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April 11, 2009
Breaking news: $90 is too much for pay for torn jeans.
News of the Revolution. And $300 and hour is too much to pay for a first year associate to read documents--if not fraud. MSNBC: "How Abercrombie & Fitch is losing its cool".
"Liberty Leading The People" by Eugene Delcroix, 1830, The Louvre
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 12:59 AM | Comments (0)
April 10, 2009
Beavis, just tell them: "No pro bono--no Beavis".
Reformation of the evils of BigLaw is a wonderful thing.... [The] evil [is] to the clients who pay for useless hours by young associates whose work product could be more swiftly and competently produced by monkeys sitting at typewriters in the bowels of the Library of Britain.
We're glad someone has the guts and Simple Honesty to just say it. See "Slackoisie to Biglaw: Be Funner" at Church of Greenfield. Most of you? You are not worthy. Ya' big weenies.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 12:28 AM | Comments (0)
April 09, 2009
Comrade Kim gets re-elected.
New York Times: "Unopposed, Kim Jong-Il Takes Third Term".
Taking measure of running-dog lackeys of imperialist West.
Posted by JD Hull at 11:56 PM | Comments (0)
April 08, 2009
Query: How many law students does it take to read a newspaper?
Clueless in America. When WAC? was just 25-years-old, he was already a brilliant securities lawyer, independently wealthy, and a leading expert on: (1) law firm economics and management, and (2) working with clients in global markets. And so were all his friends. Well, weren't you? Hey, it could happen. And monkeys could fly out of your wazoo.
Anyway, the National Law Journal on April 7 reported that: "Despite Decimated Job Market, Top Law Students Gather to Further Goal of Changing Big Law Firms". Excerpt:
The goal of Building a Better Legal Profession (BBLP) [the student group] is to create collective action among students and associates from top schools to prod large law firms to implement what it says are significant changes needed in billable hour requirements, diversity and the commitment to pro bono work. Their hope is that students and associates from the best schools will not accept jobs at firms that do not change their ways.
Available only in ladies lightweight at Famous Forever.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)
April 06, 2009
Obama in Europe: More than Kennedy-lite.
WAC? is wrong about many things--and was wrong to suggest five months ago that Barack Obama was not ready for prime time on terrain outside the U.S. Maybe Obama can't save the world, or your 401(k)--but our phlegmy Brit friends give Obama high marks for making friends in Europe. They do so, of course, without gushing. See The Economist: "The G20 Summit: The Obama Effect". It was published April 2 but still captures the Obama "atmospherics" in the days since then. Obama has even charmed dour Prague, where (despite its arresting beauty) being in a really bad mood has long been a popular sport. And as expected, France and Germany may emerge as the nations least likely to support aggressive stimulus measures:
President Nicolas Sarkozy and Chancellor Angela Merkel said Europe had done a lot already to provide economic stimulus. What was needed was far tougher regulation, whose targets would include hedge funds, traders’ pay, rating agencies and tax havens. Both of them seemed keener on trying to prevent financial crises in future than on dealing with the one that is raging now.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 11:59 PM | Comments (1)
April 05, 2009
Desperately Seeking Value For Clients.
Four 'down-economy' questions:
1. After the economy stabilizes, "should associates pay their law firms in the first two to three years?"
2. American law schools need to step up--or get out of the way. Why not bottle up students for only 1.5 years--and then release them so they can learn something about lawyering? Isn't it time to shorten classroom legal education, and let Law-Firms-That-Teach be paid for--or at least not have to pay for themselves--what they give to young lawyers?
3. In the short-term, when Big Clients find out they were being charged in excess of paralegal rates for high-priced associates-in-training to do paralegal work, will those clients sue for the difference? Lots of great class action firms out there. Talk about strange bedfellows--and novel clients for the dreaded Rule 23 Royalty.
4. Restitution is the millions would be in play. But is there money left in the law firms to pay for the judgments?
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 05:20 AM | Comments (0)