The Internet: For Entertainment Purposes Only?

Set off by the kid on his lawn who left this comment:

It’s sad, really. You’re like Alkon, unable (or perhaps unwilling) to understand the culture of the Internet. So you take offense at our customs and violate our most sacred taboos, and when someone comes to educate you, you blow him off as a “narcissi(s)tic idiot.”

Scott Greenfield writes:

My child commenter, the World Ruler, is wrong, yet right.  There is a culture of which I am not a part.  While I may know more about it then most people of a certain age, it moves so quickly and morphs in ways I would never anticipate that it’s impossible to stay on top of it while watching from the outside.  And I have no delusion that I’m not on the outside.

My own theory of this cultural divide: as we get farther and farther from the Great Depression, America’s young become more and more comfortable that their basic needs will be met without a struggle. This leaves them free to focus on entertaining themselves with anonymous comments and practical jokes.

There are no “sacred taboos” in such a world. Lying is okay in the context of a prank, so the Amazon-bombing of Amy Alkon (who may very well be a repugnant human being) seems to them a perfectly appropriate response. In this new online world, perceived transgressors are not entitled to common decency.

Add to this the failure of U.S. public schools in the last century to teach rhetoric and logic, and it becomes obvious that those who call out the new generation for lying will be seen as racist neocons like Alkon.

The culture clash is between those who have character in the real world, and expect others to behave with character online; and those who don’t; between those who view near-universal online anonymity as a detriment, and those who view it as a benefit.

Oddly, the same clash could be described as being between those who treat the internet as a serious extension of meatspace, and those who don’t. Everything anonymously written on the internet suddenly makes sense if it’s labeled “for entertainment purposes only.”

That’s why we need have no fear that Scott’s World Ruler and his ilk will ever actually rule the world. No matter how carefully they craft their pseudonymous online personas, those personas will not (except in rare pathological instances) help the people in the real world get elected, hired, or even laid. Should the actual people accidentally reproduce, those personas will not help them feed or protect their offspring or themselves.

Despite cyberpunk dreams, human beings still exist in the real world, and in the real world, people can tell you’re a dog.

Social Media Narcissism Etc.

While Avvo was having a conference in Seattle last week (at which they and I were invited to speak, billed as “Three Angry Lawyers,” but only if we paid our own way), Scott Greenfield and Brian Tannebaum twitted using the #avvo hashtag. For example:

This #avvo used car salesman conference is deeply disturbing.

and

Remember something you avvocating maniacs, if you’re not a good lawyer, people will find out, despite your blogs and online garbage #avvo

Avvo was displaying the #avvo twitter timeline on the podium.

One of the attendees, Sonny Cohen, wrote a blog post, When Flames Erupt in the Twitter-enabled Conference Backchannel (no, seriously, that’s the title). Conceding that Scott and Brian “had some great points about abuse of social media, thoughtless blogging and even the alleged ’social media gurus’ (SMG) who industrialize the process of building real human networks,” he nonetheless called them “harassers,” “flamers,” and “jackass” (half a jackass each, apparently).

Cohen’s post, and his Twitter response to Scott, were overwrought and self-important to the point of narcissism. It’s Twitter; if someone says something you don’t want to hear, you can block it. Brian and Scott didn’t even know that Avvo was displaying the timeline on the podium. (Had they known, they would have had a lot more fun with it.)

Saving for another day modern Homo Internetus’s tendency to throw around heavy words like “harassment” in response to the slightest criticism: are narcissism and hysteria prerequisites for a job as an internet marketer?

I posted a comment to the blog post, to the effect of “‘Harassers’? Really, Sonny? Credibility fail.” Or rather, I tried to post a comment, but Cohen did not publish it.

Add intellectual cowardice to the list of character traits that Cohen is displaying in this episode.

Twitter Strategy

A colleague followed me on twitter four times in a month. To do that, he would have had to unfollow me three times in a month. I asked him what was up with that. His reply:

I’ve found I don’t like to “follow” without being “followed” back.  Seems a one way conversation – not fun for me.

Why the Legal Profession Needs Us

There has been some omphaloskepsis lately among legal bloggers about the propriety of calling public attention to the lawyers who are responsible for the ethical and aesthetic mess created by online marketers.

Jamison Koehler writes:

Policing the blawgosphere and calling out specific lawyers on what are still debatable ethical issues seems to me, as I wrote on Greenfield’s site, paternalistic and futile.

And Carolyn Elefant (who is clear that ghost blogging is unethical) writes:

I don’t criticize Mark or Scott  for outing the ghostblogging lawyers, since Buchanan’s clients willingly provided testimonials and in doing so, put themselves out there.  Nor do I take issue with Brian Tannebaum’s decision to disclose lawyer marketers with tainted ethics records (in fact I interviewed him about it here) because frankly, that information is public record (even Avvo lists ethics violations).Nevertheless, I’m far less comfortable with criticisms like this one about the lawyers embroiled in the Total Attorneys ethics mess [Never mind that their names are also public record. MB.] or “naming names” of lawyers who advertise [Link missing from original] on what Eric Turkewitz has termed dreck blogs.

Carolyn’s reasoning is that

the lawyers who subscribed to services offered by Findlaw and Total Attorneys, both of which are ABA sponsors,  most likely believed that the ABA had vetted these companies’ practices before accepting their sponsorship dollars.

Any lawyer who holds that particular belief should be barred from the internet until she develops some sense. The ABA is a self-important voluntary tea-and-argument society. That it has any authority is a myth apparently popular among non-lawyers; its endorsement of a particular product (even if accepting advertising dollars constituted an endorsement), though, bears no weight. The ABA knows no more about social media than the average lawyer. It doesn’t vet its advertisers in a meaningful way—as we’ve seen—and shouldn’t be expected to.

Jamison calls the ethics of using ghostblawgers “debatable.” It may well be debatable (on the “people will argue about anything” principle) but, as I’ve commented elsewhere, I’ve yet to see the argument in favor that takes into account lawyers’ unique product and position in society. Ghostblogger Jenni Buchanan makes an effort at Blog for Profit but conveniently glosses over her own prime selling point, which happens also to be the prime argument for the unethicalness of ghostblogging: that lawyers blog to “give themselves credibility.”

There are those who are more comfortable trusting governing bodies to decide what is ethical, and are perhaps not comfortable enough with their own judgment or authority to tell others when they are wrong. Those people should certainly not be calling out others. Let’s take it as a given that those lawyers who are calling out people on ethical and aesthetic issues (beauty is truth, truth beauty) are themselves certain that those issues are not debatable. Either that, or they are willing to be publicly called out for being wrong. Or both.

Also, let’s take it as a given that those lawyers doing so care (not everyone cares about these issues, and that’s okay, Norm Pattis).

Jamison thinks that “policing the blawgosphere and calling out specific lawyers” is paternalistic and futile. I’ll take the adjectives in order.

As to paternalism, nobody is trying to act like the daddy of the blawgosphere. The cheaters are not chastised for their own good, but for the good of the community. So “Sheriff” is probably a more apt metaphor. The internet is largely lawless, a virtual wild west, and there’s nothing wrong with exercising your authority to try to impose a little order on your little corner of it to make it more agreeable to you. If that involves hurting a few feelings, well, you can’t make omelets without breaking eggs.

Maybe Jamison’s “paternalism” objection is that nobody elected Scott or Brian or me Sheriff (or “Top Cop“) of the blawgosphere. That’s true enough. But lots of people read Simple Justice (PR6), and it’s not because Scott Greenfield’s afraid of hurting people’s feelings. Fewer people read Defending People (PR5) and Criminal Defense (PR4), but the numbers are not inconsiderable. Bloggers have authority in proportion to how many people read them (and link to them) and people read and link to those three blogs, none of which is shy about publicly calling a fraud a fraud.

As to futility, consider the numbers. There are over a million lawyers in the U.S. 80% of them (according to a possibly-reliable source, the ABA) are solos or in small firms. Most of them are looking for a way to make more money. Most of them aren’t highly social-media-savvy. Call it at least 200,000 (most of most of 800,000) lawyers who are looking (some desperately) for a way to make more money and are not highly social-media-savvy.

There is a growing industry of people, not all of them disbarred lawyers, pouring poison in the ears of those 200,000 lawyers, trying to sell them on the next great way to find “leads” on the internet: comment spam, ghostblogging, splogging, dreckblogging to name just four.

If I run into a lawyer—one of the 200,000—who is funding comment spam, and I send him a gentle email, one of two things will happen: he will stop funding comment spam, or he will not. The latter outcome is more likely: since he doesn’t know that he will be named, he has little incentive to stop (the Bradley Johnson Rule)—comment spamming is probably not a violation of the DRs, and even if it were the State Bar wouldn’t do anything about it.

If he stops, that’s great: one down, 199,999 to go. (Woo hoo!) If he doesn’t, and if calling out the cheaters is wrong on principle, then I’ve done all I can. Talk about futility!

On the other hand, if I am willing to put the cheater’s name up in lights, he will eventually get the message:

[L]aw bloggers can do something about the law field spammers. Because unlike the other sites, these folks generally have very little Google juice and should actually care about their reputations. So if a few blogs decide to out the spammers, this could have a pretty big effect on the firms. When their names are Googled by potential clients, the potential clients will see that they are spammers. And it will no doubt cause them to stop.

Eric Turkewitz, New Spam Comment Policy for Law Firms (You Will Be Exposed)

That’s specific deterrence at work.

Not only will the specific cheater get the message, but some other lawyers in his position will get the message as well. That’s general deterrence.

People market themselves online to manipulate their reputations. One way or another—whether they pay FindLaw or Total Attorneys, hire a disgraced-former-lawyer “social media expert,” or do it themselves, they are putting themselves (as Carolyn might say) out there. The guys financing FindLaw to post dreckbloggen (Goldberg Sager & Associates; Arye Lustig & Sassower; Kahn, Gordon, Timko & Rodriquez to name but three) are reaping whatever (probably slight) benefit the dreck accumulates. They pay (lots of money) for their names to be publicly associated with the dreck; it’s appropriate for their names to be publicly associated with the opprobrium that dreck generates. As Scott writes:

There’s no right to enjoy the benefits of public self-promotion, assuming there are any, with impunity.  When you put yourself out there, you invite scrutiny.  If you can’t take it, then you’ve come to the wrong place.  Your peers may adore you or think you’re dumb as dirt, not to mention unethical, deceptive and scummy.  That’s the risk of going public.

Finally: I, for one, would just as soon not see more attempts by the state bars to regulate the internet: they will screw it up.

Our only hope of having rational rules for lawyer marketing online is to make and enforce them ourselves. And the only tool we have in any effort to enforce rational rules for lawyer marketing online is the credible threat of reputational harm resulting from misconduct. So even if you would never ever call out a lawyer who is (directly or indirectly) lying, cheating, or polluting, you should be glad that there are those of us who will.

More On Ghostblogging

Dear Mr. Bennett,

Thank you for including my company in your blog post yesterday about the ethics of legal ghostblogging.  As a (relatively) new form of communication, blogging is still in many ways going through its growing pains, and as more and more professionals and businesses begin to see the value of blogging I know that there will be many more debates about various aspects of it, including continuing ethical debates.  Like you, I think these debates are important, and I look forward to seeing (and perhaps being a part of) how the field evolves.

The ethics of having a ghostwriter in a field that is still in many ways expected to be transparent is something that I discuss with each and every one of my clients; that is why some of my clients choose to have my tagline at the bottom of each post that I write for them, and every client of mine knows that I expect them to read and approve every post that appears on their blog. Personal and professional responsibility is not something I neglect or take lightly.  As you might expect, I have many of my own opinions about this subject and would be happy to engage in conversation with you if you are interested in discussion.

The reason I am writing you today is because–although I have no desire to censor the debate–I would like to ask you, as a professional courtesy, to remove your reference and link to my client testimonials page.  You are welcome to leave your reference to my business and my home page (your readers can find my client testimonials page from there if they are so inclined.) As I said above, professional responsibility is not something I take lightly, and I feel it is my professional responsibility to be the “front man” in this debate, and bear the brunt of this particular criticism. I realize that in the end this is your forum and your decision, and I appreciate your consideration of my clients and of my request.

If you would like to discuss this topic further I invite you to e-mail me privately at any time.

Best Regards,
Jenni Buchanan

www.LegalGhostblogger.com
My blog: http://blogprofs.typepad.com/

Dear Ms. Buchanan:

Thank you for your email.

Blogging is not so novel that there are no precedents. In the original post I drew analogies to claiming other lawyers’ results and résumés; in the non-legal world it’s like putting a picture of one thing on the outside of a can filled with another. I note that, of the five “bloggers” with testimonials on your testimonial page, only two use your tagline; Gene Osofsky, Rick Law, and Kimberly T. Lee do not. Why do you suppose that is?

It is very important for the discussion of the ethics of lawyers using ghostbloggers to be conducted publicly, in full view of those who might be affected by lawyers’ marketing choices—not only the clients whose fortunes and futures might be at stake, but also the lawyers whose reputations are at stake. You take professional responsibility seriously, but your clients are the ones with their licenses and their reputations on the line.

It is crucial that those with ultimate legal and ethical responsibility for online marketing (the lawyers) realize that they have some skin in the game. Some lawyers feeling that it is okay to have a “front man” causes many of the problems with unethical online marketing: they trust a non-lawyer to do it for them, and wind up paying for spam, splogging, or ghostblogging. I suspect that when lawyers realize that they might be called to public account for the things they delegate to others (Outsourcing Marketing = Outsourcing Ethics), they give a lot more thought to their marketing choices.

I’d be happy to hear your arguments that hiring a legal ghostblogger is ethical, but I don’t think your clients should be insulated from the effects of this particular decision.

Mark

Rent-A-Brain With Ghostbloggers

Lawyers: want to juice your stats a little so that clients are more likely to hire you? Have we got a deal for you! GhostWins.com has a stable of excellent but self-effacing lawyers who are willing to let you take public credit for their results. Here’s how it works: you sign up for GhostWins.com, paying $250 per month for syndicated results (which other lawyers might also take credit for) or $500 per month for personalized results. Every week we’ll send you three or four actual successful outcomes in your field of law, which you can then publicize on your website or blog as your own successful outcomes. We all know how potential clients love lawyers who win; with GhostWins.com you create the appearance of being such a lawyer without putting in the many hours of hard work (not to mention good luck) required to win your own cases.

Do you look like John Edwards? No, I thought not. Yet everyone knows that success is tied to physical attractiveness. So you might be interested in GhostMug.com. GhostMug.com works on the same principles as GhostWins.com: you pay a small monthly fee, and we provide you with pictures of a trustworthy person who fits your basic demographics—just like you but much better looking. As long as you continue your subscription, you can continue using the pictures as a substitute for your own—let’s face it—homely mug in your online marketing. We’ll even send you weekly updates of “your” face in law-related poses. $250 a month gets you a syndicated face, which other subscribers might also use (we can’t guarantee that someone in your field of law and geographical area will not use the same face as you) or $500 a month gets you a personalized face, which only you will have permission to use.

Since you’re still reading this, odds are that you didn’t graduate from a Tier-One law school. You know that it doesn’t make any difference to the results you get (or lease, through GhostWins.com), but some paying clients might be more likely to hire you if your resume were a little more impressive. GhostResume.com can fix that problem. On the same model as GhostWins.com and GhostMug.com, GhostResume.com allows you to contract out your credentials. For a nominal fee, you get to use the guaranteed-to-impress bona fides of an actual lawyer in your marketing materials. Your clients will never know the difference.

To maximize your online marketing potential, sign up for TheWholeGhostPackage.com. You’ll get weekly GhostWins, a GhostMug, and a matching GhostResume for a discounted monthly $700 (syndicated) or $1,400 (personalized).

So how is it okay for a lawyer to hire a ghostwriter to write his blog?

When a client hires a lawyer, more than the results or the face or the résumé, he’s paying for the lawyer’s knowledge, intellect and heart—attributes that good writing reveals and ghostwriting falsifies. Hiring a ghostwriter to write your blog (like some of the people here using a ghostwriter “to enhance their credibility”) is no more ethical than subscribing to TheWholeGhostPackage.com.

Five Lawyers Trading on the Death of an Innocent

I invite the following lawyers:

The Law Offices of Eric Strand
West Chester, PA

Law Office of Henry S. Hilles, III
Norristown, PA

to explain how it is okay to use a dead nine-year-old child to advertise legal services. Like Sassower, Chase, and Kahn (who are also invited to explain), Strand, Beck, Petersen, Hark, and Hilles are paying FindLaw to market them through dreckbloggen.

We didn’t know? You know now. What have you done about it?

We didn’t ask FindLaw to do this? Not explicitly, but you paid them to.

We trusted FindLaw?

Outsource your marketing, outsource your reputation.

New Blog Today

Avvo Pimp, about what I call answhores—lawyers like Alan Brinkmeier who answer questions on Avvo Answers without regard to whether those questions relate to their area of practice, their state, or even their knowledge.

Bloggers’ Best Cancelled for Lack of Interest

Thanks to South Carolina criminal defense lawyers Bobby Frederick and Johnny Gardner for participating.

We get the blogosphere we deserve.

What Avvo Answers Are Good For

I thought of a good use for Avvo’s questions today.

If you needed a regular source of ideas for blog posts, you could subscribe to Avvo’s questions in your field and answer them on the blog. Lots of the questions aren’t worth answering, but there are at least a couple a week that might make for interesting blog posts.

For example, here are today’s Texas criminal law questions from Avvo Answers:

• In Texas if someone steals and doesn’t get caught but someone wants to turn them in that saw what will happen?[Probably nothing.]
• I heard that the Minimum mandatory stay in Federal Prison was being reduced to 65%. Is that true, and when will that come in fo [No. It's a perennial myth.]
• When the prosecutor’s office receive new information that is exculpatory, what is their role? [To reveal it to the defense.]
• I need a pro bono criminal lawyer to handle a case for my 18 year old son, who is being set up. He is worried about not graduate[Good luck.]
• I took the blame for a friends theft of $230. Can I still get in trouble for ratting him out? [Probably.]

At least four out of those five questions might make for informative blog posts. No effort would be required to choose a topic for a post; all you would have to do is research and answer the question. Voilà, instant blog framework, leading to the production of on-subject content.

As a bonus, by answering on your own blog you don’t have to deal with the answhores.