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July 30, 2008
Radio Free Paris, Part 2 of 2: The ICC's International Court of Arbitration
On July 18, in-house GE lawyer Mike McIlwrath completed his interview with Senior Case Worker Francesca Mazza at the Paris-based International Chamber of Commerce’s International Court of Arbitration in his weekly radio show for CPR, The International Institute for Conflict Prevention & Resolution. Hear Part II. Since 1999, the ICC's Court of Arbitration has handled about 500 cases a year. Part I of the interview with Francesca, which you can find here, covered the initial stages of ICC arbitration proceedings. Part II completes the ICC process. It resumes with “terms of reference,” and concludes with the Court's award.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 12:12 AM | Comments (0)
July 29, 2008
Spence: Law education is a fraud.
We were both intrigued and happy to see this Legal Blog Watch piece by Robert Ambrogi and links to Gerry Spence's blog. My take (with a nod to to Laura Nyro): law schools all over the globe have always attracted or produced their share of semi-literate robots with no guts, no gospel and no soul. They always will. But it's gotten worse. And the best part of many law students' undergraduate education--being steeped in old verities and enduring ideas--is ripped from him or her during the law school process. By age 35, most lawyers I know of any generation are disappointed, burned-out or bored. Reason: their work lives are not enriched by ideals or principles beyond the workaday nuts
and bolts of their job. It is the entire profession's fault (mine included) and problem. From Spence's post:
One need not write poetry or paint pictures to be a successful human being. But some intimacy with the arts and the language and its use and with right brain functions of feeling and creativity are essential to the development of the whole person. Little wonder that lawyers, disabled by all of the stifling, mostly useless mental exercises they have suffered, have trouble relating to jurors much less to the rest of mankind.
Posted by JD Hull at 12:52 PM | Comments (6)
July 28, 2008
Rainwater Harvesting
Yes, that's right. As the water supply becomes an issue, American states are considering requiring or policing it--and not just in Western states. See "Box of Rain: States Take a Closer Look at Rainwater Harvesting" by Jeff Kray at Seattle-based Marten Law Group.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 12:06 AM | Comments (0)
July 27, 2008
Exciting global news: French inching toward actually working again.
The French, uh, work ethic, so to speak. We've written about this subject before--and this news has us in a tizzy. Sixty-three years is a damn long holiday, even for Europeans. Bloomberg News: "French Lawmakers Pass Bill to Increase Work Hours":
July 24 (Bloomberg) -- French lawmakers passed a bill to increase work hours, eroding the 35-hour weekly limit and handing President Nicolas Sarkozy his sixth legislative victory this week before the summer recess.
The law allows companies freedom to negotiate the workweek, triples the annual ceiling of overtime, and lets white-collar workers swap days off for more pay. Sarkozy was elected in May 2007 after campaigning on the slogan "work more to earn more", saying the decade-old 35-hour workweek reduced French competitiveness and set back economic growth. [more]
Posted by JD Hull at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)
Obama in Berlin, Paris.
Photo: Matthew Rose
WAC? thinks America is still uncomfortable about the idea of a young charismatic black man with an insider's golden resume being president. We are embarrassed about that inner conflict. Unfortunately, we haven't come that far. As with public figures from Jerry Lewis to Bill Clinton, Europe may like Obama more than we do. From The Paris Blog in a post by Matthew Rose, the UK's The Independent, and the New York Times.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 10:51 AM | Comments (1)
July 26, 2008
The Senate works on Saturday; NBC gets all excited.
The U.S. Senate is still the most elite and effective legislative body the world has ever seen. And most members of Congress--even the dumber, wimpier and more clueless legislators--work very hard. Weekend sessions aren't all that unusual, but it apparently makes good copy ("rare weekend session") to slip that in there. MSNBC: "Senate approves sweeping housing-rescue bill". The House passed the bill on Wednesday, and the Senate acted today. The president still needs to sign it.
WASHINGTON (MSNBC) - The U.S. Congress approved a massive housing market rescue bill Saturday, offering emergency financing to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, creating a new regulator for the mortgage titans and setting up a $300 billion fund to help troubled homeowners.
With the U.S. housing market in its deepest slump since the Great Depression, Congress acted with unusual speed in recent days to move the election-year bill to the White House.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)
Happy 65th, Sir.
Thanks to Ed. and his tickler system. It's a boomer thing; if you're one of them, and you've been listening for the past 50 years, here's our choice for your entire life's soundtrack.
Posted by JD Hull at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)
Correction.
Following Dan Hull's post below on the upcoming host of Blawg Review, Scott Greenfield's wife immediately submitted this alternative photograph of Scott which she prefers to the one we used. Your wife have a single sister, Scott? Because we won't be dating her.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 11:59 PM | Comments (2)
Simply Excellent.
Listen, you creeps, you screwheads. Here is a man who would not take it anymore. A man who stood up against the scum, the dogs, the filth and the crap. Here is a man who stood up.
~ Travis Bickle, Taxi Driver (1976)
It's not that often that a high-powered, talented and well-known practicing trial lawyer has a wildly popular blog he operates on the side. The odds, folks, are against it. Well, here's a man who gets more clicks than any working attorney we know. A hero to many, and a thorn to some, lawyer-writer-New Yorker Scott Greenfield at Simple Justice is my comrade in various global struggles and movements. And together we seek to become the Travis Bickle of law and policy. Just saner, mainly. Scott is not just passionate, analytical, admirably credentialed, and way bad-ass. He's a bit mysterious, even ominous: the kind of man who beats fish to death with his bare hands. In two days, he hosts Blawg Review, #170. We'll stay up late to say we read it first. You talking to me?
Posted by JD Hull at 11:59 PM | Comments (2)
So John Edwards is a big dog, too?
Fox News, and the National Enquirer, say the ex-Senator's been breaking bad, maybe with a staffer's mistress, and maybe not. It's confusing to us, but at least someone is having some nasty-immoral adult fun:
A Beverly Hills hotel security guard told FOXNews.com he intervened this week between a man he identified as former Sen. John Edwards and tabloid reporters who chased down the former presidential hopeful after what they're calling a rendezvous with his mistress and love child. [more]
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 11:39 PM | Comments (0)
July 25, 2008
Brother, can you spare a quid?
In a few weeks I go to London for a quick stay on the way to points west. There, prices are as high as ever for Americans. Aside from the image of my panhandling (maybe Legal London would be a good neighborhood for begging, in my case) the price of my normal Mayfair or Marble Arch hotel room for a couple of nights, it got me thinking about a trip there 16 years ago. One of my first business trips to Europe was in September 1992, near the end of Bush I's first and last term. And Europeans, including rank-and-file white collar Londoners and Parisians, conveyed to me deep concerns about the then-faltering American economy, and the ripple effects on Europe.
Are things going to turn around?, they'd ask. What about this Clinton guy, the one from the southern state? Will it help if he's elected? What if Bush wins? Lots of questions about specific industries. I thought: Whoa, ordinary Europeans know their markets are linked to ours, and they worry about it--but do we Americans worry in reverse the same way? Well, if you think our British brethren aren't in our corner these days, think again. See at The Economist the new piece "Unhappy America", thoughtful and sympathetic, which begins: "Nations, like people, occasionally get the blues; and right now the United States, normally the world’s most self-confident place, is glum".
Brother, can you spare a quid? Yeah, other side of Hyde Park is okay. Your couch in Notting Hill? Okay, sure, I'll just slum.
Posted by JD Hull at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)
Harvard on Mexico: Weather, relocation, "nutty" ideas.
The Harvard International Review has this one: "Nutty? Mexico’s noisy passion for population relocation". The idea is to "move populations away from coasts and river banks, and toward urban areas".
Posted by JD Hull at 11:49 AM | Comments (0)
July 24, 2008
"Segmenting" customers and clients.
Whether they sell products, services or a products-services mix, smart companies treat their best customers better. See "Customer Segmentation" at Service Untitled.
Posted by JD Hull at 11:59 PM | Comments (1)
And don't give me any lip about it, because it's someone else's fault.
Hi, I'm Justin. And I am very happy going through life as a turd. For more insights on both sides of The Slackoisie Thing, many of them quite good/funny, see this post and related links at Simple Justice by Scott Greenfield, one of the few non-PC voices in a New Age wilderness of mediocrity-coddling and accommodating-the-lame. So the "issue" gets defined a bit more. We hard-driving boomers, subtly brutalized by our Depression Era Greatest Generation parents, have helped create this new batch of semiliterate lightweights and wimps who give up at the least sign of adversity. So what do we do about it?
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 11:59 PM | Comments (3)
If a juror claps during closing argument, what result?
Excuse the exuberant juror, declare a mistrial, do better voir dire, or hire the applause getter? At Deliberations, see "What Is The Sound Of One Juror Clapping?" The spectacularly unpersuasive (my view) California appellate opinion which prompted Anne Reed's post is here.
Posted by JD Hull at 12:37 AM | Comments (0)
July 23, 2008
Clean Energy Markets for China Exporters
Our friend Dan Harris is all over China. He wants your clients and you to make money. See at his China Law Blog the link to the U.S. Department of Commerce report, Clean Energy: An Exporter's Guide to China. From the 113-page report's summary: "It offers an analysis of the existing infrastructure of clean energy technologies and identifies market opportunities through 2020, including market forecasts, market drivers, cost data, and market segment analysis".
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)
David Giacalone: Debt Reduction in America.
Over at the consistently elegant f/k/a, lawyer-writer and former U.S. Federal Trade Commission lawyer David Giacalone gives us "Doubts Over Debt Negotiation Fees". This is one of the best supported and comprehensive pieces of writing you will read about lawyers on a blog--or not-on-a-blog. We stopped billing hours, serving subpoenas and gutting pension plans just to read it. Thank you, sir.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)
July 22, 2008
Brands, Buzz and Whispers: Blawg Review #169
This week, Blawg Review, No. 169 is hosted by brand strategy consultants Whisper. It focuses on "lawyers demonstrating their brands and thereby revealing their unique genius, rather than devolving to labored explanations of relevancy." Well, you get the idea.
Posted by Brooke Powell at 10:20 AM | Comments (0)
The People's Republic of Helpful.
"It starts out proclaiming China to be ruled by law, but beyond that, it actually is quite helpful on the legal dos and don'ts for foreigners in China." Via Dan Harris at China Law Blog, see this English translation of mainland China's "Legal Guidelines for Foreigners" for entering, exiting and staying in China during the Olympics. A 13-page white paper of mainly true stuff. There's even short sections on how the government will deal with drunks and guns--presumably in case a U.S.-style firefight involving Texans breaks out during the Parade of Nations.
Posted by JD Hull at 12:00 AM | Comments (0)
The Business of Blogging
San Diego North Chamber of Commerce
Tuesday, July 22, 2008, 7:30--9:00 a.m.
"The Business of Blogging" is the first of a number of workshops hosted by the San Diego North Chamber of Commerce to demonstrate how technology can boost business. WAC? was one of three speakers who addressed how to (1) make a blog successful (2) to help make a business improve. Below (past disgruntled blog-dogs) is the handout we used during the presentation.
Dan Hull, Rancho Bernardo, California USA
What About Clients?
• 100 Most Informative Blogs in the World (No. 60), Carnegie Mellon (Nov. 2007)
• 2007 Best Business Blog, American Bar Association (Jan. 2008)
A. Stats (from Technorati.com)
1. About 70 million blogs worldwide
2. About 120,000 created each day (1.4 new blogs every second)
3. Japanese is the #1 blogging language; English is second.
B. 5 Rules
1. Write to match business goals.
2. Only the “right” people at your shop should blog (i.e., grownups who can write).
3. Do short posts (with compelling titles).
4. Post regularly.
5. Be provocative, and brave, ya' big wimp.
C. Seven Great Blogs
1. News/Commentary. InstaPundit, Glenn Reynolds, Knoxville
2. Personal. Minor Wisdom, Ray Ward, New Orleans
3. Business. Blog Maverick, Mark Cuban, Dallas
4. Arts. Paris Parfait, Tara Bradford, Paris
5. Travel. My Marrakesh, Maryam, Morrocco
6. Business. Groovy Like a Movie, Brent Altomare, San Diego
7. Business/Law. Real Lawyers Have Blogs, Kevin O’Keefe, Seattle
D. Resources
1. Technorati: www.technorati.com
2. AllTop: www.alltop.com (Guy Kawasaki)
3. ProBlogger: www.problogger.net
4. www.blogsearch.google.com
E. Blog platforms
1. Movable Type
2. TypePad
3. WordPress
4. Blogger.com
5. Tripod
6. SquareSpace
See the full PDF version of Dan's handout here.
Posted by Brooke Powell at 12:00 AM | Comments (0)
Ruthie's Law does itself in.
Because "she is increasingly in demand for writing that she actually gets paid for", the much-stalked and popular Brit law bird Ruthie of Ruthie's Law is terminating her blog but promises to come back in the form of a website.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 12:00 AM | Comments (3)
July 21, 2008
In case you missed it: 75 new non-U.S. blogs.
"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 interview with UK's Law Society Gazette, March 2, 2006. See our May 29 post on new sites added to the Directory of Non-U.S. Blogs on your lower left. Our total is now about 300--but there are more worthy ones out here. If you have suggestions of additional sites on law or business from around the world, just forward them.
Posted by JD Hull at 10:59 PM | Comments (0)
Grits courting Brits.
The cheap dollar lured foreign investors to the U.S. last year for the biggest spree since 2000. Some American investors want that favor repaid. Last week's The Economist: "America’s Confused, and Sometimes Scared, Relationship with Foreign Investors". It begins:
Eight-five Alabamians will descend on Britain on July 13th. Despite the timing, they will not be tourists in garish shorts. This group wears pinstriped suits and includes Alabama’s governor. Their destination is the Farnborough Air Show. Their goal, in flying overseas, is to convince foreign investors to return the favour. [more]
Posted by JD Hull at 08:58 PM | Comments (0)
July 20, 2008
Equal time: Gen Ys fight back.
Below in full is one of the several comments we received to the May 20 post "Who cares what makes Generation Y tick?".
The boomer's [sic] have systematically destroyed all that once made life bearable: marriage, traditional faith, the hope of financial security. In place of what used to be the societal superstructure, our generation has been force fed the consumer culture. We still feel empty. The money you pay is not worth it. When I pay off my loans (twenty years from now) you can kiss my ass.
And after you are dead, which unfortunately will take a while and cripple our generation financially, we can correct the gervious [sic] injuries that your generation inflicted on humanity. If the present election is any indication, boomer's [sic] are incompetent leaders who's [sic] malignant narcissism is only exceeded, at times, by their myopia. Take your second trophy wives, McMansions, and blinding self love with you when you shuffle off this mortal coil.
Dang. This guy let boomers do that to him? Here's help from a great boomer band that refused to give up.
Posted by JD Hull at 11:59 PM | Comments (3)
Dog days: Hot, with increasing Chaos later this week.
And the dogs grew mad. If you live in the Northern Hemisphere, and usually feel a little weird this time of year, don't worry. The 6 weeks between July 1 and mid-August were named by the Romans after Sirius the dog star, the brightest star in the sky, save the sun. "Dog days" were linked to Chaos: "the seas boiled, wine turned sour, dogs grew mad and all creatures became languid, causing to man burning fevers, hysterics and phrensies". Brady's Clavis Calendarium, 1813.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 09:03 PM | Comments (0)
July 19, 2008
Radio Free Paris, Part 1 of 2: The ICC's International Court of Arbitration
On July 11, in-house GE lawyer Mike McIlwrath interviewed Senior Case Worker Francesca Mazza at the Paris-based International Chamber of Commerce’s International Court of Arbitration in his weekly radio show for CPR, The International Institute for Conflict Prevention & Resolution. Hear Part I of II. Since 1999, the ICC's Court of Arbitration has handled about 500 cases a year. It has branches in Tunisia, Panama, the UK and the United States. Learn how ICC case management works, and how to get the most out of a proceeding before the Court.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 11:50 PM | Comments (0)
July 16, 2008
The Tree of Good Writing
By Andō Tokutarō, circa 1846
Posted by JD Hull at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)
July 15, 2008
Hubris, Muprhy's Law, and real life.
Ah how shameless–the way these mortals blame the gods. From us alone, they say, come all their miseries, yes, but they themselves with their own reckless ways, compound their pains beyond their proper share.
--Zeus, in Homer's The Odyssey
Muphry's Law dictates that (a) if you write anything criticizing editing or proofreading, there will be a fault of some kind in what you have written; (b) if an author thanks you in a book for your editing or proofreading, there will be mistakes in the book; (c) the stronger the sentiment expressed in (a) and (b), the greater the fault; (d) any book devoted to editing or style will be internally inconsistent.
--G. M. Wallace, in A Fool in the Forest, quoting Radley Balko.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 11:59 PM | Comments (2)
Hermann the German: The "new" American Embassy
"Alcatraz reopens in Berlin". The Embassy Germans love to hate.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 11:00 PM | Comments (0)
The New Yorker is different from you and me, Ernest.
Even though I'm a native of Washington, D.C., which I love, I know The Truth: New York City is the coolest place in the world. And The New Yorker magazine, now in its 64th year, is The Program you should pick up for the show, even if you do have to pay for it. An instruction manual for the Hip-eoisie, it's still funny--but only if you're haughty-cool. Or WAC?'s astral twin Scott Greenfield. See at Simple Justice his "New Yorker: Only for Really Cool People".
Caption: Obama giving either his wife or Angela Davis the Revolutionary-Drug-Brothers/Mod Squad/New Yorker Official Handshake to show their Manhattan-ness and Solidarity with The Hip Cosmos.
Posted by JD Hull at 12:59 AM | Comments (0)
July 14, 2008
Oil drilling ban: Do something.
AP: "Bush to lift offshore drilling ban". The White House is a bit late. Congress is flatfooted. Burning daylight here, guys. We haven't had an energy policy since Jimmy Carter. WAC? gets good gas mileage--but is considering trains, barges and extreme jogging.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)
Quatorze Juillet
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)
China: Corruption by the Numbers.
I have been living in or doing business with corrupt countries for over thirty years and one of the things I have noticed is corruption far more often runs with men then with women...
--Dan Harris, China Law Blog
The "politically correct" speech-and-ideas ethos... It's big here in America, of all places. Apart from being no fun at all, "PC" (a) inhibits and emasculates speech, and (b) is often out of step with workday reality. Wouldn't it help us all if we chucked "PC" and just talked? Bribery, business theft, corruption and/or high-handedness is a way of doing business in some regions of the world more than it is in other regions--and there are often good historical or cultural reasons for it. Examples are Greater China, Latin America, Africa and the Middle East. Yikes. If you want to really understand, you'll need to stash your Western and Anglo abstracts in the closet. See Dan Harris's post "China Corruption By the Numbers", and related links at his respected and well-traveled China Law Blog. And see his "China Corruption. It's A Guy Thing?".
Posted by JD Hull at 12:59 AM | Comments (0)
July 13, 2008
How the Marquis de Sade was finally forced into politics.
And the moral of the story is never lean on the weird. Or they will chop your head off. Take my word for it, Bubba. I am an expert on these things. I have been there. --HST, 1994
Bastille Day is tomorrow, July 14, the French day of independence. According to Hunter Thompson in "Better Than Sex" (a 1994 book about U.S. politics), and some other sources, the Marquis de Sade, Parisian artist and French nobleman, played a role in this opening drama of the French Revolution. As Doctor Thompson notes, the Marquis, a serious artist, was out-front different, wild and independent; he didn't care what people thought or said about him. On occasion The Marquis would run amok on booze and laudanum to blow off steam. The mainstream French aristocracy and clergy were never happy with him. They "not only hated his art, they hated him".
By 1788, the Paris police routinely harassed him, and jailed him a few times. The Bastille itself and then an insane asylum were his homes in the days leading up to July 14. In turn, he began to hate cops--and the government. Well, by the summer of 1789, Paris, in its oppressive July heat, was about to explode anyway and, acccording to Thompson:
The mood of the city was so ugly that even the Marquis de Sade became a hero of the people. On July 14, 1789, he led a mob of crazed rabble in overrunning a battalion of doomed military police defending the infamous Bastille Prison, and they swarmed in to "free all political prisoners"....
It was the beginning of the French Revolution, and de Sade himself was said to have stabbed five or six soldiers to death as his mob stormed the prison and seized the keys to the Arsenal. The mob found only eight "political prisoners" to free, and four of those were killed by nightfall in the savage melee over looting rights for the guns and ammunition.
Posted by JD Hull at 11:59 PM | Comments (3)
Minor Wisdom
Ray Ward, of Minor Wisdom and the (new) legal writer
What About Paris? is the weekend edition of WAC? It lets us get away from subjects which occupy us during the week--like Law and Business. If you're going to have a "blog", there's no reason not to have fun with it. Besides, back in the day, many generations ago, lawyers were not just semi-literate technicians and mechanics. We were a little more. Educated, informed and curious, many lawyers could tell you the difference between Coltrane, Colbert and Voltaire. So we appreciate Ray Ward, a client-centric practitioner, lawyer's lawyer, writer, thinker, blues/jazz enthusiast and Renaissance man who lives in mystic New Orleans. Ray writes Minor Wisdom, our favorite blog. That's right, our favorite. We visit him frequently for inspiration.
And, oh yes, we thank Ray for this link--even if it is about the U.S. Supreme Court:
Supreme Court Rules Death Penalty Is 'Totally Badass'
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 12:00 AM | Comments (2)
"Reading is sexier in Paris"
See The Paris Blog which is running some of the series "Why Paris?" by Laura Elkin at her Maitresse:
I hereby call for a end to clichéd articles about literary Paris, all those which invoke the names of the deities (”Sartre” and “Beauvoir”) in an incantation to raise from the dead the spirit of a Paris that never existed.
Posted by JD Hull at 12:00 AM | Comments (0)
July 12, 2008
Writing well
He who can properly summarize many ideas in a brief statement is a wise man.
Euripides, non-lawyer (480-406 B.C.)
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)
July 11, 2008
London's Charon QC interviews What About Clients?
On Tuesday, Charon QC, London's velvet-voiced legal toastmaster, interviewed an early-rising Dan Hull in California for Charon's podcast series. Dan drank coffee, allegedly. Charon drank something, perhaps Rioja. Their first encounter, one of Charon's first shows, was live at Dan's hotel in the Mayfair section of London in 2007. Hear Tuesday's program here. Charon's posted summary:
"We talk about the meaning of client service--the difference in attitude between Babyboomers and Generation X/Generation Y to law--Legalese or 'Lawyer-speak'--review GeekLawyer’s Blawg Review 166--and if Dan is coming to [the second annual] UK LawBlog 2008 in September 2008."
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)
Jim Hassett: Protecting relationships.
Another client-focused blog which, like Tom Kane's, consistently transcends the group-hugs-and-Kumbaya marketing sites out there is Jim Hassett's Legal Business Development. There's stuff here you can use to make money. See "The Top Ten Ways For Lawyers To Increase Client Satisfaction", covering both existing clients and referral sources.
Posted by JD Hull at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)
Tom Kane: What your firm should be doing in a down economy.
Recently, Tom Kane, at his well-regarded Legal Marketing Blog, has focused on marketing during "bad times". And whether the downturn has hit your law firm or not, it's sure to have affected some of your best clients. Think as they do. The principles are the same.
Now, More Than Ever, Talk With Your Clients
Down Economy: Rainmakers Need Not Worry
Best Practices for the Down Economy
We would add: if you're nervous about not having enough work in the short term, stick to clients you already have, and relationships you've already firmed up. Put a bit less energy into building brand new ones.
Posted by JD Hull at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)
The French president gets the chair.
The presidency of the European Union's Council, the EU's main decision-making body, rotates every six months. EU countries take turns chairing and overseeing the Council's agenda. The second half of 2008 is France's turn. And so "Charlemagne", the Europe affairs columnist at The Economist--which is evolving into a kind of Time or Newsweek for the entire West--tries to explain why Europe is "nervous" about Nicolas Sarkozy’s stint in the chair.
Posted by JD Hull at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)
Virgin's tough new IP piracy strategy.
From "Stop Filesharing Or We’ll Smack Your Bottom" at Ruthie's Law:
Ruthie was also hugely amused to hear four students who had received letters [from Virgin Media] being interviewed, and who were disgusted not to receive the letter but to be accused of downloading Amy Winehouse.....When will record companies start to understand that they may have to go without bubbly at the next few shareholders meetings until they can devise some alternative means of extracting cash from the music loving public?
Posted by JD Hull at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)
July 10, 2008
The law: pasts and prologues.
Law profs Mary Dudziak and and Richard Ross co-author Legal History Blog, "Scholarship, News and New Ideas in Legal History". WAC? is especially interested in "Ross on The Career of Puritan Jurisprudence". Were Puritan judges appointed on a merit system--or elected? Did they throw fundraisers around New England? We're only half-kidding--but we'll try to find out. Seriously, LHB is an elegant--and seriously interesting--site. If you are interested in the great Judge Jerome Frank, see "Legal Realism and International Law, 1938".
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 12:30 AM | Comments (0)
100 blogs for brass: leadership and mangement.
A resource you don't see every day. Lisa Haneberg at Management Craft notes that HR World has assembled a list of 100 top-notch blogs on management and leadership, including sites on branding, marketing, finance and technology.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 12:11 AM | Comments (0)
July 08, 2008
Blawg Review Republic
Do read Blawg Review #167, skillfully covering last week's best posts. Ambitious and expertly-done, it pays homage to the 50 states in order of their ratification of the Constitution. And there's even a mention of WAC?'s native Washington, D.C., where for years this blog's founder freely romped with the sage Ernie from Glen Burnie and discovered, unfortunately, his inner Irish guy. So our comment yesterday to Northern Virginia's Jon Frieden and his E-Commerce Law, the hosts of Blawg Review #167, stands:
Wow is the word. Classy, literate, both broad and deep; we "past-is-prologue" history of ideas freaks at WAC? love the ratification springboard. First rate--and this week all without hard porn, too. How'd you manage that...?
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 12:41 AM | Comments (0)
July 06, 2008
Jim Hassett: "Advances"
Moving the ball. Read Jim Hassett's "How to increase results by planning sales advances" at his Legal Business Development. In his live presentations and tapes, Jim talks convincingly on the need to "plan advances" while prospecting for new business--and how to do it.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 12:00 AM | Comments (0)
July 04, 2008
1776-2008
Still a young country, America. And July 4th means reflection as well as celebration. When does America square realities with its fine but unmet principles? See at Scott Greenfield's Simple Justice "Our 232nd Year and It Doesn't Look Promising".
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)
Thinking well.
No great genius has ever existed without some touch of madness.
Aristotle (384–322 BC), fragment
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 11:58 PM | Comments (0)
Posted by JD Hull at 12:00 AM | Comments (0)
July 03, 2008
Utah
WAC? considers Utah a republic unto itself. We even considered adding Utah sites to our Directory of Non-U.S. Blogs, on your lower left. Let us be vague here. You'd need to spend time in Utah to begin to understand. Hull McGuire has worked much in the Salt Lake area, both courts and transactions, for out-of-state clients. And we always have hired local counsel in Utah, if only as a cultural resource. Our reasons
for viewing Utah as insular and different are chiefly professional; our clients need to know that Utah is different. But lots of talented lawyers live here, including the best pretrial mediator we ever worked with. We also think ex-trial lawyer (a fact he doesn't advertise) Sen. Orrin Hatch is a trip, charitably put, and we follow his doings. But here is something Utah does right other than Sundance and skiing, at least this weekend: a few good people in Park City.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 04:32 PM | Comments (0)
July 02, 2008
Help, I'm a rock.
Left brain, right brain, stale brain, jury work. In the first semester, and not gradually, you lose some of your command of the English language. The verbal agility and fired imagination that got you through your Reynolds Price course in college is gone. Next, you notice that your creativity is, somehow, inhibited. But you do start thinking in a linear and more Western-logic way. And you learn, as a law student, to think about something that is inextricably attached to something else without thinking about the thing to which it is attached. That's the idea, the prize. But something is lost. In a few years you start writing documents that begin "COMES NOW, oye oye, by and through XYZ law firm, Upstart, Inc., which avers, somewhat obsequiously, to his Honorable Court, the following, which..." when just "Upstart, Inc. states" would suffice. You think it's normal. You notice that, for years now, you have argued, rather than listened, in conversations. You are now a prisoner of your goals. Read Anne Reed's post "Stop Thinking Like A Lawyer!" at her challenging Deliberations.
Posted by JD Hull at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)
Bad dog: GeekLawyer coverage
Oxford grads are baaad. Blawg Review #166, hosted this week by the Keith Moon of legal blogs, got noticed. Nothing sacred; no one spared.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 08:07 PM | Comments (4)
"Are lawyers just kidding themselves about delivering true service to clients?"
Reviews on lawyers always have ranged from architects of great nations and the world's commercial markets to necessary evils who add little or no value to any project. We are said to be manipulators with at best convenient notions of truth.
And horror stories about our botched or inattentive services are legion. True service to clients: are we delivering this and, if we aren't, can we talk about why?
Opening lines of our first post of August 1, 2005.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 12:59 AM | Comments (1)
Learning well.
Read no history: nothing but biography, for that is life without theory.
--Benjamin Disraeli (1804-1881)
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 12:00 AM | Comments (0)
July 01, 2008
One hot market: China nuclear energy.
Last week, Westinghouse told a Pittsburgh Post Gazette reporter that China needed 100 reactors out of it in the next decade. 100. And via the vigilant wunderkind Dan Harris at China Law Blog, we see that China Comment, a new blog covering energy, environment and politics in Greater China, has this truly information-rich piece, "China's Nuclear Power". We've said for months think that global climate change issues alone put nuke power in U.S. back in big play. It has. Just a fact.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)
O Rare GeekLawyer
If you want a friend, find Jesus; but punters [clients] are for bleeding.
--GeekLawyer on Client Service
Blawg Review #666. Barrister-pundit GeekLawyer never disappoints. We at WAC? like him the way he is. But the world-famous Glastonbury festival in Somerset this past weekend likely did him in--so I plan to take him to an AA meeting near Fleet and Chancery when I'm in London in September. This is Blawg Review #166. He is your host. Women, children, liberals, conservatives, Catholics, Presbyterians, Baptists, Methodists, your Mom, Mormons, the religious right, Midwesterners, most lawyers and their spouses will not like it. Witty, very British--and vile. So it's bound to be one of the most popular and famous Blawg Reviews ever. Bravo. You sick unit.
Posted by JD Hull at 11:59 PM | Comments (2)