, Phillips Andover, Deerfield or The Hill School, except it's "public"--and with far more extensive and imaginative cross-dressing. (The new London mayor, in that respect at least, is normal.)
Posted by JD Hull at 02:32 PM | Comments (0)
May 24, 2008
Is txt msgng the new threat to France?
The Economist asks: "Parlez-vous SMS?" France's American-like President Nicolas Sarkozy is worried about what "text-messaging is doing to the French language". Please aim higher, sir.
Posted by JD Hull at 11:10 PM | Comments (1)
May 23, 2008
IP getting its green on?
Patent and natural resources law may collide more. Wonderful, especially if it makes business sense. See Cincinnati's Patent Baristas, New York's IP Law360, and London's Science Business.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)
Got proofreading?--Part II
Proofreading may be boring. But it's important, and part of who you are if you are in the business of turning words into money and value. Here's a comment by Minneapolis lawyer T.J. Conley--he gives us wisdom and a tip--in response to yesterday's post:
One of the senior lawyers at our firm used to say that you are only as good a lawyer as you are a proofreader. One of my tricks, to avoid the natural tendency to see what you think should be there, is to read a document backwards. You'd be amazed at what you catch.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 05:03 PM | Comments (0)
May 22, 2008
Ford CEO Mulally: Tough times
Rising fuel and steel costs mean reduced production and profit goals. Bloomberg. The Guardian. The Detroit Free Press. AP. Good news: we'll get smaller cars on the road.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)
Ted Kennedy
To be Irish is to know that in the end, the world will break your heart. --Daniel Patrick Moynihan
Call me a cultural stereotype. A boomer. A limousine liberal. I don't care. Ted Kennedy being diagnosed with malignant cancer of the brain floored me. I don't even know why.
Long ago, Duke University, which changed my life in a number of ways, awarded me my first paid desk job to work for Wisconsin's Senator Gaylord Nelson. With some help from my father, I rented an overpriced and horrible little apartment across the street from the hospital on Washington Circle where I had been born 21 years earlier, and excitedly entered the world I'd been seeing on television since I was in my early teens growing up in the Midwest. That first sunny Monday morning in May, I walked all the way to work, zig-zagging down Pennsylvania Avenue, and then up Constitution Avenue, well over two miles total, just to take it all in. But I walked in a hurry.
The Hill job was in health policy, and I was asked to follow and report on the work of the busy U.S. Senate Subcommittee on Health, chaired by then 42-year-old Ted Kennedy. I saw Kennedy up close a lot during committee sessions and mark-ups during the next 3 months. (A few years later, I worked again on Capitol Hill, and lived there for many
years. I'd see him around. Today, if I were lucky, he might recognize my persistent face if he saw me--but I certainly wasn't important those first 3 months.) But way before that, as the "last Kennedy", he was always part of the soundtrack of my life and my friends' lives since we were in our early teens. But he was more than a name, mystique and the booming populist oratory and Gaelic cadences of speech which come naturally to him.
For me, Ted Kennedy has never been about ideas, legislative agendas or even the Kennedy schmaltz: the hope, the dream that never dies, the struggle, all that. He left that music to others, like to his uber-aggressive brother-in-law, Steven Smith, and to his staff. I just never saw Kennedy as an ideologue, even when he ran for the American presidency--which I bet he never really wanted. A character out of a novel, he's simply as Irish as they come: brooding, playful and contradictory. Quietly but definitely war-like. He's smarter than people think, and remarkably adept at sifting through and making sense of too much information thrown at him. In the main, though, he's passionate, human, even poetic--and vulnerable in all the best ways.
Like lots of senators, he's also distracted as hell, even endearingly spacey--but warm and charming, a natural politician, easily the best in his family. He can turn that on and off. Like Bill Clinton, and for whatever the reason, Kennedy genuinely likes people; it's not for show. Watch the guy in a crowd. He's at ease once he's there. He physically resembles most, and is most like, his mother Rose, the family saint and caregiver. And that soulfulness, I think, helped him to be very good at his job. Family friend and economist John Kenneth Galbraith once said that Ted Kennedy was the best U.S. senator he'd seen in his lifetime.
Finally, the last Kennedy is as wounded as they come, too. Try, if you can, not to cry when you watch a clip of his eulogy of his brother Robert in 1968, when he was 36. Kennedy's voice cracked badly, and I can't forget the sound of him as he struggled to finish the speech for his older brother. It wasn't about politics, ideas, or even about anyone's family. The sound was pure grief and loss, unashamed.
Posted by JD Hull at 11:59 PM | Comments (1)
HRC: Until the last dog dies.
That's a Bill Clinton Ozark mountains expression. We have always liked it even though WAC? writers (and Hull McGuire lawyers) are very split among the three candidates still punching, and we have some stalwart if calm Clinton dislikers. But wondrous, irrational keep-your-options-open optimism is very American. Sometimes it works. From today's daily Hillary Clinton campaign e-mail update: "On May 31, we'll hear the decision from the DNC's Rules and Bylaws Committee on whether they'll seat the delegates from Michigan and Florida". But, she continues, "Puerto Rico votes in 10 days, and the last primaries in Montana and South Dakota are just two days later, and...." See Salon's "She's in it to spin it".
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)
How To Work With A Weenie, If You Must.
Two fine posts on Gen-Y, Gen-X, Boomers:
Scott Greenfield, NYC, Simple Justice, "Hull to Gen Y Lawyers: Get It or Get Out". Greenfield is a criminal trial lawyer and writer.
Jordan Furlong, Ottawa, Canada, Law21: Dispatches From A Legal Profession On The Brink, "How to Work with Boomer Lawyers". Furlong is Editor-in-Chief of National magazine at the Canadian Bar Association.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 12:59 AM | Comments (0)
Got proofreading?
Proofreading errors are avoidable, even under the gun--if you make ardor in proofreading a habit.
Take invoices to clients. Invoices, if done correctly, are a great way to communicate what you've done for a client and they can even serve as a marketing tool. They are a genre of documents we all need to get right. Clients can always be expected to read them. So they need to be really "right", right?
Lawyers don't talk about proofreading enough. It amazes us that badly proofread pleadings and letters still emanate from some of the best American and European law firms. It mars and even desecrates otherwise good and sometimes brilliant work. Mistakes will happen in
law practice in any event--but the idea is to minimize them, and especially those you can control. Proofreading errors are avoidable, even under the gun, if you make ardor in doing it a habit. Our recurring nightmare is that the GC of our best client says: "If at $___ an hour you guys can't spell [or write], believe me, we can find a law firm tomorrow morning that can." For that reason, as mentioned in a 2005 WAC? "Just Say It" post on writing for lawyers, Rule 5 (of 8) in the good writing section of our firm's Practice Guide is:
5. Proofread, proofread, proofread. (Oh yes, at our firm, we have a written policy on proofreading you must actually sign before you start work. Go ahead, laugh.)
"Pretend that, for every typo you miss or grammatical error you make, you have to buy Dan Hull as many Heinekens as he could drink in one evening in his late twenties on St. Patrick's Day in the most expensive Capitol Hill watering hole he and his friends could find."
Together with thinking and writing simply and clearly, there's no more important habit for a lawyer to develop. Misspellings, omitted or misplaced words and off-the-charts bad grammar are often important errors which blot out otherwise good work--and ones we can control.
It's that simple.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 12:59 AM | Comments (2)
Learning well
Education is not the filling of a pail but the lighting of a fire.
--William Butler Yeats (1865-1939), poet and statesman.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 12:59 AM | Comments (0)
May 21, 2008
The Dumbest Generation?
See last week's WSJ piece "Can U Read Kant?" in which David Robinson reviews Mark Bauerlein's new book. In The Dumbest Generation, Bauerlein, an Emory English prof, contends that the digital revolution and cultural factors "have conspired to create a level of public ignorance so high as to threaten our democracy". OK, it's bad, but let's not go nuts.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 11:56 PM | Comments (0)
Oil is $132 a barrel.
Another new record. Bloomberg: "Oil Rises Above $132 on U.S. Supply Drop, Bank Price Forecasts". Last week, the US DOE says, supplies fell 5.32 million barrels to 320.4 million, the biggest drop in 4 months.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 08:33 AM | Comments (0)
China's New Labor Law
Plus "Why Vietnam Is No Big Thing". Read peripatetic Dan Harris at China Law Blog. And see "China Earthquake Donations".
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 12:42 AM | Comments (0)
May 20, 2008
Who cares what makes Generation Y tick?
From a marketing e-mail I received today:
Are you frustrated by young workers who feel entitled to success, need constant praise, want everything to be 'their way'? Are you struggling to attract and retain a generation of workers whose commitment seems more temporary than permanent?
This is Generation Y, a workforce of as many as 70 million, and the first wave is just now taking their place in an increasingly multigenerational workplace.
In this 1-day seminar, we'll show you how to motivate and manage Generation Y. You'll learn what makes them tick, how to retain them, and make them productive and energized.
It's your problem, Gen-X and Gen-Y. Not ours. Work, figure it out, ask questions, and we'll help you--but it's your job to adjust to "us" and the often hard adventure of learning to solve problems for your employer and its clients.
Posted by JD Hull at 11:59 PM | Comments (28)
Not just an Irish thing: "Let no man write my epitaph".
It was a 1960 movie with Shelley Winters, Ricardo Montalban, Jean Seberg and Burl Ives (playing a nice boozy Irish Chicago judge) I first saw as a re-run on TV growing up in Cincinnati. It was based on a 1958 novel by Willard Motley. But the words came from a real guy, Irish nationalist Robert Emmet, during the "speech from the dock" before he was hanged by the British in 1803 for leading a march on Dublin Castle. History doesn't think Emmet was the most effective Irish rebel who ever lived--but his final words endured:
I have but one request to ask at my departure from this world – it is the charity of its silence. Let no man write my epitaph. No man can write my epitaph, for as no man who knows my motives and character dares now to vindicate them, let not prejudice or ignorance asperse them. Let them rest in obscurity and peace until other times and other men can do justice to them. When my country takes her place among the nations of the earth, then shall my character be vindicated, then may my epitaph be written.
Posted by JD Hull at 12:52 AM | Comments (0)
May 19, 2008
Perfection's curse: Why Justin isn't helping us move the ball.
Devil perfection is the bane of first children, overachievers and, yes, lawyers. Especially new ones from top schools and/or with top grades. Rule 10: "Be Accurate, Thorough and Timely--But Not Perfect".
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 11:56 PM | Comments (2)
Blawg Review #160: Ms. Ruthie, finally.
"The ultimate London law bird", according to Palo Alto-based WAC? news chief Holden Oliver, hosts this week's Blawg Review #160 at Ruthie's Law. For a time she was Robin to GeekLawyer's Howard, and much more. Brains, beauty, wit and British subtlety in one hard-working solictor. Originally from King's Lynn in Norfolk (on The Wash), she just moved to London, which she plans to conquer. A European with an American soul.
Posted by Brooke Powell at 11:31 PM | Comments (1)
May 18, 2008
How did Humans first start resolving the Fist Fights of Life?
The International Institute for Conflict Prevention & Resolution (CPR), International Dispute Negotiation program (IDN): Interview with American cultural anthropologist Robert Carneiro.
Ten thousand years ago, how did humans first go about developing formal methods of resolving disputes--and why did they do it in the first place? Listen to IDN's latest podcast interview by General Electric's Florence, Italy-based litigation counsel Mike McIlwrath. This is Mike's 26th interview with the best and brightest of the litigation-ADR international community, including U.S. trial lawyers with higher-end business clients. Not one program has disappointed us.
This week, Mike interviews respected American anthropologist Robert Carneiro on the "Evolution of Dispute Resolution". The Carneiro interview is an especially compelling IDN segment, and rapidly covers: evolution of the state, the orderly introduction of legal systems with formal methods of conflict resolution, dispute resolution in societies that have remained in clusters of small, autonomous groups, and conflict resolution's role in keeping larger groups together and productive.
The IDN segment got us thinking, and worrying. In our view, much business litigation--and in the U.S. especially--is a wasteful ruse of "going through the motions", and outright churning, often in cavalier disregard of both fact and law. Lawyering itself during the litigation process has lapsed into a cynical mix of untruthfulness and laziness. Even many clients think it's business-as-usual to join their lawyers in misusing the system ("the lawyers will tell me what to say" and "they keep telling me not to remember anything"). Suits which easily form the basis for subsequent abuse of process actions are filed every business day of the year.
Is demanding good faith in the good fight too idealistic? Can we at least evolve that much? One small step further? Litigation and ADR all over the world needs to be both streamlined and resistant to processed and packaged falsehood. Both lawyers and judges need to be proactive in making the terrain not only more business-friendly but increasingly economical, fair and honest for all participants, from Microsoft and Coca-Cola to corner shops and street vendors.
Think of it as real truth-finding done efficiently.
Like humans themselves, litigation, ADR and dispute resolution will always be aggressive by its nature and context--as it probably should be. Even sophisticated litigants need to vent. But it should be intelligent and aggressive--not a "game" for and by lawyers. A bloodless but honest war, with prompt starts and quick endings. That goal is still possible, even for American humans and their lost generations of lawyers, in this century. Think about that when you hear Mike's interview with Dr. Carneiro.
Posted by JD Hull at 12:26 AM | Comments (1)
May 17, 2008
London star Ms. Ruthie hosts next Blawg Review.
Ruthie of Ruthie's Law is the ultimate London law bird: (1) solicitor-writer-biker and (2) one of the few women who on earth who can make my badly jet-lagged boss--now on his way back to California--gush, rock back and forth like a mental patient, and make noises like a damn raccoon. "To most of the world, she's a saucy if talented flirt--but she melts my heart". Ruthie hosts Blawg Review this week, Monday, May 19th.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 11:01 PM | Comments (1)
May 16, 2008
Mike Huckabee: He's back!
And we're seeing Mike on and in the national news a lot lately. We kind of missed him, even when he was acting weird, and even though we generally have good taste. Ah, memories...
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)
Writing Well: The Criminal Defense Trial Lawyer Weenie-Client Exception.
New York's Scott Greenfield at Simple Justice makes a good point in "Crossed I's, Dotted T's, Enough".
Posted by JD Hull at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)
EU steps up antitrust investigation of drug makers.
BRUSSELS (Canada's Law Day) – European antitrust investigators are expanding their inquiry of the European pharmaceutical market in an effort to determine whether companies are blocking generic drug makers from getting less-expensive medicines to market quickly.
Posted by JD Hull at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)
Rjon Robbins: Failing to win.
Whether you are hunting mega-large publicly-traded or mom-and-pop small ones, to land clients, maybe you should "double your rate of failure". See Thomas Watson's Formula for Success at HowToMakeItRain.com.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 12:59 AM | Comments (1)
May 15, 2008
Profits
Ron Paquette at More Partner Income has a 3-part series: "Partner Cost And Client Profitability".
Posted by JD Hull at 02:56 PM | Comments (0)
Holden heads to northern England, gets his solidarity thing on.
Hearing "Blackleg Miner", a 19th century Northumberland, England folk song, could make a serious, union-hating industrialist drink too much, give all his money away to orphans, and buy up all the Pete Seeger recordings in Palo Alto. Especially this version with video. Via the UK site White Rabbit:
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 12:03 AM | Comments (0)
May 14, 2008
Persistent Cleveland
Like other Midwestern U.S. cities with manufacturing roots, it has tried to diversify. In recent years Cleveland lost TRW, Office Max, BP, and Oglebay Norton to acquisitions, mergers and re-structurings. But it's still headquarters to National City Bank, American Greetings, Eaton Corporation, Sherwin-Williams, Parker-Hannifin and Aleris International. It's become a go-to city for biotechnology and fuel cell research, led
by Case Western and the Cleveland Clinic. Jones Day (in our view, one of the few functional mega-law firms still out there, along with Skadden and a few others) started in Cleveland over 100 years ago. It has about 2300 lawyers. It's had only 7 managing partners since 1913, including the respected Dick Pogue during the 1980s and 1990s. Dean Erwin Griswold was a partner there.
Posted by JD Hull at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)
Patent reform in in the US--and business-method patents.
The Economist: America's Patent System: Methods and Madness. "The federal court charged with hearing patent appeals has hinted that it may use a case [Bilski, argued at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit in DC last Thursday with 200 people present] to cut back the scope of patent protection for business methods." [more]
Posted by JD Hull at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)
May 13, 2008
China's earthquake: How you can help.
See China Law Blog and the UN's ReliefWeb. Yesterday's earthquake, China's worst in 30 years, has left at least 10,000 dead. Countless more are trapped, isolated or homeless.
Posted by JD Hull at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)
May 12, 2008
Toyota suspends southwestern China plant after quake.
TOKYO/SHANGHAI (Reuters) - Toyota Motor Corp. on Monday suspended production at a 13,000-units-a-year joint venture plant in Chengdu, southwestern China, after a powerful earthquake struck, killing at least 107 people. [more]
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)
Blawg Review #159
This week's Blawg Review #159 is hosted by Brian LaBovick at the Whistleblower Law Blog.
Posted by Brooke Powell at 05:33 AM | Comments (0)
May 11, 2008
BBC News: French industrial output way down.
You are holy conservators of the best things Western: ideas, art and living. But you must get back to work. Sixty-three years is too long a holiday.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 11:50 PM | Comments (0)
French Moroccan
Writer-photographer Maryam at My Marrakesh heads north to Casablanca.
Posted by JD Hull at 11:49 AM | Comments (1)
May 10, 2008
Hermann the German: Germany as "Americanization Nation".
Posted by JD Hull at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)
Writing well: we're not.
It's what we've been trying to tell you. It's a problem and a shame. The lawyer as man or woman of letters: where did you go? We've had to ask half the bright young associates and law clerks we work with if English is really their first language. And all the electronics aren't helping matters. See National Law Journal.
Posted by JD Hull at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)
Wanted: "A fool in the forest".
Which is the name of a site of a talented California lawyer named George Wallace who has been working too hard, even by WAC?'s brutal standards. We miss his playful yet erudite Renaissance man's perspective. We need more lawyers writing about Salvador Dali.
Posted by JD Hull at 11:45 PM | Comments (2)
May 09, 2008
International Dispute Negotiation: Iraq
Hear this week's IDN podcast, No. 25, "Resolving Disputes and Drafting a Constitution in Iraq" with Zaid Al-Ali, adviser to the United Nations on legal developments in Iraq.
Posted by Brooke Powell at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)
EU trade commissioner: "Lose the protectionist jive"
One of the best points made in the 2008 U.S. presidential election has come from a British politician. A reporter with the Financial Times in London writes that EU trade commissioner Peter Mandelson, a former member of Parliament and Labour Party mainstay, has had it with candidates, presumably Obama and Clinton, hunting American Democratic votes with protectionist rhetoric that they themselves don't likely believe. And he thinks the campaign noise may be setting the world trading system back by "decades". According to the FT, in a BBC interview on Hardtalk soon to be aired, Mandelson said:
It is irresponsible to be pretending to people you can erect new protection, new tariff barriers around your economy in this 21st century global age and still succeed in sustaining living standards and jobs. It is a mirage and they know it...
It is going to lead us into a vicious spiral of beggar-thy-neighbour policies which will take us decades back in terms of trade growth.
Mandelson refused to name the culprits.
Posted by JD Hull at 03:59 PM | Comments (0)
May 08, 2008
Who said this? "We have no great illusions, my brethren and I, ..."
about how much good it will do you to be told these things in advance. We have learned by bitter experience that you will not take the things we tell you very seriously. You conceive this, I take it, to be somewhat in the nature of the pep meeting to which you were first exposed when you entered college. You expect me to tell you that you should be earnest about your work, and get your back into it for dear old Siwash, and that he who lets work slide will stumble by the way.
And to whom was this said? Think carefully. The first person with the
right answer to both parts of the question will receive a free WAC? gift.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 11:56 PM | Comments (1)
May 07, 2008
The Economist: Can Viagra cure jet lag?
Posted by JD Hull at 11:59 PM | Comments (1)
Mr. Obama: Got platform?
After the Indiana and North Carolina primaries yesterday, NBC's Tim Russert may be right, and you may be the Man. Most Americans love hope, motherhood and good crops. We are optimists if nothing else. But specifics, if you please. The U.S. economy? Foreign policy? Trade?
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 11:31 PM | Comments (1)
Chief Seattle
Forget Amazon, Starbucks, Nordstrom, Safeco and Washington Mutual. As goofy as you feel when you watch and hear it, each trip to Seattle must include Pike Place Fish Market, and watching a little fish-throwing. They always make it seem normal.
Posted by JD Hull at 08:55 PM | Comments (3)
May 06, 2008
2008 U.S. primaries: just about done
Today: Indiana and North Carolina
May 13: West Virginia Democratic, West Virginia GOP (1/3 selected)
May 20: Kentucky, Oregon
May 27: Idaho GOP
June 1: Puerto Rico Democratic
June 3: Montana Democratic, New Mexico GOP, South Dakota
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)
John Day: Great trial lawyering.
John Day in Tennessee is a working trial lawyer and writer who respects clients, juries, the profession and lawyering. Since December, he's somehow found time to keep giving us his remarkable series on "What It Takes To Be A Great Trial Lawyer" at his respected site, Day on Torts.
Posted by JD Hull at 11:33 PM | Comments (1)
The U.S. candidates and global trade.
Thanks to China Law Blog, we picked up on this still timely February 28 piece by Craig Maginness at Going Global entitled "Presidential Primary Edition--The Candidates, the Parties and Their Positions on Global Trade". Excerpt:
[John McCain] seems to be very much a free trader, and is willing to go even further in staking out what I think is a sensible but apparently unpopular stance on immigration as well. Among the Democrats, their records would suggest that Ms. Clinton has a more favorable view of international trade than Mr. Obama, though their pitched battle for the nomination is forcing both of them to skew their rhetoric to play to the protectionists in the labor movement bloc of the party.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 07:01 PM | Comments (0)
May 05, 2008
Smile when you violate our patents.
At Canada's Law Day: On Friday, Procter & Gamble sued Johnson & Johnson over two teeth whitening patents in Wisconsin's U.S. Western District. See also Reuters.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)
Your Mother hosts Blawg Review.
Our Blawg Review host for BR #158 is a Dallas mom-attorney at The Mommy Blawg. The focus in part is on today, apparently International Midwives' Day. But she writes very well, this mother, better than WAC?'s moms.
Some Mothers we knew 1964-75
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)
Client service in a down economy.
See Leo Bottary's "Client Service And The Economy" at his Client Service Insights... CSI/Season 2.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 11:00 PM | Comments (0)
In 2008, how are law firms getting and keeping clients?
Brian Ritchey at More Partner Income breaks down ALM's recent survey on how larger firms globally (about 75 on up) are developing business these days. One interesting point is that only about 50% of these larger firms have a system in place that include each of the following: client interviews, client care "teams" and sales training.
Note: The grumpy but inspiring Holden Oliver and I are happy to help. We need two days with your main team and, most importantly, an iron-clad commitment and plan from your Executive Committee on how you will build and keep a client service culture at your firm after we leave your conference room. Seminars without dogged follow-up that firm management "gets" and buys into won't cut it.
Posted by JD Hull at 12:04 AM | Comments (0)
International Dispute Negotiation: Mark Kantor interview
In ADR, nothing is more important than the quality and backgrounds of the arbitrators or mediator you select. Internationally, the appointment process is even more challenging. So hear (along with the program's trademark perky jazz violin intro) the newest IDN podcast, No. 24, "Mark Kantor on Appointing Arbitrators". Kantor, a D.C. lawyer, discusses how to assemble a first-rate international arbitration tribunal, from obtaining good information on candidates to logistics to ethics rules.
Posted by Brooke Powell at 12:00 AM | Comments (0)
May 03, 2008
France's American-esque president: his tough first year.
Nicolas Sarkozy was elected on May 7, 2007. According to The Economist, in "Sarkozy's France: The Presidency as Theatre", his difficult first year in office can be divided into three acts. In Act II, as we reported in December, the business-oriented President Sarkozy on national television told millions of his countrymen:
The French needed to work harder, he told the country that invented the 35-hour working week. They needed to invest more in brainpower; and the state needed to tax and spend less. [more]
Posted by JD Hull at 11:11 PM | Comments (0)
Ten years of Swerdloff Dot Com
A NYC-residing lawyer and Renaissance man with smarts and wisdom beyond his years reaches a milestone, celebrates.
Posted by JD Hull at 03:22 PM | Comments (0)
London has a new--and different--mayor.
Yesterday in UK local elections, Conservative Party candidate Boris Johnson defeated the Labour Party's incumbent two-term mayor, Ken Livingstone. Labour lost hundreds of council seats in London, northern England and Wales in the party's biggest defeat in 40 years. See Daily Telegraph. Even by Brit standards, which prize oddity, the new London Mayor Johnson, a 43-year-old writer and TV commentator, is a unique fellow. AP: "Eccentric and offensive, London's new mayor boasts a devastating wit but reckless streak".
Posted by JD Hull at 10:52 AM | Comments (0)
May 02, 2008
"No love" in China for foreign corps.
Sorry, Yanks. China does love foreign investment--but it puts managing its populace of 1.4 billion people first. It will not tailor, bend or even explain laws and regs for foreign companies upon demand. WAC? doesn't like it either--but then we have an ugly American streak where U.S. clients doing business abroad are concerned. But listen to these two old China hands. Dan Harris at China Law Blog notes that "Foreign Companies In China Can't Get No Love" and Shanghai-based Rich Brubaker at All Roads Lead to China has this one: "Regulations in China: Are You Prepared? Are Ready? Are You OK?". And see CLB's earlier and related piece, "China Law As A Guessing Game".
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 06:56 PM | Comments (0)
"Yes, they have more money."
Associates are different. So do they really need to market? Back to marketing, selling, clients, serving clients, keeping clients, and keeping clients you like. In a gem we missed last October, our friend Jim Hassett notes that associates, with limited time for marketing, are different from you and I, Ernest.* Also see Jim's post this week: Self-test: How efficient are your business development tactics?, an exercise for partners and senior attorneys.
*From alleged and oft-quoted exchange between F. Scott Fitzgerald and his glib friend Ernest Hemingway.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 06:31 PM | Comments (0)
The decline of the American newspaper?
More on good things to read. London-based The Economist doesn't always love Yanks. But these men and women are clever and often hilarious. They write well enough to make Newsweek and Time seem like that 3rd grade paper about your new dog Sparky. See "On the Brink--Some of America's most venerable newspapers face extinction, unless they evolve".
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 06:19 PM | Comments (0)
May 01, 2008
The Blog Thing--finding good ones.
See at Anne Reed's Deliberations her post "Finding Good Blogs". And for non-U.S. legal blogs, just scroll down the left-hand side of WAC? You'll find them sorted by nations and jurisdictions. We currently have a total of 222.
Posted by JD Hull at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)
The new Wall Street Journal
We know what you mean, sir. Yesterday Broc Romanek got cranky about the "new" Rupert Murdoch-driven Wall Street Journal in "The New Media: Time to Merge with Old Media?". It's at Romanek's TheCorporateCounsel.net Blog. Don't be killing the brand, please.
Posted by JD Hull at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)
Labour Day, May Day, Beltane.
If today and in the next few days you have trouble rousting people in Norway, Italy or China on the phone or with e-mail, here's the reason. In many nations of Europe, Asia, Latin America and Africa, May 1 is Labour Day, or international workers day.
And a bonus day for all you pagans and druids out there: in parts of Europe, as in the U.S., May Day is also a rite of Spring, including Beltane, still observed by some in Scotland and Ireland.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 06:59 PM | Comments (1)
2007: "Prelude to Famine?"
Is Carolyn Elefant a saucy wordsmith or what? See at Legal Blog Watch her "Am Law 100: 2007 Was a Year to Feast, But Is It a Prelude to Famine?". The new Am Law 100 list is out, where clients can find (a) some of the very best (as in olden days) and (b) some of the most spectacularly mediocre lawyers on earth. Guys, you aren't what you used to be--on either skills or service.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 05:42 PM | Comments (0)