practicehacker

There isn’t much about this infographic we didn’t know. After all, law school is becoming more expensive and riskier all the time. But as long as the number of applicants to law school continues to increase, young people continue to be gullible, school is easier to handle than real-life, and there is money to be made, law schools will continue to mass-produce graduates.

Ironically, lawyers are blame for this crater in the market. But which lawyers really brought on problem? I published my answer here in connection with the ABA’s Legal Rebels project. Enough said. You can make up your own minds, but I think I made my case.

Posted via email from practice (redux)

This is the second really good practice hack that I’ve come across in a week, and it incorporates all the best things about the new, new Internet (Web 2.1?): crowdsourcing, naming your own price, friction-free transactions, and cheap labor.

Cheap labor, you say? You bet. Instant Law Clerk uses the cheapest, most plentiful resource in the world – law students – to deliver research to practicing attorneys faster than they can do it themselves, and at a fraction of the cost. The idea is so simple, it’s a wonder law schools haven’t monopolized the market themselves. The recipe is compelling: take one practitioner short on time and resources but in need of research to make it to trial or to meet a briefing schedule; add a law student in need of cash and real-world experience; and you’ve got a match made in Internet heaven.

So now the only question you need to answer is: Are you still doing your own research? Why? When you can simply enter a question to be answered and name your price at www.instantlawclerk.com? Their team of 2^nd and 3^rd year students from around the country is ready to do the research so you can analyze, review, and ultimately use the results in your pleadings, letters, and memoranda.

Leaving you with more time to play golf … er … prepare for trial.

Posted via email from practice (redux)

As we all know by now thanks to articles like this one, Yahoo -! that stalwart pioneer of the World Wide Web and harbinger of search engines to come – has fired it’s CEO and put itself up for sale. Which raises the question: How did Yahoo! go from Hero to Zero in just over a decade? Funny you should ask … I’ve put together this handy chart to answer that very question.

Posted via email from practice (redux)

I like JD Supra and admire the cojones with which it shot out of the starting gate 3 years ago. I’ve used it myself and blogged about the experience while waiting for the promised traffic to materialize. I was still waiting when my “free look” expired a year later and JD Supra informed me that if I wanted to keep my profile, documents, etc. I’d have to pay. In one e-mail JD Supra went from Law 2.0 superstar to paid lawyer directory. Fair enough. If JD Supra wants to get paid like a vendor, I get to evaluate their services as a vendor. Let’s see, the company claims that it can

• promote my firm to prospects
• connect me with the prospects
• earn higher search-rank for me
• earn higher profile on LinkedIn

Can it really do any of these things? Who knows? I spent 40 minutes yesterday talking with a salesperson who couldn’t answer that question or explain why he was calling a 5-person firm to sell a big-firm document posting service. Can’t blame him: there is no explanation.

The fact is JD Supra should be paying for high-quality content, not the other way around. The more content, members, and activity it accumulates the more of a network effect it generates, the higher its search rank, and the more leverage it has to value itself in the inevitable acquisition (Lexis, Westlaw, whoever). So far everything is coming up JD Supra. What about its members? The company promises to put them in front of prospects. But how does it know who and where my prospective clients are? Presumably JD Supra assumes that putting me in the “bankruptcy” category in the “Illinois” bucket on their directory is all the customization I need.

Seriously, JD Supra? Why would you insult my intelligence like that? Your service should cost $0, you should be paying for my content, and LinkedIn is the Dane Cook of social networks. And don’t call me back until you are prepared to treat my content as valuable or you manage to get a grip on reality. Whichever happens first. Posted via email from practice (redux)