Bloggers Impacting the World of Litigation 120
DaveKleiman writes "Will bloggers change the world of Supreme Court litigation by inspecting published opinions? Rachel C. Lee has an interesting take on the question in the Stanford Law Review, Ex Parte Blogging: the Legal Ethics of Supreme Court Advocacy In the Internet Era (PDF). She begins the review with: 'Lawyers have been arguing their cases before the Supreme Court for over two centuries, while the phenomenon of legal blogs is perhaps a decade old. Yet legal blogs cannot be dismissed as merely a sideshow novelty — they are already capable of having a substantial impact on Supreme Court litigation.' The review hits on many key points both for and against the use of blogging, but ultimately concludes that members of the Court and their staff will have to refrain from reading any blog post relating to a pending case, no matter who it is written by. It's even possible we'll get carefully drafted rules preventing blogging by attorneys." It's going to be tough to make any such prohibition work. After all, Groklaw's PJ is not an attorney.
Re:Why not? (Score:5, Informative)
The legitimate, if somewhat carebearish, reason they do that, whether they know it or not, is that if someone reasonably believes you're offering legal advice, and she follows your advice and loses some legal right or money, she can sue you for legal malpractice.
"IANAL" hedges heavily against that. Just like when I invoke "IAALBIANYL" when I comment on legal stuff.
Re:Why not? (Score:5, Informative)
Ironically, if people understood the law better, I'd probably have more work. People who understand the legal issues surrounding general partnerships and inventions know that they are playing with fire if they don't have some kind of LLC or S-Corp. to put their stuff in. They know how important it is to document things and think in advance. And they know that in school and practice I've seen a lot of issues they've never even considered, so I can draft language that will help prevent problems from arising. It's not because I'm smarter than they are. Some of my clients are absolute geniuses (others, not so much). It's because this is what I do every day.
I just litigated a case where (depending on whom you believe) either A stole B's invention after "leaving the fold," or B tried to come in and pretend he (and their loose partnership) was involved with the invention after he saw that A was on the brink of making a lot of money. Nasty, nasty business divorce. And the whole issue could have been avoided if the parties had a clear agreement in the first place.