Biglaw is Dead - Part III

Build a better mousetrap, and the world will beat a path to your door. This 19th Century quotation on the power of innovation is attributed to  Ralph Waldo Emerson. Modern Biglaw, however, adheres to a different ideology: "Build a better mousetrap, and we'll sue your ass for copyright infringement."

$100,000 in law school student loans?

Today's legal world has changed dramatically and irreversibly. It's an age where the average 12-year old has a greater technical capacity than the entirety of a law firm's IT department; where the average 16-year old has a more established and reputable social media presence than a law firm's marketing department (and is also doing freelance work for their advertising group). 

Since the 2008 recession, doomsday prophets have been voicing their Dewey Bingham, Hogan & Hartson, Howrey, Heller Ehrman concerns over Biglaw's reluctance to deviate from an outdated business model, namly billable hours, an argument, which, frankly, rings true to anyone not actively profiting from it. 

But let's say you're a struggling start-up and you need to retain counsel to deal with a troublesome fly situation. To handle "Project Airborne Winged Trajectory," would you choose—work quality being very nearly equal—a rolled up magazine that offers reasonable and flexible fee arrangements or a tank that charges by the hour?

The recession saw legal titans with century old empires figuratively, no wait, literally vanish from the ABA stratosphere. But as far as Biglaw was concerned, it don't make no nevermind and they pointedly, arrogantly, stayed the course. 

But if you're feeling untouchable, cocky, or maybe even just comfortable in your current Biglaw profession, take a quick peak at this list of now obsolete occupations, and remember the words of David L. Calhoun who warned: "You need to be absolutely paranoid about the currency of your knowledge." 

Or at least Aaron Sorkin:

Aaron Sorkin: Listen, lady—a gender I write extremely well if the story calls for it—this is serious. We make horse buggies. The first Model T just rolled into town.

Liz Lemon: We're dinosaurs.

Aaron Sorkin: We don't need two metaphors. That's bad writing. Not that it matters.

Fin

20 Things My Little Brother Has Learned About The District

My little brother is celebrating his second anniversary in our great Nation's Capital (or as our parents' refer to it, the fast-paced city-life he's chosen over settling down and giving them grandchildren.) 

The following twenty items are nuggets of wisdom he's collected over the past two years of Washington, D.C. residency:

20.  Happy Hour is kind of a big deal 

19.  Non-stop construction, business growth, and corruption

18.  The weather is nice for about 3 weeks in October

17.  People love complaining about how long their commute is. Monday morning is like a contest on who drives the farthest

16.  "I'm from DC" "Oh really, where?" "Bethesda"

15.  Everyone has a friend who works for the CIA, who doesn't actually work for the CIA 

14.  Karaoke here is full of nepotism 

13.  Everyone is hiring, just not you

12.  People name drop like elsewhere, but it's way more esoteric: "So I was talking to the Deputy Secretary of Commerce Bruce H. Andrews and he loved my Tariff Proposal"

11.  Taxation without representation

10.  The Non-Profit industry surprisingly employees thousands of people 

9.  Food desserts 

8.  Never cross the Anacostia 

7.  In terms of travel, Virginia might as well be the moon

6.  Brunch makes Sunday morning Binge Drinking feel responsible

5.  "$1,300/month for a converted sunroom? That's an amazing deal!"

4.  I can look up your salary. And I will 

3.  DC Metro, "Expect delays in all directions due to single tracking"

2.  Rush hour is every hour

1.  Everyone has a fictitious, but completely reasonable sounding explanation on building height restrictions

The Bermuda Triangle

Modern romance is riddled with causal flings, on-again/off-agains, and half-hearted commitments. Call me old-fashioned, but I'd always thought that a monogamous relationship meant that one man, one women, and their sex dungeon were ready to settle down and spend the rest of their lives together. But ask the average couple a question about their relationship and......

These days, couples are charting a far more perverse new territory of relationships: the Bermuda Triangle. Just what is the Bermuda Triangle? And why does it doom so many relationships to its murky depths? 

Studies have shown that when choosing a paint color if given five color options to select from, people tend to make the decision faster and more confidently than people who are given twenty color choices. The theory is that an overabundance of choice leads to fear of "missed opportunities and unrealistically high expectations". It's the worry that we're settling, that we could do better, or that we’re missing out. By allowing a relationship to remain undefined, we avoid choice (e.g. "the talk") as a way to prevent ourselves from experiencing regret. 

While Gulf Streams, Violent Weather, and Methane hydrates will seal a mariner's fate in the actual Bermuda Triangle, interpersonal instability poses the greatest threat to otherwise seaworthy relationships. 

So is there any hope for a couple who has navigated into this watery relationship graveyard?