Real Lawyers Have Blogs : Law Blogs, Blawgs, Law Firm Marketing

Welcome to 2008, and our first LexBlog Q & A of the new year. After a brief hiatus, our ongoing interview feature returns today, hopefully setting the stage for a wave of epic Q & A updates for the next 12 months.

The first guest in the hot seat this year? Colette Vogele, a San Francisco-based intellectual property lawyer who is well-known in the technology savvy legal community for her podcast Rules For The Revolution. I spoke with Colette in late December, discussing mostly her experience podcasting and how creating a podcast stacks up against writing a blog.

1. Rob La Gatta: Podcasts are very similar to blogs in many ways, most notably that both allow an individual to establish themselves as an expert on a specific issue. When did you first start podcasting, and what got you interested in it in the first place?

Colette Vogele: My first podcast that was my own production was at the beginning of [2007]. But I had been involved in the legal side of it for a couple years before that. Finally, after realizing [that] I really needed to use media to really understand what’s driving a lot of it, I decided it would be fun to try and put something together.

But I appeared on a lot of podcasts in the last couple years: some with Denise Howell, some [with] other podcasters who had legal questions and wanted to bring me on.

2. Rob La Gatta: Since you started doing your own, do you develop them for the general public, or for other lawyers? Who are your podcasts geared towards?

Colette Vogele: My podcasts are geared towards the public, more generally. I think I get lawyers listening, and I do get comments and other questions from them, but it’s really geared towards other podcasters who are out there trying to do stuff: to help them understand the implications of copyright and publicity rights, things like that.

3. Rob La Gatta: There are quite a few lawyers blogging, though it doesn’t seem like nearly as many offer podcasts. Why do you think blogs have caught on relatively quickly, while podcasts still seem fairly limited in their scope?

Colette Vogele: Well, blogs have been around a lot longer. The earliest blogs that I was aware of were back in like 2002, 2003 (and I know there were some before that).

So it has been five years, and now they’re getting to be quite popular, and more accessible...the user friendliness of setting up a blog is quite easy. So I think that hurdle – the technical hurdle – is very low now [for blogging].

I think for podcasting, it takes a bigger time commitment. I bought a recorder, and a microphone that was good. You have to [...] try to make the quality of the podcast listenable. And that just takes time.

And, the commitment to setting aside time on any kind of a regular schedule to have a program is a little more intensive than blogging is, even though the overall barrier to having an audience is quite low, compared to history. I think that’s probably the biggest issue.

Lawyers – and I don’t mean this in any bad way – I don’t think were the first to adopt the technology normally. I mean, if you’re a tech lawyer you will be [blogging], but there are so many practice areas where this is just not as important as it is in a tech practice.

4. Rob La Gatta: What do you see as the biggest challenge you’ve encountered podcasting…the aforementioned time issue, or is there some other hurdle?

Colette Vogele: It really is [the time issue].

In my head, what I’d like to have and what I’m able to really do with the time I have are two different things. I started off thinking I would try and do something weekly, and that kind of trickled to every other week, and now if I’m lucky it’s monthly. I think [in 2008], I’m just going to say, “Whenever I can, I’m going to do it,” and not put all this pressure on myself. So it’s really keeping a schedule.

From the podcasts I listen to, I’m really grateful knowing that they’re there...I can go and say, “Oh, there’s a few more episodes, that’s great.” It feels reliable, like we were all taught to watch television: our show was on a certain time, every week. I feel like I’ve completely bombed on that front (laughs). But I still think it’s a valuable resource, and when I can, I do it.

5. Rob La Gatta: You’re obviously one of the more tech-savvy lawyers around today. Do you think that in coming years, a knowledge of new media and technology – be it blogging, podcasting, etc – will becoming increasingly important in giving lawyers a competitive edge? Why or why not?

Colette Vogele I think so. Even if your practice doesn’t have anything to do with the Internet or technology, people are using the Internet – and these technologies – to learn about what they need; consumers are using the web, regardless of if they’re looking for something techy…they’re looking for something.

For example, maybe they need a family law lawyer. Or maybe they need a construction defect lawyer. They’re going to go and look for a website, and then they’re going to see, “Oh, this person writes a blog. What have they written about? Are they an expert? Oh, look, they have some audio files! Lets listen to those…let me see if I like this person’s demeanor, what I can gather from that kind of a setting.”

I think those types of questions for consumers are going to be more and more important for them to be comfortable with picking up the phone and calling that lawyer and asking if [that lawyer] would be able to represent them. So I think, over time, it will be important regardless of your practice area.

In a lot of cases, practices grow through referrals, and so whether you have a great website or not may not matter in a huge way. But I think consumers are finding the Internet to be a great place to do some of their research, and it’s a good way for a lawyer to have a credible existence to potential clients.

Interested in hearing more? Check out some of our other featured guests...Colette is just the latest in our ongoing series of legal blog interviews for the LexBlog Q & A.

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Yesterday's LexBlog Q & A featured Walter Olson of Overlawyered; today, we switch gears to another pillar of the legal blog community. Our guest for this last Friday before Christmas? Denise Howell, an appellate/IP lawyer who has been active in the legal blogosphere for the past six years. Denise's name can be found around the web, most notably at her personal blog Bag and Baggage and at a ZDNet blog, Lawgarithms.

In an e-mail interview conducted earlier this week, Denise and I spoke about her history operating within the legal blogosphere, why blogs are here to stay and more. The full text of the interview is below.

1. Rob La Gatta: An old post Kevin wrote says that you've been blogging since 2001. Is this accurate? If so, what first piqued your interest and made you get involved with blogs so early in the game?

Denise Howell: It's accurate, and it actually was a game that got me blogging. I had read The Cluetrain Manifesto in 1999, and it resonated with me about individuals and business more than anything I'd studied in college or law school. After that I kept up with the writing, thinking, and online doings of three of its co-authors who were early bloggers.

One of them, Christopher Locke, was writing an article for the Guardian about weblogs. He exhorted the readers of his e-zine (about 5,000 folks) to start blogs and link to him, so (1) he could have something to write about, and (2) his standings in "Daypop" (a Technorati precursor) would theoretically go through the roof. I took the bait over the Thanksgiving weekend and became a blogger in the process.

The point was to play around with the technology (which was free and easy), and the network effects of using it (which were fun and ultimately quite powerful on a number of levels). Many of the folks who participated in Locke's "article research" are still blogging away, and are some of the most thoughtful and insightful folks I've come to know.

2. Rob La Gatta: What are some of the most noticeable changes you've seen legal blogs undergo in the six years you've been watching them?

Denise Howell: I suppose the most noticeable change is volume. In '01-'02 there were so few bloggers that were connected in some way to the legal world, [that] we all pretty much knew each other, and it was possible to keep up with every blawg out there.

By '03 the new blawgs were coming fast and furious, and it was great to be able to discover a steady stream of new voices through the blogrolls and recommendations of the folks you were already reading. There was great potential for legal institutions - firms, academia, and government - to leverage the technology, and I had great hope for law firm blogs.

That potential has not yet been realized. With few exceptions firms seem to dabble in blogging reluctantly without "getting" it. Law schools do a far better job. It's a process, though. In the mid-90's email was novel; now it's ubiquitous. Blogging and/or its related/successor tools are here to stay. They'll become such a part of our culture, interviews like this one are bound to seem pretty silly before long. E.g.:

Q: What are some of the most noticeable changes you've seen legal telephone conversations undergo in the six years you've been participating in them?
A: Uh...

3. Rob La Gatta: You argued back in 2005 that law firms should look to PR folks, who have made serious headway in spreading their message through blogging. But it's almost 2008, and we still see many large law firms showing resistance to blogs, and even fewer encouraging their lawyers to blog freely. Why do you think this is? What will it take to convince big law firms that there is value in blogging?

Denise Howell: I did? I don't remember. :) I was probably struck by the contrast.

I saw Steve Jobs speak at the first "D" Conference (and blogged it). When asked about the challenges they faced at the beginning of the personal computer era, Jobs quipped: "People couldn't type. We realized: Death would eventually take care of this."

Legal institutions, firms among them, will adapt to (and adopt) the communications tools that work for their evolving work force. If/while they don't, key parts of their work force will inevitably use those tools to do away with the need for things like institutions at all. (Have you been following the Web fallout of the WGA strike?)

4. Rob La Gatta: You have given yourself an advantage in the legal profession by utilizing technology and new media skills. How important do you see the use of technology as being to the legal profession today, and why should lawyers take the time to learn these skills?

Denise Howell: I don't think you can force technology on anyone, but the beauty of blogs and related tools is their ease of use and the unlooked-for (and sometimes near-magical) effects that flow from their use. I should say rather that our generation might consider those effects magical; future generations will simply expect them, then demand (and create) situations and relationships we can't even imagine.

5. Rob La Gatta: And the question I like to ask everybody I interview for this feature: if you were to encounter a lawyer just starting his or her first blog, what is the one most important bit of advice you'd offer them?

Denise Howell: If you haven't already, immerse yourself in the new media ecosystem. Explore, learn and enjoy.

• Find what resonates with you: text, images, audio, video - or some combination thereof.
  
• Pick your medium and give it a whirl. Don't worry about having to feel your way. Don't worry about being polished. Learn as you go.
  
• Ask questions in public.
  
• Use easy tools.
  
• Don't get fleeced by consultants or marketing folks who insist you'll flounder without their help. You can accomplish a great deal for little or no money and primarily on your own.
  
• Educate yourself about the ethical obligations specific to online communications.
  
• Educate yourself about Creative Commons, take advantage of the wealth of licensed material there, and license your own work in the way that makes the most sense.
  
• Share the information you're most passionate about.
  
• Heed a Dave Winer-ism and narrate your work.
  
• Be a guide.
  
• Give your take on events and proceedings that are interesting but not necessarily accessible through mass or even niche media.
  
• Remember you're person and speak in your own voice.
  
• Most of all: have fun.

Interested in hearing more? Check out some of our other featured guests...Denise is just the latest in our ongoing series of legal blog interviews for the LexBlog Q & A.

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Today's LexBlog Q & A is short but sweet, and features legal expert Walter Olson in the hot seat. Walter, who serves as a senior fellow at the New York City-based Manhattan Institute, also writes for the popular blogs Overlawyered and Point of Law.

In a brief e-mail interview conducted earlier this week, Walter discussed his past relationship with the legal blogosphere, the role blogging has played in his professional life and more.

1. Rob La Gatta: You’re credited as starting one of the oldest – if not the oldest – law blog on the web. What made you think starting a legal blog was a good move at a time when nobody else was doing so?

Walter Olson: I'm a writer, and the desire to write came first, before much thought as to who the audience would be. It started more or less as notes to myself, on topics I figured I might write about later. Also, while Overlawyered is a blog about law, its early readers were more policy types and journalists than lawyers.

2. Rob La Gatta: In many ways, blogs have indirectly created a new system of checks and balances, where people and businesses are held much more accountable simply because their moves are constantly being documented on the web. Do you believe blogs have the power to contribute to the “reform of the American civil justice system” that you say we need?

Walter Olson: The fact is, despite the obvious dangers in it, that blogs are great at shaming. No one wants to have the top page of Google hits on one's name be from having committed some ethical howler or taken some ridiculous position in a case.

If you haven't given up on the idea of self-policing by professionals (and I haven't) there is real hope that legal blogging will focus peer pressure and scrutiny on the underside of law practice in a way that the prospect of bar discipline often fails to do. This isn't just law, by the way – read the medical blogs and you'll see plenty of frank talk about the ethical dilemmas and temptations that doctors face. It's quite an education, actually.

3. Rob La Gatta: I notice that you’ve popped up in a wide range of print and television media outlets. Do you believe your blogging work has helped enhance your overall professional reputation?

Walter Olson: Sure. Reporters and their editors inevitably spend time on blogs, as do talk-show bookers. How could they not? They use Google constantly, and Google leads them to sites like mine. Most working reporters are also starved to see intelligent reactions to stories they've done. As a book author, I was already a media source, but it's not uncommon for reporters making their first call to say they feel they "know me already". It's blogging that does that.

4. Rob La Gatta: What is your take on the future of the legal blogosphere…will it continue to gather steam? Do you think that eventually, lawyers will need blogs to stay competitive?

Walter Olson: It continues to change and expand at an incredible pace; new bloggers can still make a name for themselves in months, even weeks. I would say that certain types of lawyers – in particular those who want to become well known with the press or among other lawyers, but are not already handling front-page cases – really should consider blogging if the aptitude is there.

5. Rob La Gatta: Since you’ve been blogging for quite some time, you’re probably one of the most well-suited individuals to answer this question: if you were to meet a lawyer just starting his or her first blog, what is the one most important bit of advice you’d offer them, and why?

Walter Olson: Find a niche (or two or three) that you'll never tire of writing about – very few of the good niches are taken. Then write short, pace yourself, and leave them wanting more.

Interested in hearing more? Check out some of our other featured guests...Walter is just the latest in our ongoing series of legal blog interviews for the LexBlog Q & A.

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On Friday, we launched part 1 of our LexBlog Q & A featuring Ernest Svenson (better known in the blogosphere as Ernie the Attorney), a pioneer of legal blogging who documented Hurricane Katrina from his hometown of New Orleans and provides insights on a range of topics in his blog.

This post features the rest of our interview, in which Ernie discusses why lawyers can benefit from showing their "human side" - and why law firms sometimes may crack down on them if displaying such humanity involves use of a blog.

 1. Rob La Gatta: You’ve said that people outside of the legal profession want to see the human side of lawyers, which is easily displayed through blogs. Can you see any potential harm that could come from lawyers displaying their “human side” to the general public?

Ernie the Attorney: No, I really don’t. I think that is one of the things that I was most intrigued by, and I still am. [...] You go to law school, and your way of thinking gets molded and changed, and you start to question things more and look for the underpinnings and analyze things. And then you come out and you’ve kind of been imbued with this appreciation and inclination towards a lot of formalism that most people in everyday life don’t have. And it’s very difficult, I think, for many lawyers – maybe most – to keep that part going, while at the same time switching gears quickly into informality (or just combining informality with formality)

I picked the name “Ernie the Attorney” because there was a magistrate in federal court, and she used to call me that. [And] she was one of those people who could be extremely formal and yet be completely down to earth at the same time: she’d see me and say, “Hey, Ernie the Attorney, how ya doing?” If she was picking a jury and the juror told her, “Oh, I’m not married…” she’d say, “A good looking man like you, not married? I can’t believe that.”

That’s not the kind of thinking that most lawyers do or feel comfortable doing. We, for whatever reason, have this sense that we have to be very distant. Kind of like doctors probably feel like they need to be distant from their patients because they’re going to do these invasive procedures and so forth, and so they have to create this distance. And I think that’s a completely wrong perception. I don’t think you have to create distance or be overly formal just because part of your professional role involves that to some extent.

Can’t you just do that part and then be a human being? I think the answer for me is, "Yeah, you can." I watch people do it. It’s totally possible, and in fact, I think it’s actually better, because it puts people at ease. If a lawyer’s job is to get their client to share confidences so that they can figure out how to help them, which one is going to be more likely to make that person want to share confidences with you? Being extremely formal, which people might interpret in the sense of being judgmental? Or is it more likely that they will tell you things that you need to know if you’re casual with them and make them feel at ease?

2. Rob La Gatta: So then why do you think so many big firms oppose the idea of being personal, and seem kind of resistant to that (if it's done through blogging)?

Ernie the Attorney: I don’t think they oppose the sense of being personal. [...] All corporations, all big firms, all large gatherings of people – and large can be more than 2 or 3, in some cases – have expectations about how the group members are supposed to behave. And then they have concerns about certain kinds of behavior getting out of line. I think with firms that still adhere to dress codes, or who say, “Well, lets go with casual Friday, and we don’t do any other days,” their concern is that people will take advantage. And that’s a legitimate concern: I think people can take advantage of being given freedom. But at the same time, that freedom is necessary and it’s important.

I don’t think firms don’t want people to have [freedom]; I think they just don’t want to see mistakes. I think the reason why [organizations] are overly controlling of individuals is because, in their mind, they’d rather not have any mistakes and shut everybody down than allow everybody to kind of try and experiment with it (and then have a few mistakes). It’s just not natural for organizations to allow small bands of people to experiment, because experiment means “try/fail/try/fail.” They don’t like that idea, because it’s just not part of the way organizations think. And yet, there’s a value to it.

[...]

Lawyers are very conservative. Nobody who is a lawyer fails to see that; it’s a conservative profession. It’s a profession dictated by tradition, by precedent, by analysis of what’s happened in the past to determine how to act in the future. It’s not the kind of profession that takes its hand off the handlebars and just says, “Well, lets see what happens.” So I think it was pretty natural that they were going to be circumspect about blogging, especially within the realm of large law firms and organizations.

Interested in hearing more? Check out some of our other featured guests...Ernie is just the latest in our ongoing series of legal blog interviews for the LexBlog Q & A.

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Continuing with our LexBlog Q & A interview series, today we feature some words of wisdom from Ernest Svenson, aka Ernie the Attorney, a New Orleans-based lawyer and long-time blogger.

Since the interview was quite extensive, I've decided to break it up into two posts. As a result, today part 1 is going up; on Monday, I'll launch part 2.

1. Rob La Gatta: Kevin has called you the “grandfather of lawyer blogs,” due to the amount of time you've been operating in the blogosphere. What first got you blogging at a time when not many other folks were doing so?

Ernie the Attorney: Sweet serendipity. A friend of mine had a software company; I had downloaded a trial version of [a blogging] program and liked it. Then he came to New Orleans, and he had a blog and showed me what it was – because he’s the sort of person who tools around and meets other people in the tech world – and I said, “Oh, this is really interesting.”

I realized I could try that for 30 days for free, and I played with it. I guess it resonated for me because I liked to write, and I in the past had been interested in the idea of publishing to the web, but I could never figure out how to set up the website...there were a lot of dots to connect. But with blogging, there weren’t any dots to connect anymore. It was just write and hit "post." So I just kept experimenting and playing with it, and it seemed like it was going to be something that was going to be incredibly useful, because – just like I felt that way about wanting to write but not being able to figure out how to do it – I knew that there were other people even less technologically inclined than I who probably were experiencing the same thing.

The legal profession, in my experience, had always been a place where people had ideas, and knew how to express themselves, knew how to parse information and how to digest it and absorb the key points. And so I was kind of surprised that there weren’t more lawyers doing it.

So, Denise Howell [and I] were the ones who saw each other doing it, and we traded e-mails, and then we started keeping track of lawyers who were blogging, even if they weren’t blogging about law (and if any lawyers were blogging back then, I’d say most of them weren’t blogging about the law).

2. Rob La Gatta: With your blog, it seems you can write about a range of topics and still maintain readers who come back and comment. Is this the way you’ve always blogged, or did you start with a specific focus and expand to rely more on your personality after you had an initial readership base?

Ernie the Attorney: I think I’ve always kind of written for myself. I wasn’t interested as much in writing about the law, except that when I started – as I mentioned – there weren’t that many people doing it. Then I gave myself the name Ernie the Attorney, so people figured out I was an attorney, [and] they would e-mail me or say, “Hey, what do you think about this?” [So] I kind of felt obliged to fill that role. It wasn’t a role that I really wanted to fill that much. So when Howard Bashman started his blog, and both Denise and I extolled it to a great extent, I was really happy, because I thought, “that’s exactly what somebody should be doing to cover the general bases.”

Then, more and more, people started jumping in to fill in niche areas, and Denise and I kept track of who was blogging in various areas. That was great, because I didn’t really want to write about the law, per se. I mean, I like doing it sometimes, but for the most part I’d rather just write about everything. I was a philosophy major, and my interest is…in everything.

3. Rob La Gatta: If a lawyer just starting his first blog were to approach you, what is the most important bit of advice you’d offer them, and why?

Ernie the Attorney: [T]he main thing that I would tell people (and I do tell them this) is [to] try to find your voice. And don’t be afraid to make “mistakes,” because part of the joy of blogging – and I find it to be something that’s joyful – is getting feedback from people, feeling like you’ve actually connected with people. This is not unique to blogging...any form of writing or expression can bring you that. But I think you get that sort of feeling and that feedback and that passion, you see it happen with a greater intensity when you allow yourself the freedom to explore and experiment.

When people ask me, “Well, why do you write your blog?”, the real answer is, I write it because it helps me figure out things. And that’s writing in general; I write so that I can figure things out. In the past I had tried to keep a journal, and I just didn’t care. It didn’t have the same intensity: only I was reading it, and I wasn’t editing it to say something in a particular way. Yet I was exploring thoughts that I had.

With blogging, it’s the same thing, except in exploring those thoughts, you have to think about them. You have to compress the ideas. You have to write it, you have to rewrite it, and so forth. A lot of times, I’ll look at something and have a much better sense of what I was thinking about - [after] I’ve edited it and written it and put it out there - than I would have if I had just mulled it over in my head, or written it quickly, or tried to write it to conform to what was safe.

Check back on Monday to see part 2, when Ernie will discuss why he thinks lawyers should show their "human side," and why large law firms are often resistant to allowing them to do so through blogs.

In the meantime, interested in hearing more? Check out some of our other featured guests...Ernie is just the latest in our ongoing series of legal blog interviews for the LexBlog Q & A.

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For today's LexBlog Q & A, I conducted a phone interview with Larry Schwartz, president and co-founder of Newstex.

This post is a bit longer than our usual Q & A features (seven questions instead of five...I just couldn't help myself). As a result, the duration of the interview is available after the jump.

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Today we return once again to the LexBlog Q & A interview feature, this time profiling Stamford, Connecticut-based lawyer Daniel Schwartz.

Dan, who runs the Connecticut Employment Law Blog and is a partner in the Labor & Employment practice at Epstein Becker & Green, updates his blog with new content almost every day of the work week. In a phone interview this morning, I spoke with Dan about how he manages to blog so often, his tricks for increasing blog traffic, and how media coverage of the blog has impacted his reputation at the office.

1. Rob La Gatta: To start, lets talk about your blogging routine: you post a lot, and your updates are often lengthy. Do you schedule time each day to blog, and do you map out in advance what issues you will cover? Or is it something you don’t decide until you sit down in front of the computer.

Daniel Schwartz: I try to do it either in the evenings and schedule the post for the following morning, or I try to do it first thing in the morning, before the phones start ringing and clients start e-mailing. Typically what I’ll do is, during the day, I may star some stories from Google Reader to follow up on, or check the court dockets to see if any new decision has come down. Sometimes there’s a pressing matter where you want to update it immediately. But I try to reserve the time for both the beginning and end of the workday.

I end up updating really every business day. I’ve decided not to post on weekends, because no one really reads it [then].

2.Rob La Gatta: All lawyers are experts in their respective fields, but only so many of them can be recognized as such. Do you believe blogging is an effective method for establishing yourself as a recognized expert in employment law?

Daniel Schwartz: I do. I think it is an effective way to essentially demonstrate your expertise to people, instead of telling them that you’re an expert. I think that when you’re able to write about a particular subject matter in particular detail, people tend to respect that much more than [if you are] just pounding on your chest and proclaiming to the world, ‘I am the greatest!’

I’ve tried to make it a point of picking out topics that I find of interest and that I think others might, and getting into a bit of detail that can explain a subject a little more – and may ultimately provide the answers to sort of general questions that people out there might have.

3.Rob La Gatta: I noticed on the about page of your blog, you specifically mention that reader participation – through comments, e-mails, etc – was crucial to the blog's long-term success. Have you gotten this type of response from readers so far?

Daniel Schwartz: I have. It really is a conversation...[you are] entering into a dialogue. I’ve made an effort to reach out to other blogs and comment on them, which in turn has those people look[ing] at my blog and comment as well. From that sense, it’s really been a terrific help in spreading the word and discussing subjects in more detail.

Ultimately, other blogs – such as Above the Law or Point of Law – have picked up on my employment law topics, which may reach a larger audience [because of] it. And I’ve also gotten calls from prospective clients and newspaper reporters that would not have otherwise found me.

4.Rob La Gatta: Yes, about that: I noticed that you’ve recently generated some respectable media exposure. Has this had any impact on how you are received by other lawyers within the firm? Are you given any voice in discussions on marketing issues?

Daniel Schwartz: In fact, I’ve been tasked within my firm – based on the success that we’ve had with the blog – [to look] at other blogs that the firm or other attorneys within my firm can do, and at specific targeted areas where we can provide some additional insight and background, given our involvement in the field.

I think, as with any larger firm, there is always reluctance to try something new. But they have been supportive throughout, and every time the blog gets mentioned in the media, much like it would for other attorneys, the firm has posted it – both internally and externally. It shows the success that the blog can have, of getting referenced in the media and building your word of mouth.

5. Rob La Gatta: f you were to meet a lawyer just starting his or her first blog, what is the single most important bit of advice you’d offer them? Why?

Daniel Schwartz: I think you need to want to do a blog, and I think you need to enjoy doing a blog.

I have found that blogging fits within the marketing and overall approach that I want to take to my practice. It gives me an outlet to do some writing, and it gives me an excuse to keep up on recent developments in the law. I think we all have limits on our time, and I end up sometimes blogging from home with my kids sitting next to me, on my laptop. But I view it as something I enjoy doing rather than as work, and I think if you want to do a blog, you need to do it for the right reasons. It’s not a one shot endeavor; it’s a work in progress that you build on.

Ultimately, I can look back on this, and I’ve got dozens and dozens of articles on various subjects that are a reference, not only to people out there, but to myself as well.

That's it for today's interview. Know someone you think lawyers might be interested in hearing from? Drop me their name in an e-mail and we'll see if we can sit them down for a LexBlog Q & A.

Meanwhile, don't forget to check out our past legal blog interviews.

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1. Rob La Gatta: First off, what do you enjoy most about blogging?

Scott Greenfield: The best part of blogging is being a small part of an enormous conversation on things that interest and matter to me. Whether it’s local or worldwide, and amazingly it sometimes goes worldwide, and whether it’s with laypeople or renown[ed] scholars, everybody gets a seat at the table for the chat. It’s incredible what you can learn.

2. Rob La Gatta: What has been the biggest challenge you’ve faced – either personal or professional – since you became a blogger?

Scott Greenfield: It was surprising to learn how many people read, or at least learn about, the things you post. For me, this has included judges before whom I’m trying cases, who make sure that I know that they know that I was critical of them in the past. That little comment slipped in with a wink will remind you that you had better be prepared to live with your opinions expressed online because they will eventually come back to bite you in the butt.

3. Rob La Gatta: I got the impression through your post on the ABA 100 list and the subsequent discussion in its comments page that you don’t blog just to market yourself. Is this an appropriate assumption to make? If so, why do you blog?

Scott Greenfield: Not only do I not blog to market myself, but I find the idea of self-aggrandizing blogging to be offensive. It defeats the purpose of blogging, to have the freedom to express your views on subjects that matter, as well as assuring that you offer nothing that anybody else will want to read. Nobody wants to read posts about what a wonderful lawyer you are or how brilliant you are. If you’re brilliant, show it by posting substantive pieces.

My blogging is solely for fun. I would (and did) write regardless of whether blogs existed because I feel a desire (compulsion?) to express myself that way. I’m a news junky and seem to have an opinion on a lot of subjects. Writing allows me to get it out, and blogging allows me to have others let me know what they think of my views.

4. Rob La Gatta: Where do you see all this going? Do you believe that legal blogs are a fad that will come and go, or do you think they're reshaping the way lawyers do their job (and if so, how)?

Scott Greenfield: Legal blogs are in their infancy at the moment, but I don’t think they are just a fad. On the other hand, I would anticipate that 90% of the blogs that lawyers start will be abandoned within a year. It takes a lot of work to maintain a blog that people want to read, with a steady, reliable stream of substantive work. The notion that you can start a blog that says nothing, or post every 6 weeks, or write only about what a terrific lawyer you are, and anybody is going to want to read it is simply wrong. The only thing that brings people back is substance, and substance takes effort.

I doubt that blogs will “reshape” the way lawyers do their job. They will provide a new, hopefully more interesting, way to keep abreast of new developments, but they are unlikely to have any great impact on the practice of law.

I do think, however, that blogs are gaining in credibility and influence, and may ultimately have a significant impact on both public and judicial thinking. Blogs are suddenly being cited in opinions, and are influencing mainline media stories. This is huge. There is still a long way to go to establish real credibility, but I think this may be the lasting influence of blogging.

5. Rob La Gatta: If you could provide one bit of advice for a lawyer new to the blogosphere, just starting his or her first blog, what guidance would you give them?

Scott Greenfield: It’s all about substance. If you want anyone to care about what you have to say, then have something to say. But keeping up a blog with substantive posts takes a lot of effort. So if you aren’t having fun, or think you’re going to see some direct financial correlation with your blogging, you’re going to burn out quickly and be very disappointed. So either have fun with it or find a hobby more suited to your interests. Blogging isn’t for everyone.

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Today's LexBlog Q & A features a celebrity from the legal blogosphere, a man who needs no introduction: David Lat, Editor-in-Chief of the prominent legal tabloid Above The Law. Above The Law offers a constant flow of news and gossip, often presented with a humorous edge, about developments in the legal world.

I spoke with David over the phone last week about his blog's popularity, the challenges he's faced getting the site to where it is today and more.

1. Rob La Gatta: What do you think has made Above The Law so popular? Did you believe it would become so big when you launched it?

David Lat: I don’t think I had an idea that it would become quite as popular as it has, although I did think that it was going to attract a significant readership – which is why I had the idea for doing a site of this nature. There were sites that existed at the time for other industries and other professions, and I just thought that lawyers love to gossip, they love to talk about what’s going on in their field, and I thought that there was a place for that.

2. Rob La Gatta: Do you think that Above The Law has had any impact on how lawyers are perceived by the general public?

David Lat: To be honest, I’m not so sure about that, partly because most of our readers are lawyers. Not all of them; we did a reader survey once, and I think maybe we have somewhere between 10 and 20 percent who are not lawyers (although most of those people are married to lawyers or thinking about going to law school or have some connection to the profession). But since most of the readers are [lawyers], it is somewhat of a niche site, and so I’m not quite sure whether it’s had an impact.

But you never can tell. I think that the site does try to bring to light the more fun and quirky aspects of what’s often viewed as a pretty staid and conservative profession. So, it could be a good thing – or not, to the extent that it also exposes lawyers and judges who embarrass themselves. But I’m just here to write…other people can sort things out.

3. Rob La Gatta: By the way you’re producing this, you’ve pretty much independently created a powerful magazine on the web. Have you faced any big challenges along the way?

David Lat: I think one challenge that I’m constantly dealing with is really an issue of tone. The site is styled as a legal tabloid…it is designed to be irreverent. But on the other hand, lawyers – being lawyers – tend to be more conservative in their sensibilities than a lot of other people. So a lot of times, you’re trying to walk the fine line between provoking the readers but not alienating them.

A second challenge – and it’s really a good challenge to have – is also figuring out how to deal with user generated content in the form of reader comments. We have a very vocal group of commenters, and a lot of them have great things to say that are very insightful or very funny. But sometimes they do cross the line, and so trying to figure out how to harness that energy – without getting burned by some of the less pleasant aspects of commenting – is a challenge for a site like this.

I had no idea that it would reach a point where a single post would get hundreds of comments. But like I said, it’s a good problem to have.

3a. Rob La Gatta: Do you have systems in place that you use to control what’s going on in the comments section?

David Lat: We do have the ability to moderate comments, and we also have the ability to block certain IP addresses from commenting. I tend not to do it very much, because I don’t want to inhibit legitimate comments. But for a while, we tried to have absolutely no moderation, and that just proved untenable.

In the next couple of months, we’re probably going to be doing a redesign of the site. We haven’t figured this out definitively, but we are probably going to change the approach to commenters. We may require people to register before they comment, so that might change things; I think maybe people would feel a greater sense of accountability for their comments. But that is still sort of a work-in-progress.

4. Rob La Gatta: Do you think that if you were practicing law today, you would have a blog?

David Lat: (laughs) Probably not. You know, I can write from the luxury of someone who is no longer practicing. It’s hard, because it is a pretty conservative profession, and people can get very easily bent out of shape. A lot of the lawyers I know, they’re even nervous about having a Facebook page, to say nothing of a blog.

I think that’s why so many leading legal bloggers are academics, especially tenured academics, because they can voice their opinions freely. But people who work for law firms are much less likely to have blogs, just because they’re worried about alienating clients, or running afoul of legal ethics rules. It can be a real minefield.

4a. Rob La Gatta: Do you think those are legitimate concerns to have, or is it just paranoia?

David Lat: I think it’s a little bit of both. I think that there are some people who can get themselves in trouble with blogs, but on the other hand, I think lawyers tend to be very overcautious (especially lawyers who have interest in political or judicial office someday). And so they probably don’t even say as much as they could.

But I can understand why they would want to err on the side of caution. There are stories. You hear about summer associates who get in trouble for having blogs; there was that story about the doctor who was on trial and he was blogging about the case, and then it came to light during the case…so in the legal context, blogs can sometimes get people into some amount of hot water.

5. Rob La Gatta: Where do you see this going? Do you have a goal you’re working towards, or are you just going to keep going and take whatever is thrown at you?

David Lat: Yeah, pretty much…as you were alluding to earlier, I would like to make it even more like a magazine, in the sense that I would like to bring in some more outside contributors [and] have some sort of regular columns on specific topics (and I’ve been talking to people about that, but it’s hard to get people to focus because everyone is just so busy). But I would like to bring in some different voices, and have an even better mix of content on the site.

I do have some goals for the future, and we’re going to be doing this redesign, so I think there’s even more that we can do. But basically, I’m pretty happy with how things are now, and I’m quite content to keep on going.

That's it for the LexBlog Q & A feature until after the holiday. Happy Thanksgiving, readers.

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