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November 12, 2005
Sex Sells Contracts: Why Not Securities Law?
The ContractsProf Blog recently posted about "Sex and Contracts." Frank Snyder notes that the post resulted in a huge traffic spike. "There's a lesson there," he concludes. There sure is.
I could (as this blog did) identify a case or so that directly appeals to your prurient interest in the topic. But maybe the better path is to take a step back, and consider a more academic question.
Let us assume that you, a general counsel, have just learned that your CEO is having a consensual affair with a subordinate. Also assume that the corporation has recently stated, in a regular reporting statement, that its management team is "cohesive, ethically sound, and 100% committed to shareholder value." [Note: this is entirely hypothetical]
Putting aside other considerations, is it likely that a court or jury would find it materially misleading to have omitted disclosure of the affair?
I think there is at least an argument that reasonable shareholders would find it significant that the officers of the corporation are romantically involved with each other, because such relationships often end badly, either in litigation or in a private settlement. Assuming materiality, I think that plaintiffs would assert that failing to disclosure the affair renders the statement misleading ("cohesive" and "100% committed" have a different meaning in light of the relationship). Still, I am tempted to think that we should immunize non-disclosure to protect the privacy interests of the employees in question. Does the answer differ if the affair is an adulterous one?
If disclosure is required, I have to bet that the following example wouldn't do at all.
"I'll try to answer you, but you can't put a lot of faith in what I'm going to say," [the CEO] said, according to a transcript of the call. "I know in one meeting I said if we look at this a year from now it will be clear, or should be clear, you know, what is and what we can do and what's attainable and how quickly, and I still think that's true. God knows, I would hope that's true."
Er. What was that again?
Posted by hoffman at 09:03 PM | Comments (4) | TrackBack
Back from the Hiring Conference
I just returned from the AALS hiring conference. Temple saw some wonderful folks, including several confessed readers of this blog.
Because of the swirl of events, I didn't get to see others who I would have liked to, even though I did mill around the Friday night reception for that very purpose! (For a pre-conference take on whether going to such receptions makes sense, see here.) Despite Al and Mike's fashion tips, I admit to not wearing a tie. And that is about as much as I think I can say about the experience, as the deliberative process privilege probably applies to the rest of what went on.
Posted by hoffman at 08:59 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Academic Blogging Scandal
A developing case about academic bloggers contains a chorus of major issues swirling in the blogosphere: the career consequences of blogging, moderating blog debates, hot-button political issues, and defamation.
The case involves Paul Deignan, an engineering PhD candidate who has a blog called Info Theory. Deignan got into a debate with the anonymous blogger Bitch Ph.D. over abortion. Deignan is pro-life; Bitch Ph.D. is pro-choice. They exchanged posts on their mutual blogs, and Deignan also placed a comment on one of Bitch Ph.D.'s posts.
As reported by Inside Higher Ed:
Then he posted a seemingly innocuous entry on the Bitch Ph.D. site: “Your linking talking points w/o analysis. Already I see several points that are exaggerated and misconstrued without even needing research…”Feeling that this comment and subsequent ones from Deignan did not qualify as “substantive debate,” she soon deleted his comments and banned him from her site. Her policy states, “Comments are great; obnoxious comments get deleted. Deal.”
If this were all, the story would be just a typical tale of the blogosphere. But things got much uglier:
A frequent visitor to the Bitch Ph.D. site, the University of Northern Iowa history professor Wallace Hettle, felt obliged to defend Bitch Ph.D.’s liberal end of the blogosphere. Hettle found Deignan’s curriculum vita at Info Theory, which lists his academic advisers, the Purdue mechanical engineers Galen King and Peter Meckl, who will play a big part in deciding if he will ultimately receive a Ph.D. Hettle e-mailed them, indicating that Deignan’s comments were “unprofessional” and “contrary to the spirit of free enquiry.” Hettle announced his actions within the comment section of Bitch Ph.D.
In the email sent to Deignan's advisor (according to Deignan's blog), Hettle wrote:
Yesterday and last night Paul Deignan spent in "trolling" a feminist academic web site with disruptive and abusive comments. . . .This kind of behavior is not unheard of on the net. But Mr. Deignan chose to do this action from a homepage that claims you as a dissertation adviser.
Mr. Deignan has a right to free speech. He shouldn't disrupt the discussions of others--it is highly unprofessional. And it is linked to your name.
Might you please advise him to exercise a little discretion in the future. As matters stand, Mr. Deignan appears to be doing a bit more politicking than mechanical engineering. . . .
According to the Inside Higher Ed article, things might be escalating to a legal case:
Both Deignan and Bitch Ph.D. have hired lawyers. Hettle wouldn’t comment on whether he has done the same.Deignan said he is prepared to begin a lawsuit as soon as possible. He accuses both Hettle and Bitch Ph.D of libeling him — Hettle because of the e-mail he sent to Deignan’s professors, and Bitch Ph.D. for saying that he may have used a technique known as “IP spoofing,” which is a form of hacking, to try to determine who she is. Deignan denies having done that.
Posted by Daniel Solove at 01:50 AM | Comments (10) | TrackBack
November 11, 2005
Want better student evaluations?
I read an advertisement for the University of Virginia’s Darden School of Business Administration in the US Airways magazine recently, headlined “The best professors in the World don’t like hearing themselves speak.” The advertisement continued, “To develop great communicators and leaders we ask students to, quite simply, communicate and lead. That’s why Darden professors spend the least amount of time lecturing of any of the top MBA programs. We believe this is one reason the Princeton Review ranked our professors the #2 teaching faculty in the nation.”
So, to improve teaching scores, talk less. Hmm, something to think about as I prepare for class today.
Perhaps I should file that under the important lessons I learned while sitting on an airplane. Of course, I might also have learned it from Ben Stein's monologue in the 1980s movie, Ferris Bueller's Day Off.
In 1930, the Republican-controlled House of Representatives, in an effort to alleviate the effects of the -- anyone? Anyone? -- the Great Depression, passed the -- anyone? Anyone? The tariff bill? The Hawley-Smoot Tariff Act? Which -- anyone? Raised or lowered? ... raised tariffs, in an effort to collect more revenue for the federal government. Did it work -- anyone? Anyone know the effects? It did not work, and the United States sank deeper into the Great Depression.
Posted by Alfred_Brophy at 08:52 AM | Comments (5) | TrackBack
Revised Law Professor Blogger Census Coming Soon
Thanks to the comments of readers, I've located a number of other law professor bloggers. I'll be updating the law professor blogger census and the statistics this weekend and will post a revised version early next week.
Last call for any additions or corrections.
Posted by Daniel Solove at 02:21 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Suing Wikipedia
What happens if there's a Wikipedia article about you that's unflattering? What if it is in error or revealing of your private life? Wikipedia, for those not familiar with it, is an online encyclopedia that is written and edited collectively by anybody who wants to participate.
Daniel Brandt, a blogger who maintains blogs called Google Watch and Wikipedia Watch complained to Wikipedia administrators asking them to delete an entry about him. What should one's rights in this regard be?
Here's what Brandt writes:
There is a problem with the structure of Wikipedia. The basic problem is that no one, neither the Trustees of Wikimedia Foundation, nor the volunteers who are connected with Wikipedia, consider themselves responsible for the content. . . .At the same time that no one claims responsibility, there are two unique characteristics of Wikipedia that can be very damaging to a person, corporation, or group. The first is that anyone can edit an article, and there is no guarantee that any article you read has not been edited maliciously, and remains uncorrected in that state, at the precise time that you access that article.
The second unique characteristic is that Wikipedia articles, and in some cases even the free-for-all “talk” discussions behind the articles, rank very highly in the major search engines. This means that Wikipedia’s potential for inflicting damage is amplified by several orders of magnitude.
Brandt muses whether he ought to sue Wikipedia:
As someone who has been jostling with Wikipedia administrators for several weeks, I am very interested in whom I should sue if I wanted to sue. This assumes, of course, that I’ve decided I’ve been clearly libeled by Wikipedia’s article on me, and/or the discussion page attached to it. At the moment, this is an intellectual interest of mine, and I am not currently claiming that I have been libeled.
1. Should Wikipedia take down the entry as a matter of policy? If so, should they take down anything that a person finds offensive or disagreeable? Or should they be more restrictive as to what they deem deletable?
2. The Communications Decency Act (CDA) § 230 provides immunity for an ISP or website operator for liability for comments posted by others: "No provider or user of an interactive computer service shall be treated as the publisher or speaker of any information provided by another information content provider." 47 U.S.C. §230(c)(1). Under § 230, ISPs cannot be liable as "publishers" of information posted by a user. The operators of a blog cannot be liable for comments posted by others. Wikipedia is akin to the operator of a blog that accepts comments by users; the folks at Wikipedia are allowing others to put up information, and under § 230 they cannot be held liable.
3. There remains a disputable issue as to whether § 230 applies once a website operator knows that a comment posted is defamatory or invasive of privacy. Some cases have held that § 230 still applies, but other courts have concluded that once a website or ISP has knowledge of about an improper comment and still leaves it up, this could give rise to liability. What should the rule be in this regard?
Related Posts:
1. Solove, Yahoo! Nude Photos Case (PrawfsBlawg)
Hat tip: Google Blogoscoped
Posted by Daniel Solove at 12:33 AM | Comments (7) | TrackBack
November 10, 2005
Blogging Isn't Just for the Young
This AP article, available at CNN, chronicles older individuals who are blogging:
Web logs, more often the domain of alienated adolescents and middle-aged pundits, are gaining a foothold as a new leisure-time option for senior citizens. . . .Three percent of online U.S. seniors have created a blog and 17 percent have read someone else's blog, according to the Pew Internet & American Life Project. Compare that to online 18- to 29-year-olds: Thirteen percent have created blogs and 32 percent have read someone else's blog, according to Pew.
Joe Jenett, a Detroit-area Web designer who has been tracking the age of bloggers for a personal venture called the Ageless Project, said he has noticed more older bloggers in the past two years.
The title of the article is "Senior Citizen Bloggers Defy Stereotypes" but the article's URL at CNN is . . . well . . . not as kindly worded:
http://www.cnn.com/2005/TECH/internet/11/10/geezers.who.blog.ap/index.html
Posted by Daniel Solove at 02:53 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Grokster R.I.P.
The recent news of the Grokster settlement has generated only modest discussion, and I suppose that's not surprising. The Supreme Court's decision in the case came out months ago, and the big open questions left by that decision are unaffected by the settlement. Moreover, there appeared to be sufficient evidence in the record of "actual inducement" to make Grokster's shut-down unsurprising.
Still, I would note that, according to the reports, the recording industry got Grokster to agree to pay $50 million in damages, even though they don't expect to be able to collect. This gives the industry a big number it can use to deter future such technologies, and it's consistent with the broader strategy of publicly signalling (through public announcements, lawsuits against end-users, education efforts, and even movie previews) that these activities are, in the industry's view, infringing.
To some extent, this is the flip side of an earlier post I made about information regarding fair use rights. Just as some would like individuals to have greater information about their fair use rights, the copyright industries would like users to have greater information about the restrictions imposed by copyright. (Jason Mazzone has an interesting proposal about what to do when the industry overstates such restrictions).
All of this is to suggest that there seems to be a need to give individuals clearer and better information about what they can or can't do under the copyright laws.
Posted by Joseph_Liu at 11:40 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
Legal Realism and Fashion Consulting: A Misunderstood Relation?
Some years ago a colleague gave me a copy of John Molloy’s 1975 book Dress for Success. Perhaps the fact that he asked me whether I own an iron contains a clue to his message; I’m not sure.
I found it buried in a box of books I unpacked recently and began to read the chapter "For Lawyers: How to Dress Up Your Case and Win Jurors and Judges." It contains the following sage commentary on the behavior of judges:
Before the urban judge you should avoid the Ivy League tie. You should avoid any sign of ostentation. You should avoid any look that is with-it, chic or "in." Urban judges tend to be quite ticklish about their newfound socioeconomic positions, even if they’ve held them for some time, and often look upon anyone coming into their courtroom as a threat to them personally. Anybody who doesn’t treat their courtrroms with respect, and that means anyone who dresses in a manner that they find is unbecoming, will be dealt with harshly. Their response may well be subconscious; no judge will ever tell you that he’s ruling against you because of your smartass tie, but believe me, many of them will.
So that set me to wondering whether Judge William Hutcheson’s "The Judicial Hunch," a foundational article in legal realism, might have had some influence on the modern fashion consulting industry. Compare, for example, the passage above with Hutcheson’s statement that a judge:
brooding over the cause, waits for the feeling, the hunch–that intuitive flash of understanding that makes the jump-spark connection between question and decision and at the point where the path is darkest for the judicial feet, sets its light along the way.
Or, to make the case a little less abstract, take the example of a study of the disposition of criminal cases in the New York City Municipal Court reported by Jerome Frank in Law and the Modern Mind.
Of 546 persons charged with intoxication brought before one judge, he discharged only one and found the others (about 97%) guilty, whereas of the 673 arraigned before another judge, he found 531 (or 79%) not guilty. . . . Everson [the author of the study] concludes that these figures show to what a remarkable degree the individuality of the magistrates is mirrored in their disposition of cases. "Justice," he says, "is a very personal thing, reflecting the temperament, the personality, the education, environment, and personal traits of the magistrate."
Were the lawyers were wearing smartass ties? Of course, mere order of publication is not always an indication of influence of the former upon the later. For, perhaps, Hutcheson learned his legal realism from the same source as Molloy: observation of the behavior of judges. Then again, they may all be wrong. For perhaps their observations are yet further examples of the ways that biography (of judges’ behavior) is autobiographical.
Of course, as Dave Hoffman's recent discussion of dress codes at the AALS hiring conference illustrates, fashion consulting for lawyers continues to be an important topic.
Posted by Alfred_Brophy at 10:47 AM | Comments (8) | TrackBack
Kerr v. Goldstein on Georgia v. Randolph
There's a terrific debate going on over at the VC between Orin Kerr and Tom Goldstein of SCOTUSBlog about the recently argued U.S. Supreme Court case, Georgia v. Randolph. Tom Goldstein argued the case for Scott Randolph. The case involves an incident where Janet Randolph (Scott's wife) consented to the police searching the couple's home. Scott, who was present at the time, objected. The police searched nevertheless, and they found evidence against Scott of drug violations. The issue, as framed by the grant of cert is: "Can police search a home when a co-habitant consents and the other co-habitant is present and does not consent?"
A few quick thoughts:
(1) It seems clear that both Scott and Janet had a reasonable expectation of privacy in their home.
(2) Both Scott and Janet can validly waive their own Fourth Amendment rights by consenting to a search.
(3) If Scott weren't home, Janet's consent would allow the police to validly search the home. In United States v. Matlock, 415 U.S. 164 (1974), the Supreme Court held that the "consent of one who possesses common authority over premises or effects is valid as against the absent, nonconsenting person with whom that authority is shared."
The key factor in this case is that Scott was present, voiced his objection, and the cops searched anyway. Should Scott's presence and objection make a difference? In other words, should the rule in this case be any different from the rule in United States v. Matlock, described in (3) above.
The answer depends upon the purpose of the consent doctrine. I think that as a policy matter, the focus should be on creating clear rules for the police officer acting in good faith. The rule in Matlock above would be justified because the police officer is searching pursuant to a clear grant of authority. Making the officer have to guess whether all non-present parties would have consented would slow down the search process immensely. First, it would take time to locate all the other non-present parties. Second, the cop would have to figure out how many non-present parties have authority over the place being searched.
For sure, the rule in Matlock is problematic from an individual rights perspective, in that a person's rights can be waived by another party. But from the perspective of an efficient way to allow police officers, acting in good faith, to be able to search pursuant to consent, the rule in Matlock does make some sense.
But now let's turn to Georgia v. Randolph. If we have a clear communication by a party that he does not wish his property to be searched, the ambiguity in Matlock goes away. From the individual rights perspective, the result is problematic for the same reason as Matlock is. From the police perspective, there is a clear indication of no consent by a party being searched. It would seem to me that without facing any uncertainty as to whether all other parties consent and without the difficulty of having to check with all non-present parties to find out if they consent, there's little justification to allow a cop to search here without a warrant. The benefits of the rule in Matlock disappear. Thus, Georgia v. Randolph is not analogous to the situation in United States v. Matlock.
Anyway, check out Kerr's debate with Goldstein. They've been focusing on the case for a lot longer than I have, and their debate is far more informed than my musings.
Background about the case is here at SCOTUSBlog and here.
Posted by Daniel Solove at 01:04 AM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
Old Courthouse Architecture
The other day, I blogged about new courthouse architecture. A few of the commentators said they had a soft spot for older courthouse architecture, which I share. Therefore, I thought I'd surf the web for some examples of older courthouses. I love architecture, and I found many an interesting picture to share with you. Here is what I found, with the year each was constructed:
Posted by Daniel Solove at 12:34 AM | Comments (6) | TrackBack
November 09, 2005
A Modest Defense of Law Reviews
It is a pretty common place observation that one of the virtues of markets is that they manage to aggregate a great deal of disaggregated information. Obviously, folks disagree rather vehemently as to how effectively markets do this, but most people, I suspect, would admit that the market is frequently smarter than particular actors within the market. The same is true, I think, of law reviews.
The classical critique of law reviews is that they are staffed by dumb students who don't know anything. Obviously, there is a lot of truth to this. However, I think that the case for the incompetence of law reviews can be overstated. While obviously no law review is doing a perfect job, citation studies suggest that the article selection process is far from random. All things being equal, articles that appear in top journals get cited more often than articles that don't appear in top journals. Of course, it may be that law professors are simply dolts who are taking the name of the journal as a signal of quality. However, it seems at least equally probable to suppose that the law reviews -- or at least the top law reviews -- are identifying important legal scholarship considerably better than the classical critique suggests.
The mistake of the classical critique, in my opinion, is that it assumes that the only meaningful difference between law reviews and other academic journals is peer review. There is, however, a second and equally important factor: law reviews allow multiple submissions. This fact, coupled with the expedited review process, means that law reviews in effect compete with one another for pieces. Hence, you have a system in which a lot of smart but basically clueless students are desperately trying to find good articles. They are grabbing their information from lots of sources: discussions with friendly professors, a quick review of the literature on Westlaw, perhaps even blogs. None of these sources is perfect, and none of them amounts to any sort of expertise. Nevertheless, student editors are not making their choices at random. They are acting on the basis of information. When they act by making an offer, this places pressure on the "price" of the article by providing an additional reason for other reviews to consider it. The result is that taken as a whole, the system of multiple submission and expedited review will tend to aggregate information.
Peer review, in contrast, relies on individual expertise rather than the institutional aggregation of information. Indeed, the process of peer review is designed so as to insulate the peer reviewers from institutional pressure. They don't compete with other journals. The process is slow. They are deprived of signals about what other people think of the article. Obviously, there are a lot of virtues to this system, and I suspect that in a lot of areas -- sophisticated empirical research, for example -- it dominates the law review model. However, the important point is to see that it is a model that relies on the conscious and personal aggregation of information, and that this is by no means the only way that information can be aggregated.
Does this mean that the law review system is perfect? Far from it. Obviously, factors such as reputation and law school letter-head have a huge impact on the process. Some of this is probably not such a bad thing. It is not as though reputation and law school letter head tells you absolutely nothing about the possible quality of the piece. Still, I have submitted articles as a practicing attorney and I am sure that there is bias against such pieces in the selection process. As an editor, I reviewed more than one piece that no one on the committee would have looked at but for a big name author. Law reviews, however, are not as bad as people argue they are.
The oddest thing of all is that in a sense it shouldn't matter. Suppose that we believe that peer reviewed publications are decisively better signals of quality. Who cares? Presumably, the main consumers of academic publications are academics. In other words, they are people who ought to have the expertise to independently assess quality, and therefore don't require the signal provided by where a piece is published.
Posted by oman at 04:54 PM | Comments (7) | TrackBack
ChoicePoint: More Than 145,000 Victims?
ChoicePoint just won't be outdone. They were, after all, the company that started all the extensive attention on data security breaches. Back in February 2005, ChoicePoint announced that it had improperly sold personal data on about 145,000 people to identity thieves. Pursuant to a California data security breach notice law, ChoicePoint notified the affected individuals in California. Soon afterwards, many states started thinking: Geez, we'd like our citizens to be informed too. They put up a fuss, and ChoicePoint voluntarily agreed to notify all of the 145,000 people it said were affected. Many states subsequently passed data security breach notification laws similar to California's.
After ChoicePoint's announcement came a barrage of announcements of security breaches by numerous companies and institutions. According to a very useful listing and tally by the Privacy Rights Clearinghouse, data security breaches have affected over 50 million Americans (there may surely be some double-counting here, as some unlucky folks may have been affected multiple times).
Now ChoicePoint has announced that it has notified another 17,000 people that their personal data was compromised in the breach announced in February. According to the AP:
ChoicePoint Inc., the company that disclosed earlier this year that thieves had accessed its massive database of consumer information, said Tuesday in a regulatory filing it has sent out another 17,000 notices to people telling them they may be victims of fraud.
The Alpharetta-based company had said in February, after announcing the breach, that it had notified roughly 145,000 consumers that they may have had their personal information improperly accessed.That number has now increased to 162,000, ChoicePoint said in its quarterly report to the Securities and Exchange Commission. The filing did not detail reasons for the increase, though the company had previously said the number could ultimately be higher.
Related Posts:
1. Solove, Free Credit Reports: My Exciting Adventure (Concurring Opinions) (October 2005)
2. Solove, Notice Much Delayed: The FDIC Security Breach (PrawfsBlawg) (June 2005)
3. Solove, Data Security Breach Supersized: 40 Million People Affected (PrawfsBlawg) (June 2005)
4. Solove, Data Leaks: Déjà Vu All Over Again (PrawfsBlawg) (June 2005)
5. Solove, Tallying Up Data Security Breaches (PrawfsBlawg) (May 2005)
Posts on Identity Theft:
1. Solove, Youngest ID Theft Victim? (PrawfsBlawg) (July 2005)
2. Solove, Why Identity Theft Isn’t Pretty (PrawfsBlawg) (July 2005)
3. Solove, Identity Theft Fears and Online Shopping (PrawfsBlawg) (June 2005)
4. Solove, Identity Thief Professors (PrawfsBlawg) (June 2005)
Posted by Daniel Solove at 12:35 PM | Comments (6) | TrackBack
1950s and 2000s Conservatism
Last spring I went to a talk by Phyllis Schlafly at the University of Alabama. It was the most entertaining evening I’ve spent in years, much better even than the O’Reilly Factor on a good day. And I left with an “I love capitali$m” poster, which is one of my prized possessions.
Ms. Schlafly did what I take to be her usual stump speech-–opposing judicial activism and, of course, feminism. She was plugging her new book, The Supremacists (about left-wing judges). She had some amusing lines. Something along the lines of, “Feminists are pushing their way into the military. Forty-five percent of women can't throw a hand grenade far enough to keep from killing themselves. So I guess you can say that feminism leads to death. Ha, ha, ha.” I took the laughter to be a realization that her arguments in this case were laughable–a wonderful self-insight. I have a warm spot in my heart for people who don’t take themselves too seriously. It’s an appealing character trait, to be able to be not too serious. Wish I had more of it.
The highlight of the evening was the question and answer period. It was the usual free-for-all: questions from a women’s studies graduate student on one side and from someone who thought Ms. Schlafly was too soft on liberals (yes, that’s right!). Her face looked like she sort of couldn't believe what he was saying. Most of the rest of us couldn't, either. And then towards the end, there was a most illuminating interchange. A young woman in the audience said something along the lines of:
Ms. Schlafly, I think you’re an antique. You’re turning off a significant part of your conservative base. I am a young conservative woman. And I am in law school to be a good role model for my child and to provide for my family. Telling women not to work is alienating people who agree with a lot of conservative values.
Reminds me how successful the feminist agenda of the 1950s and 1960s has been. Now virtually all young women (or at least many young conservative women) aspire to professional careers.
But here’s the punch line that really cinches this story. I later learned that the law student was, a few years ago, Miss Mississippi. What a great debate, between two conservative women, one an icon of the 1950s and the other an icon of the 2000s. Fifty years from now, some American Studies scholar will be wishing that she had a tape recording of that evening–and particularly that exchange.
Posted by Alfred_Brophy at 09:49 AM | Comments (7) | TrackBack
New Courthouse Architecture
They're being built at a staggering rate. New ones are rapidly replacing old ones. Top architects are being called in to design them. . . .
No, I'm not talking about stadiums. I'm talking about courthouses. A recent Legal Affairs article chronicles a dramatic transformation in courthouse architecture and describes the building boom in new courthouses. Courthouses used to be built as "solemn, neo-Classical style structures," but recently things have changed. Today, top architects bid on the construction of courthouses:
The new architect selection standards coincide with the largest federal courthouse building initiative in the nation's history, a program necessitated by the rise in the number of federal cases—up some 20 percent in the last decade—and a shift in caseloads from the Rust Belt to the Sun Belt. As droves of people continue to move from Buffalo to Houston or from St. Louis to Phoenix, caseloads are moving with them. In all, nearly 200 courthouses will be built or renovated over the next 25 years, at a cost in the tens of billions of dollars.
If you're interested in the history of courthouse architecture, the article is well worth checking out. One of the courthouses discussed in the article is the stunning new federal courthouse in Boston, pictured below:
For all the law architecture nerds out there, I did a little web surfing and found some pictures of new or planned courthouses. Beginning with state courthouses, here are ones from Lexington, SC, Lexington, KY, and Syracuse, NY:
Here are courthouses from Albequerque, NM and Hall County, GA:
Here are new federal courthouses from Washington, DC and Fresno, CA:
Here are new federal courthouses in Las Vegas, NV and Minneapolis, MN:
Here are new federal courthouses in Seattle, WA and Buffalo, NY:
And, although not brand new, it is certainly worth mentioning the 9th Circuit courthouse in Pasadena, CA where I clerked, which is one of the most beautiful courthouses I've seen:
Hat tip: beSpacific
Posted by Daniel Solove at 12:02 AM | Comments (8) | TrackBack
When Web Chat Turns Into Threats
An interesting AP story:
Two weeks before William Freund donned a mask and cape and fatally shot two neighbors before killing himself, members of an online forum for people with a rare mental disorder read the 19-year-old's string of violent rantings. Freund's online musings and his pre-Halloween rampage raised fresh questions about the little-policed world of Internet discussion rooms: What, if anything, should Web site gatekeepers do when users post threatening messages online?Internet law experts generally agree there is no legal onus on site owners or users to notify police. . . .
Before last Saturday's shootings, Freund begged for help and told an online message board for people with Asperger's syndrome, a neurological disorder marked by a lack of social and communications skills, that he was lonely and suicidal and would begin a "terror campaign to hurt those that have hurt me." . . . .
"It is very risky to impose responsibility on Web site owners to police their users," said Jennifer Granick, executive director of Stanford University's Center for Internet and Society. "How do you know if someone is serious? Are you making a big deal out of nothing? How hard are you supposed to try? Are you betraying the person?"
Posted by Daniel Solove at 12:01 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
November 08, 2005
Guidant/JJ Litigation
Counsel, start your time-clocks.
As has been well-reported, Guidant has sued Johnson & Johnson for specific performance of J&J's $25.4 billion acquisition. J&J will almost certainly assert that its obligation is void under the merger agreement's "material adverse effect" clause, and, specifically, will argue that the clause has been triggered by Guidant's messy encounters with state and federal regulators over its heart stents.
Bill Sjostrom at the Business Law Prof Blog has been all over this looming fight.
Back in September, he started questioning the deal's continued viability. In October, he put up a great post on the MAE at issue in the (then) potential litigation. He argued that NY AG Spitzer's lawsuit against Guidant may strengthen JJ's claim here. Finally, he broke news of the suit here.
Obviously, I do not know how this will turn out. But doesn't it seem that J&J could have protected itself against this type of risk with more precision? Isn't regulatory action the number two legal problem medical device makers potentially face, after patent claims?
For more information, Pharmablog talks about the underside of drug testing here. Finally, the Stent Blog (!) is a must-read resource if you care about the statistical likelihood of stent failure.
Posted by hoffman at 11:30 AM | Comments (3) | TrackBack
Law Professor Blogger Census (Version 3.0)
UPDATE: The census has been revised. A new version of the census, Version 3.1, incorporates changes and additions suggested by readers. It includes 20 more bloggers.
Back in June of 2005, I decided to do a census of law professor bloggers. I released Version 1.0, and after receiving comments from readers, released an updated Version 2.0 on June 16, 2005, which is available here.
In Version 2.0 of the census, on June 16, 2005, I listed 130 bloggers (28 female, 102 male), and schools with the largest number of bloggers: San Diego (7), UCLA (5), George Mason (5), Cincinnati (4), Ohio State (4), GW (3), Georgetown (3), Stanford (3), St. Thomas (3), Chapman (3), Villanova (3).
I’ve decided to update the census for this fall, creating Version 3.0. Please email me about your blog if you were left out of this list or if you know of others we overlooked. I will post a revised version after receiving comments.
Current statistics for Version 3.0 are:
Number of Bloggers: 182 bloggers.
Growth: Since the last census on June 16, 2005, the number of bloggers has grown from 130 to 182, an increase of 40%! That’s a big increase in less than 5 months.
Gender: Of the bloggers, 41 are female and 141 are male. There are 13 new female bloggers and 39 new male bloggers. Female bloggers increased by 46% and male bloggers increased by 38%.
Schools: Schools with the most bloggers include:
Chicago (14)
UCLA (7)
San Diego (7)
GW (5)
George Mason (5)
Stanford (4)
Northwestern (4)
Ohio State (4)
U.C. Davis (4)
Cincinnati (4)
Schools in the U.S. News Top 20 rankings account for 59 bloggers
1. Yale (3)
2. Harvard (2)
3. Stanford (4)
4. Columbia (2)
5. NYU (1)
6. Chicago (14)
7. Pennsylvania (0)
8. Michigan (3)
8. Virginia (1)
10. Northwestern (4)
11. Cornell (3)
11. Duke (1)
11. Berkeley (1)
14. Georgetown (3)
15. UCLA (7)
15. Texas (2)
17. Vanderbilt (1)
18. USC (0)
19. Minnesota (1)
20. Boston University (1)
20. George Washington (5)
There are 59 bloggers from Top 20 schools. The number is roughly a third (32.4%) of the total number of bloggers (182). It thus appears that the Top 20 schools have a disproportionately large representation in the blogosphere. Only 2 schools in the Top 20 have no bloggers.
The Chicago Law Faculty Blog partly accounts for the disproportionate numbers among Top 20 schools. Without Chicago, there are 45 bloggers from the Top 20 schools, accounting for 24.7% of the total number of bloggers. Not including Chicago, the average Top 20 law school has 2.25 bloggers.
If we use Brian Leiter’s Top 20 law faculties based on scholarly citations, we must include 3 different schools (Colorado, Emory, Illinois – 4 bloggers) and exclude 3 schools (Pennsylvania, Vanderbilt, Minnesota – 2 bloggers total). This results in a net increase of 2 bloggers, thus yielding 61 bloggers from the Leiter Top 20.
The schools with the most bloggers generally fare quite well in the Leiter rankings.
Chicago – Blogger Rank = 1, Leiter Rank = 1
UCLA – Blogger Rank = 2, Leiter Rank = 15
San Diego – Blogger Rank = 2, Leiter Rank = 23
GW – Blogger Rank = 4, Leiter Rank = 16
George Mason – Blogger Rank = 4, Leiter Rank = 23
Stanford – Blogger Rank = 5, Leiter Rank = 4
Northwestern – Blogger Rank = 5, Leiter Rank = 12
Ohio State – Blogger Rank = 5, Leiter Rank = 28
U.C. Davis – Blogger Rank = 5, Leiter Rank = Unranked (outside Top 30)
Cincinnati – Blogger Rank = 5, Leiter Rank = Unranked (outside Top 30)
New changes and additions to the census are indicated with the word "NEW." This designation either means that the blog is new or the blogger is new or both.