Set in Style

Consider the following line from the California Health and Safety Code:

Under existing law, a health facility is prohibited from
retaliating or discriminating against an employee of a health
facility that has presented or initiated a complaint or initiated,
participated, or cooperated in an investigation or proceeding of a
government entity relating to the care, services, or conditions of
the facility.

A health facility that’s complained about conditions? That’s the subject (or not, depending on whether the first instance of ‘a health facility’ refers to the same facility as the second instance does).

Had an editor touched that line, it might have turned out like so:

Under existing law, a health care facility is prohibited from
retaliating or discriminating against an employee who presents or
initiates a complaint or who initiates, participates, or cooperates
in an investigation or proceeding by a government entity concerning
the care, services, or conditions of the facility.

We expect high school students to know good grammar from bad; shouldn’t we demand that of legislators?

I’m sure this can’t possibly be true, but just imagine that the legislators (lawyers) used bad grammar intentionally and for the sake of the union (so other lawyers can go to court and argue about what poorly written legislation really means).

Here’s the original (published by a firm that thinks it doesn’t need an editor):

Effective December 1, 2009, it will be unlawful for any motor vehicle operator to text message while driving. Violations of the new law will constitute an “infraction” punishable by a $100 fine.

Here it is after it’s been touched by an editor:

Beginning December 1, 2009, it will be unlawful to text message while driving in North Carolina. Violators will be subject to a $100 fine.

Any law firm that thinks readers are looking for a firm that likes to make things more complicated (or more convoluted) than necessary is one that could use an editor (if you ask me).

Yesterday’s post was about how some law firms (two personal injury firms) are republishing the news.

Today, let’s see how another firm is republishing the news. Let’s look at the Chicago DUI Lawyers blog, published by the law offices of James E. Fabbrini.

Consider the latest post at the blog. Most of it is copied from an article copyrighted by the Associated Press. Of 166 words, the firm of James E. Fabbrini contributed 32, or less than 20%.

Just about every post at the blog consists of a news article with a bit of commentary.

Is that fair use? Should Fabbrini credit the sources of the news articles he republishes?

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Let’s look at how yet another firm is republishing the news.

Farella Braun + Martel publishes a newsletter (Sustainability Market Intelligence Newsletter) that consists of excerpts (some edited) from published news articles. And it bears a copyright notice claiming all rights to the newsletter.

Is that fair use? If it’s fair, is it reasonable? **

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Let’s consider two very sensible (and not at all questionable) ways some law firms present the news.

First, there’s the second-hand-report method. It’s simple: you read news articles (about injuries and negligence, drunk drivers, or sustainability issues) and then retell the stories in your own words (using the relevant SEO search terms).

Here’s a blog (Indiana Injury blog) that does it fairly well.

Then, there’s the report-the-news method. This is the method used by primary sources of news, and it’s more effective and far more professional than any of the republish-the-news methods.

Here’s a blog (Dirt Lawyer’s blog) that does it extremely well; i.e., makes a positive impression on (by providing very useful and fresh news to) people involved in Chicago’s commercial real estate market.

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** Imagine an attorney from Farella Braun + Martel representing a publisher, the plaintiff in a copyright infringement suit. And then imagine the reaction when the defendant’s attorney shows that Farella Braun + Martel does what its attorney claims is prohibited!

Today’s discussion is about law firms republishing news articles.

Here’s the question: is it OK for a law firm — as a part of its marketing effort — to compose a newsletter and claim all rights to it when the newsletter is composed of material copyrighted by others?

Let’s begin by looking at what’s going on over at Hayman & Kirshenbaum these days. (I first wrote about H & K (a personal injury firm) in a post titled “Personal Injury Plagiarist.” At the time, the firm was republishing news articles and taking full credit for (and claiming all rights to) articles published by the likes of NBC and The Chicago Tribune.

And it still does. Take a look at the article titled “Recall of Chenille Robes Expanded.”

NOTE: To access the article, go to the firm’s home page, select Wrongful Death in the left side bar, and then select the article under Featured Articles on Wrongful Death.

That article was published by UPI.

Ditto for all the articles at the firm’s site. All are republished news articles.

(more…)

A TV commercial for a car says nothing about the car per sé. Why is that?

The commercial could list specifications like fuel mileage, drive train coverage, and horsepower, but it doesn’t: not when it comes to luxury automobiles.

The spots for fancy cars are entertaining, 30-second stories that evoke positive emotion, followed by a five-second display of the car and the manufacturer’s logo (plus fine print for speed readers).

It’s psychology in action.

Have you watched the news on TV? Then you’ve noticed how news programs have adopted animated graphics and streaming text. Why?

Psychology.

And what has this to do with law firm marketing materials?

Stay tuned.

Criminal defense attorneys are so concerned with how their clients appear in court, and that’s because they know the power of appearance, and how it affects the attitudes of judges and jurors*, in particular.

Just imagine the defendant — a fellow who used to look so rough — who shows up in court looking like an attorney himself, all clean cut and polished. “This fellow certainly doesn’t look like he could have done it. Men in Armani don’t do such terrible things to children.”

Then why don’t criminal defense attorneys see it? Why don’t they see that so many of their Web sites (the ones that look like they were designed by color blind sixth-graders) have a negative effect on potential clients?

Those sites drive good, high-class criminals (the sort you see in movies) away. Instead, they attract zanies — the hardest people in the world to defend and the ones who can least afford a good, skillful lawyer.

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* There’s no doubt about it — people can form their first impressions of others in one quick instant. Given that juries can be so unpredictable, a defendant needs to make the best appearance he can. In that respect, law firms are like defendants, while clients are like juries.

Let’s discuss blogging, or — as some put it — blawgging: i.e., attorneys blogging about the law.

Let’s begin with Scott Greenfield’s latest post — “Blogging Is Alive, And Aggravating.”

If you’re an attorney and you’re thinking of starting a blawg, read Greenfield’s post. Heck . . . before you read that post, read these two posts by Mark Herrmann:

1. “The Life Expectancy Of A Legal Blog”
2. “Blogging As A Business Development Tool”

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Greenfield and Herrmann — regular blawggers with popular blawgs – emphasize how much work it is to maintain a blog.

Writes Greenfield:

Anyone can have a blawg. Everyone cannot. I’ve watched as friends in the blawgosphere faded away. I’ve watched as their enthusiasm waned, their efforts failed to bring in the eyeballs they hoped to gain. The sad truth is that the blogosphere is maturing before our eyes. It’s also a wondrous truth, as it’s separated the wheat from the chafe.

Notes Herrmann:

Legal blogs are like small businesses: Half of ‘em fail in the first year, and 90 percent of ‘em fail in the next five.

And both caution against expecting too much too soon from a blawg:

Greenfield:

If you think it’s the path to success in your law practice, you will be sorry and your blog will fail.

Herrmann:

They [blogs] require a ton of work; they gather readership only slowly over time; and they’re not the gold mine of new business that blogolaters say they are.

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Well done, blawgging can be quite the effort. Some blawgers come to hate the effort; others find that all they have to say’s been said, and then they move on to something else (another blog, perhaps).

Poorly done, blawgging is a matter of reposting news stories about a particular topic (e.g., DUI incidents).

Consider the Chicago DUI Lawyers blog.

Most of it (around 70%) consists of excerpts of copyrighted material (newspaper articles). Is this fair use? Does it matter that there are links to the articles? Does it matter that the publisher claims rights to the blog? Does it matter that the blog promotes a practice?

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Stay tuned! Tomorrow, we’ll discuss law firm newsletters and fair use.

You know what you don’t want? You don’t want to be talking to someone you hope to impress, and find she’s holding a copy of some of your worst writing — something you wrote in haste.

Just imagine: there she is — someone with the power to give you a hand up the ladder of success — and she’s got something that says you don’t hold yourself to high standards.

You know the sound:

“Arrggghhhhh!!!!!!!”

Yet another example of what editors do for attorneys.

In a hurry, an attorney might write something (e.g., for a client alert) like this:

IRC § 149(b)(1) provides that the interest on bonds, which are federally guaranteed, is not tax-exempt.

But that’s certainly not what the attorney meant.

Realizing this, an editor would fix it like so:

IRC § 149(b)(1) provides that the interest on federally guaranteed bonds is not tax-exempt.

Why?

Because that’s what editors do for attorneys — find and fix their errors so potential clients don’t even realize the attorneys are capable of such errors.

Here’s another example of what editors do for attorneys.

In a hurry, an attorney might write something (e.g., for an article for an upcoming seminar) like this:

Thus, a bondholder may look for repayment to all sources of revenue, which the municipality is entitled to receive.

But that’s certainly not what he meant.

The editor for the attorney fortunate enough to have one will fix it:

Thus, a bondholder may seek repayment from any of the municipality’s sources of revenue.

And that means people (like potential clients at the seminar) won’t wonder about the attorney’s writing skills.

That’s what editors do — they make attorneys look their best, especially when they (the attorneys) are in a great big hurry.