The slow creep of the TSA / new site review

By J. DeVoy

Roosh, the celebrated love tourist and proprietor of Roosh V, has a new project titled Return of Kings.  In one of its first posts, he addresses the TSA’s gradual metamorphosis into a pseudo-police force accountable to no one but themselves.

Roosh’s experience is not as jarring as Amy Alkon’s.  However, it is jarring to read as a citizen of a country that professes to have and protect the Fourth Amendment.

With the flats of his hand he pressed through every inch of my torso. He lifted my shirt slightly and felt around my jean waistline. Then he ironed my legs and the side of my thighs. He didn’t touch my crotch area. […] I had thought the pat down was going to be similar to how some nightclubs do it, but it was intimate enough that I’m sure the agent knows I’m not skimping on my deadlifts.

Roosh even comments on the TSA’s proclivity for stealing passenger’s possessions.  While not apropos to his article, it is worth noting that TSA agents have included alleged child molesters, proving once again that there is no bar too low for entry into the blue shirt brigade of losers and misfits.

Finally, a solution is proposed that is equal parts critique of the TSA’s inability to truly fulfill its stated mission and indictment on the complacency of cowed Americans:

It took about four minutes for my pat down procedure while the x-ray machine takes 15 seconds. If just 10% of flyers opt out, the whole thing shuts down and they’ll have no choice but to stop using them. The fact that most Americans don’t want to be inconvenienced for only four minutes tells me how much they care about having an increasingly authoritarian government.

Return of Kings looks to be a kind of introduction to Roosh’s school of lifestyle and travel advice.  If books such as “Bang Poland” and “Don’t Bang Denmark” don’t appeal to you, I feel bad for you.  However, if you’re weary of American culture that chides you for not thinking a costly, debt-financed B.A. from Bovine University is impressive, and skeptical of following the traditional path of a soul-crushing cube job to support a widening wife and your(?) insatiable-yet-ungrateful spawn, the site seems to be a soft introduction to the kind of subversive thoughts that have led others to ditch the American rat-race.

Michael Lucas Pays Homage to a Friend

By Laura Tucker

Michael Lucas of Lucas Entertainment recently wrote a heartbreaking post about the suicide of former porn actor turned personal trainer Dror Barak.  Lucas describes Barak as “shy, smart, sweet-natured, and serious,” someone who helped him out at the gym because Barak was worried Lucas would hurt himself.

Lucas takes aim at the commenters on the websites reporting Barak’s death, countering their cold-hearted sneers with warm stories about his friend.  Props to Lucas for calling out those who chose to make assumptions about a man they didn’t know.

Nice people don’t do porn, one commenter said. Well, here’s one who did.

Read Lucas’ post here.

Around the Intertubes – March 13, 2011

By J. DeVoy

Some recent finds that warrant sharing:

At the re-vamped In Mala Fide, in which godfather Ferdinand Bardamu has assembled a stable of bloggers for a contribution-based society and political forum, 4chan and Anonymous receive an interesting and in-depth treatment.  As the workforce and academy become more feminine, and men participate less in education, the workforce and their communities, Anonymous’ destructive antics are just one manifestation of men dropping out of society.  Rather than playing Call of Duty for entertainment, though, they’re DDoS-ing Visa.

Speaking of Anonymous, Zero Hedge reports that they’ll (allegedly) be picking up where Julian Assange failed and releasing damning information on Bank of America.  At the heart of this embarrassment will be Bank of America’s shady behavior in forcing the foreclosure of thousands of homeowners across America.  More to the point, remember when Bank of America acquired Countrywide and the heapingly full, stinky diaper of subprime and other “exotic” mortgages it owned?  It’s hardly surprising that BoA is in their current position, in light of that, and really needs to cover its losses.  Anonymous’ first demand is the resignation of Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernake.

As for the worst case scenario, Crime and Federalism‘s archives has information about surviving financial armageddon.  No, society will not collapse in a Mad Max fashion, but there will be the kind of home invasion, rape, robbery and kidnapping activity one would expect in a second world kleptocracy.  Read all about it here, here and here.  If you want to insure your loved ones against kidnapping and ransom, or just get a sweet payday if they go missing, such services are available through Lloyd’s of London and New York International Group, but designed for high net-worth individuals and company managers.  We have a way to go before Progressive’s bangable, hipster-looking spokeswoman “Flo” and Geico’s gecko mascot start battling for your kidnap & ransom policy dollars with the usual volley of inane advertisements.

The Department of Homeland Security is no longer just impounding domains – it’s bringing criminal charges against people who link to infringing content (e.g., filestube).  Brian McCarthy, operator of channelsurfing.net, now faces criminal copyright infringement charges for contributory infringement by linking to sites hosting the pirated content.  Allegedly, he was arrested.  While heartening to see government stem the tide of piracy that erodes content producers’ earnings, this seems to be going too far: After a criminal trial and forfeiture of the defendant’s assets, little, if anything is left for recovery in civil actions.  While perhaps tinfoil hat territory, it’s possible that the government has seen that piracy is lucrative, but wants to keep the spoils for itself and will act to block individuals from taking money that could go to the state’s largess – analogous to the Depression-era policy forbidding the ownership of physical gold.

I will never, ever get tired of this unironic painting of Barack Obama.

When feminism and art clash

By J. DeVoy

“Pierce Harlan,” contributor to the False Rape Society, posts an interesting historical account about an 89-year-long feud between feminists and sculpture in New York City.

A teaser from the article:

What was so offensive about this statue? MacMonnies had the audacity to give vice a feminine face, and to depict virtue as decidedly male. The reaction of many women to this statue, from 1922 to today, is eye-opening.

Practice Pointer

Siouxsie digs up a great pwning from the 1970s here.

For more of the same, check out Jackass Letters.

ABA 100 Recommendations

By Randazza & DeVoy

Every year, the ABA Journal has a run-off of its top 100 Blawgs, which are selected by reader votes.  Others have made their recommendations so far, and now the time has come for us to offer ours.  Indeed, it is our hope to use this blog’s status as last year’s winner in the IMHO category to be the Kingmaker deep into this competition.  If you haven’t voted yet, you can register here, and then vote in each category (links to the categories are in bold).

Here’s the category-by-category breakdown:

Law Biz: What About Clients? Dan Hull is no pussy. If lawyers laid eggs and hatched their young, Randazza would have been in Hull’s nest.  Highly educated and a spirited advocate for his clients, he sees, and has long seen, that the legal marketplace for attorneys old and new is driven by value and versatility, rather than pieces of paper from exclusive schools that don’t teach you anything about legal practice.

News: Above The Law Enough said, and an obvious answer to anyone who reads legal trade news.

Law Prof Plus: This category is the bone that the ABA throws to the academic circle jerk. Most of the blogs in this category, if you waste a little time reading them, make you understand that term. However, Religion Clause, unlike competitors Feminist Law Professors and Brian LeiTTTer’s Law School Reports, is actually useful and insightful. Well, it is useful if you want to learn about the Religion Clause — which we do (and we would assume many of our readers do). It’s much more than useful, it’s great, but when dealing with academics, “utility” is the relevant threshold, and this is one of the rare law professor authored blogs to cross it. Honorable mention, TaxProf Blog, which is useful too. Of course, if the categories were organized properly, Volokh would be in this category, and he would pwn the shit out of it.

Torts: New York Personal Injury Law Blog Well written, prolific, and primarily dealing with one of the major legal markets in the country. However, Turkewitz strays from his yard a lot, bringing insightful commentary to many areas of law that have little to do with personal injury or New York. Don’t let the title scare you away.

IP: TTAB Blog You can actually teach yourself trademark law by reading this blog for 90 days.  Insightful, timely, smartly written, and covering a wide range of topics with appropriate context. John Welch, the author, is a hell of a great guy and blushes when told that certain lawyers got their start in IP law by reading his work.

Criminal Justice: Not Guilty Normally the endorsement might have gone to Simple Justice, but Greenfield would be too busy chasing kids off his lawn and eating disgusting, chalk-flavored Necco wafers to make it to the victory party if he won (assuming it was before his bed time). Besides, Greenfield despises the award and does not wish to win it. Nevertheless, Not Guilty is brilliantly written and a welcome addition to the blogosphere.

For Fun: Corporette A First Amendment attorney who tells women lawyers that they don’t have to dress in pantsuits and potato sacks to be successful.  Sounds fun to me. She’s a First Amendment attorney. We’ve got her back because she’s got the Constitution’s back.

Legal Tech: Tossup – Technology & Marketing Law Blog / Robert Ambrogi’s LawSites Both are strong blogs and we couldn’t pick a favorite.  If you’ve never heard of either of them, be sure to give both a read.

IMHO: Although we are nominated in, and currently leading, in the IMHO category, The Volokh Conspiracy gushes content published daily from leading writers and thinkers, and it is edited by probably the most brilliant legal mind in America and someone who would be a shoo-in for the Supreme Court if we were in charge.  Seriously, what the hell are you doing here?  Although the reading is sometimes a bit eye-glazing, since it consists of so much academic navel gazing, it is still amazing — think of a law journal without all the worthless parts. Volokh’s blog should be in the Law Prof Plus category, but he’s here with us, and there’s no shame in admitting that he’s better.  He has this blog’s collective vote – even over voting for ourselves.

But if our current lead in the competition holds up – and the Legal Satyricon wins again – we will assign the ABA’s award to goatsegirl.  Do not look at that website at work unless we are your employer. Really.  

Giving the credential to a site so vile and bizarre is the only way to properly thank the ABA for the stewardship it has offered this profession.  Between allowing the massive outsourcing of legal work to India, accrediting every toilet law school with a roof, and not even having the stones to categorically refuse accreditation to overseas law schools, goatsegirl seems like a great fit for the ABA, a dysfunctional and self-interested shitbucket of an organization if one ever existed. (more)

That said, we actually love the ABA Blawg directory and the ABA journal, and all the news we can find there. Martha & Debra serve up the only useful functions that the ABA manages to provide.

Blogs that belonged in the list: Popehat, Public Citizen’s CL&P, Citizen Media Law Project, Crime & Federalism, Siouxsie Law, and Spam Notes.

So, if you’ve got the time, register here. And then go vote in each category.

Welcome to the Satyriconroll

Look what Zac 'found'

I would like to welcome some new authors to the SatyriconRoll.

1. Shit!!! Planet!!! Authored by the pseudonymous Metasonix, whose blogger profile lists one interest: “ABUSING YOU. He’s not all that abusive to us though. Well, he hates Charles Platt, but as I’ve often said, my admiration for people has little to do with how much I agree with them. Keep shitting, Metasonix, keep on shitting.
2. Not Guilty. Authored by Mirriam Seddiq, who I have dubbed “Ms. Awesome.” The very definition of a female Alpha. Mom of twin boys, who I predict are going to be the coolest fuckers in history once they get to college. She thinks that I’m “fancy” because I don’t ever find myself at the jail on weekends, and she doesn’t mean that as a compliment. Although how much I agree with someone has nothing to do with how I feel about them, I completely agree with most of Seddiq’s views, and I absolutely love her writing.
3. In Mala Fide. Ferdinand Bardamu is apparently the only person in the world (aside from DeVoy) who thinks that Helmut Seifert did the right thing. Bardamu says, “My advice to men looking for youthful quim who don’t want to lose their balls? Stick to girls with absent or inattentive dads. There’s nothing wrong with breaking something that’s already broken.”
4. The Spearhead. The Spearhead documents and resists the pussification of America. Required reading for any Alpha.
5. Crime & Federalism. No tolerance for bullshit, and not afraid to take on his natural allies. C&F is a major sleeper that should be getting more link love in the future.

When announcing new additions to the Roll, I like to also share my methodology:

1. How useful is your blawg? If I think it is a worthwhile resource, that gives you some points.
2. How pertinent is it to my subject matter? Even the greatest workers compensation blawg of all time will probably not make the Roll, because I just don’t give a fuck about work comp law.
3. Do I regularly read your blawg? If I don’t read you, I probably won’t recommend that others do.
4. Do I think that others should? Duh.
5. Do you share the love? While I don’t believe in quid pro quo as a controlling factor, it comes into play. Some on the Roll have never linked to me, but they get so much juice from the other categories that I can’t help but link to them. On the other hand, there are other blawgs and blogs out there that link to me obsessively — but the other criteria are just not there. No offense to them at all, but the Legal Satyricon is a bit ADD as it is. I need to try and keep some focus.
6. The dormant share the love clause I have had a few blawgs purged from the roll for failing to share the love. If I link to a blawg a lot, and never get so much as a wink back, it bugs me. When I can tell that someone isn’t respecting the “hat tip” protocol, I lose interest in promoting and recommending them.
7. Do you work at it? I loved Quizlaw. I found Mass Law Blog useful. No updates for three months gives me the impression that they are abandoned. I want to keep the roll short.

Thank W.F. Price

By J. DeVoy

Programming note: I’ve recently become a contributor for  the men’s rights publication The Spearhead.  While The Legal Satyricon will remain my primary focus, a few times a month I’ll be gracing them with some of my more, uh, “unique” social commentary.  In contrast, my rants here will be more focused on legal matters like the scourge of filial support laws.  (Don’t we have enough young-to-old value transference in this country on the federal level?)

My first post, about online anonymity, is up here.

Cool video / Our predictions come to pass

By J. DeVoy

In March, I speculated that a third Creative Commons-licensed album was forthcoming from recording business pioneers Nine Inch Nails.  This recently came to pass… kind of.

First, music was released, but from How To Destroy Angels, Trent Reznor’s side project with his new wife.  Second, no word yet as to whether the forthcoming album will be released under a Creative Commons license or traditional copyright license.  The group’s first single shows a copyright registered to the Null Corporation at Amazon.com,  but so too does Nine Inch Nails’s 2008 Ghosts I-IV release, which made a big splash upon being released under a Creative Commons license.  Therefore, the best information available on this subject is inconclusive for now, and the first How To Destroy Angels album may still be released on a Creative Commons license.

The music evokes Kidneythieves‘ early promise, hinting at what may have been for that band with a halfway competent producer.  Others liken Reznor’s wife to Yoko Ono.  For good or ill, the endeavor has produced this really great music video:

Legal blogger Ann Althouse gets skewered

By J. DeVoy, Madison’s second most famous blogger

In the land of big egos and petty catfights known as the legal blogosphere, Ann Althouse looms large.  Beginning her blog in 2004, when the internet was a barren wasteland devoid of YouTube and easy file embedding, Althouse’s commentary on law, politics and life now garners more than 500,000 viewers per month.

The x-factor that put her in this position, a certain jai ne sais quis, irks some people, and one of them finally called her out on it.

UPDATE:  This is far from the first time Althouse has come under fire from others.  Last summer, commenters at The Volokh conspiracy raked her over the coals for giving this exam question (reprinted in part):

On May 1, having received notice that Justice Souter will retire, President Obama said:

Now, the process of selecting someone to replace Justice Souter is among my most serious responsibilities as President. So I will seek somebody with a sharp and independent mind and a record of excellence and integrity. I will seek someone who understands that justice isn’t about some abstract legal theory or footnote in a case book. It is also about how our laws affect the daily realities of people’s lives — whether they can make a living and care for their families; whether they feel safe in their homes and welcome in their own nation.

I view that quality of empathy, of understanding and identifying with people’s hopes and struggles as an essential ingredient for arriving as just decisions and outcomes. I will seek somebody who is dedicated to the rule of law, who honors our constitutional traditions, who respects the integrity of the judicial process and the appropriate limits of the judicial role. I will seek somebody who shares my respect for constitutional values on which this nation was founded, and who brings a thoughtful understanding of how to apply them in our time.

Let’s assume that the President — who used to teach constitutional law — has arrived at this preference through studying the cases that we studied in this course. […]
Where, in the cases that we studied, has it mattered whether a Justice followed abstract theories and dry text from case books instead of the things the President wants from a Supreme Court Justice? Choose specific opinions (majority, concurring, or dissenting) … that illustrate the two types of judicial reasoning that the President contrasted….

[L]ooking at the opinions you have written about, take a position on the importance of the quality of empathy in a Supreme Court Justice.

I took that exam about a year ago, and there was a 2,000-word length limit.  I still remember sitting outside at Cosi after the exam, talking with my classmates, and will let the readers determine the substance of that conversation.  I beat the median, so thank FSM for small miracles.

As Althouse’s student, I was impressed.  Her ability to talk about intersecting doctrines and issues in Constitutional law without the aid of notes was impressive, and becoming of someone who graduated at the top of her class from NYU Law and clerked for the Southern District of New York.  She did have a few quirks – one time she left the classroom with her clip-on microphone live and still attached to her – but it was a good experience.  I have no idea where the meme that she’s a right-winger arose from, other than her own proclamation, because it doesn’t seem to be true.

Vote for Photography Is Not a Crime

Photography is Not a Crime is one of the most compelling publications in the blogosphere. Its editor, Carlos Miller, was arrested for exercising his First Amendment right to photograph police officers in a public place. He turned that experience into a one-man crusade to push back against overreaching law enforcement. He is not a lawyer, but he successfully defended himself in an appeal of his case, and he continues to serve as a source of both information and inspiration.

Miller is currently running in 6th Place in the Fort Lauderdale Sun-Sentinel “Best of Blogs” awards. In a tribute to how goddamned stupid Flori-duh is, he’s running behind “The Daily Cute” and “Grrl Grrrl – Adventures of a Girl on the Grill.” Are you shitting me?

Please, take a few moments to register and vote for Photography is Not a Crime.

Why did we try so hard in the ABA Blawg 100 competition?

By J. DeVoy

This is the award we should have been vying for.  Elegant in its simplicity and actually funny, Bhetti‘s commendation has singled out In Mala Fide and OneSTDV (a personal favorite) for kudos, but not The Legal Satyricon.  What. The. Fuck.  I imagine Bardamu is sitting in some swivel chair from Target as he reads this, clumsily dancing and singing along like Eric Cartman does to so many popular songs.

If awards could be so obscure and hilarious, there would have been no need to escalate with John Turley over the ABA competition.  Alas, lawyers are boring and uncreative, so it’s no surprise that a Med student pwned us hard.

Then again, with the ubiquity of online trophy ordering for any damn thing, The Legal Satyricon can make its own awards, to the point of devaluing the very idea of trophies.  With the demise of formal recognition, a new regime of praise can be ushered in — perhaps Satyricon plaudits, a commodity that can only rise in value.  Whatever the case, watch your back, Ferdinand.  Haters gonna hate.

The man-hating crowd’s blood lust strikes again

By J. DeVoy

I have no issue with feminists.  In this classic case of taking it too far, however, certain women have descended upon bloggers I frequently read and link to here — Ferdinand Bardamu and Roissy — and are harassing them for promoting “anti-woman” views.  This is correlated with Roissy’s (brief, thankfully) cessation of writing and closely timed with Bardamu taking a step back from daily blogging.  Hopefully it isn’t causative, though it seems unrelated to Bardamu’s slowdown.  Worse, this probably isn’t the first time something in this vein has happened, but I’m noticing it only because it affects blogs I liked.

This attack seems to have two prongs.  First, a jilted commenter from Roissy’s blog has started a campaign to out him; the efficacy of these efforts is unknown.  Because outing anonymous or psuedononymous people is uncool, these materials won’t be directly linked to here, but intrepid readers can easily find them from other web sites referenced in this piece.  Second, and with greater reach, Denise A. Romano, M.A., Ed.M., has been harassing other bloggers with the old vanguard of illogical attacks, shame.  I will not be half surprised if she finds her way to this blog’s comment section, though I hope she does not.  I question whether other Ed.M. holders who read this blog share Romano’s views and appreciate her methods, but I digress.

At the heart of this debate is “game,” the attraction-building strategy I previously discussed and predicted would be subject to attempted suppression because it’s not politically correct.  Game comes in two broad varieties, namely for men and for women.  At its core, it’s based on evolutionary psychology principles that allow its user to present himself or herself in the most desirable possible light.  It will not, however, change the substance of the user.

Romano and other activists contend that game is a misrepresentation that harms women.  First, how does this harm women?  Sociopaths who use these techniques aren’t hurting women because of game – they’re hurting women because they’re sociopaths.  Game is a tool like a hammer, or a screwdriver, or an alligator, and can be used for good or evil.  Second, game itself doesn’t entail misrepresentation.  I doubt Romano would criticize a woman for trying to make her partner feel like a priority to her and attempting to cook well for him as a relationship-seeking strategy, despite the fact that she may be busy or indisposed to cooking.  A man shouldn’t be penalized for employing strategies with proven effectiveness to make himself more desirable to women so long as he’s not expressly lying about material facts such as his marital status, any STDs he many have, or so on.  Romano’s argument essentially considers all styles of personal presentation a lie, which is beyond asinine.

Tolerance means you shut up.

The second layer of this action, beyond protesting game itself, is the punishment of people who provide information about it.  This should be a realm of intense interest for lawyers, law students and anyone else in a demanding field that consumes all of their time and attention, sucking the marrow out of your personality.  Success in life and particularly with women boils down to being cool and interesting.  Generally speaking, lawyers and law students are not cool and certainly not interesting.  As engrossing as we may think it is to debate the scope of the commerce clause and toothlessness of Fed. R. Civ. P. 11, NOBODY CARES.  It’s not a personal failing or defect — just life.

Since at least the sexual revolution, men have pondered why women “only like jerks and assholes”; most recently, the term “douchebag” has been reflexively attached to men who do better than average with women.  My friends in similar educational and life situations have made identical observations, as women acquaintances who were college graduates would furiously rationalize their decisions to date lesser men.  “Lesser” isn’t some petty and idiosyncratic distinction of attending a crapp(y/ier) school, having bad grades or being poorly traveled, but entails clear demarcators of failure such as having children he didn’t support, a criminal record with at least one felony conviction, repeated and flagrant infidelity, and even physical abuse.  From there, two groups emerged within my acquaintances: Those who chose to do something about it, and bitter losers who thought they would win in the end if they never changed and attributed their failings to the fecklessness of women.

Among the former camp, Roissy was a must-read, as he almost specifically reached out to too-driven educated people who spent all their time in high school, college and beyond racking up resume lines without learning how to date, navigate the sexual marketplace, and get out of their own heads.  Truly, the advice there was instructive for people who thought their accomplishments in life would be sufficient to find a desirable and loyal companion, rather than part of a package of factors — sometimes a troublingly small one.  Learning how to use attraction-building techniques while capitalizing on the prestige of a decent education and upward social mobility it demonstrates — or demonstrated, considering the current economy — gave options to men who previously found relationships of varying enjoyability through personal acquaintances and serendipity.  These skills were also used without falling into the stereotypical category of effete, medallion-wearing “pickup artists” mocked in the media.  Anecdotally, these techniques are even more effective on intelligent women who have the intellectual horsepower to revel in harmless teasing and the challenge of a man who doesn’t reflexively accede to their demands.  Indeed, a woman’s receptiveness to these tactics may be a good proxy for intelligence, making this skill even more important upon leaving the bubble of higher education.

To the extent maintaining civilization is a common concern, this kind of information should be disseminated more freely to men; indeed it should be mandatory at good universities so that our most promising minds aren’t given the run-around by women looking for more than a handout.  Granted, this isn’t representative of all women, but women with options, like men with options, explore them; there are far fewer women with no options than men in that situation.  The engineers, accountants, actuaries, dentists and lawyers this country relies on have no reason to settle for the opposite gender’s table scraps, but many don’t know how to do better.  Now they’re being attacked on both fronts, branded as liars and misogynists for using effective techniques to meet desirable women, while the purveyors of such information are subject to life-ruining character assassination attempts by angry strangers.

Admittedly, this is a lot of information and its consequences seem trivial.  Blogs shutter and people stop writing all the time, often for personal reasons.  The issue is that only a small memorial will result, with no conclusive action taken.  I don’t know what that decisive action would entail, though, beyond educating men about the inherent gender biases in law, especially the family court system, and the importance of resisting intimidation.  I once had faith in the lofty rhetoric of Martin Luther King Jr., plagiarism aside, that the arc of the universe would right these wrongs and bring justice to all.  With age I’ve realized that’s crap.  All too often the individual right to be heard is determined by those with the most popular support.  To their credit, men who care about their gender and its fate have been marshaling evidence and intellectual firepower to support their views on the issues facing them.  Unfortunately, it may be time for them simply to scream louder.

Findlaw, are you really that douchetastic?

Anyone in the blogosphere knows that The New York Personal Injury Law Blog is the fine work of one Eric Turkewitz, Attorney at Law. Findlaw has decided to jump into the legal blawgosphere by launching … The New York Personal Injury Law Blog. Not only did Findlaw rip off Turkewitz’ name, but they gave us further evidence of Greenfield’s Law: “Anyone can blog, but not everyone should.”

One thing about knock offs — they are usually crappy and cheap imitations of the original. Findlaw’s blog is no exception. The writing on the knock off is crappy and bland, informs you of nothing, provides zero value, and is just so many wasted pixels screaming out to the search engines “PLEEEEASE READ MY ADS!”

Lets go back to Greenfield for some wisdom on the subject at hand.

The barrier to entry into the blawgosphere has increased dramatically. It’s not one of cost, or concept, as much as one of merit, focus and purpose. If you have the desire to write, the guts to write something worth reading and the stomach to deal with the constant onslaught of stupid and crazy readers, there’s a place for you in the blawgosphere. If you think it’s the path to success in your law practice, you will be sorry and your blog will fail. (source)

Findlaw obviously didn’t get the memo. They hired a milquetoast writer to author a milquetoast blawg for the sole purpose of selling ad space to shitty lawyers who can’t develop a reputation on their own. Each crappy post ends with something like this:

In a case against the city, there are a number of restrictions that require the expertise of a New York personal injury attorney. If you are planning on taking the city to civil court, contact a New York personal injury attorney to help you even the odds.

Or this

If you are planning on taking two people to court as opposed to one, hire a New York injury lawyer. They can organize your case and help you balance the blame.

And the words “New York Injury Lawyer” link to a page of bottom feeders’ ads.

Here’s a rule of thumb… if a blog post ends with “for more information, contact the lawyers at Douchestein and Dickwadbaum,” then it is an advertisement, but, it isn’t advertising the lawyer’s services. It is advertising that lawyer’s stupidity, desperateness, and cluelessness. I would advise any potential client who sees a “blog” that ends its posts that way to turn around, run away, fast as you can, and do not look over your shoulder.

And to any lawyer who thinks that setting up a blog is the killer app for client development, listen. Come closer. LISTEN! Blogging does NOT, I repeat, does NOT get you clients.

Sure, I get lots of inquiries from potential clients who read the Legal Satyricon. In the past three years, there may have been two or three who weren’t broke dicks without a dime to pay me. The vast majority are from complete lunatics who want me to sue the government for beaming radiation into their heads, or who want to sue the Obama administration over some birth certificate issue. Nevertheless, I always get “knowing” nods from fellow lawyers who think that this blog is a marketing gold mine. It isn’t. On the other hand, it is fun, lots of fun. It gives me an outlet to blow off steam — steam that otherwise might find its way into my hand, and I might just have to smack someone upside the head oh, ten or fifteen times a day. After I purge on here, I am far less prone to violence.

Let me set you straight. If you are a lawyer who is also a writer… that is, if you are a lawyer AND you love to write, then by all means, start a blawg. May a thousand flowers bloom, or whatever the stupid saying is. Bring your voice to the blawgosphere!

If you think that this is the ticket to riches, glory, and client development, you are wrong. But, don’t lose faith, as all is not lost! I do have some advice for you if you think that you just want a website that can make you money! Go sign up for a porn affiliate program and buy a thousand random domain names, and use those domain names to market the porn site. I hear that Fleshlight pays really well. If I slapped a Fleshlight ad on this blog, I would probably make more money in pocket pussy sales than I would ever make from the lunatics and morons who use my contact form.

So lets recap: Findlaw ripped off Turkewitz. Not only that, but they ripped him off in a really bland and lame way, and they ripped him off to support a complete piece of shit business model. If you think a Findlaw ad is the way to market your law practice, maybe you should think about their business ethics, business judgment, and what it says about you as a lawyer.

Avvo recognizes awesomeness

Well, its been a hell of a good year… it seems that our friends at Avvo think awfully highly of the Legal Satyricon. We’re one of their 10 favorite legal blogs.

I don’t want to spoil the fun by telling you the other 9 (you can go read them yourself), but I will say that I’m honored to be on the list with the other 9 they picked. Thanks Avvo!

My only critique: Popehat really should have been on there, and Rex Gradeless should not have been.