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Tuesday, June 19, 2007 |
Filing lawsuits is as routine for lawyers as grabbing a Starbucks on the way to the office. And they're kind of (to stereotype an entire profession) sensitive about things. So who could have predicted that a consumer website dedicated to rating lawyers would get sued?
Editor's Note: There's more to this than the story of a website gone wrong. The outcome of cases like this determine the limits of interactive websites and just how much protection the now famous Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act offers operators. Eric Goldman relates this case to the Roommates.com case, which had an unfavorable outcome. What do you think? Let us know in the Comments Section.
Anybody that's paid any attention at all, that's who. The length of time it took Avvo.com to get slapped with a class action lawyer-crafted nasty gram?
About eight business days.
Avvo launched in beta on June 5, coming out of stealth mode, with the stated intention of helping consumers choose better lawyers. The main problem was that there were two main ways of finding an attorney: via recommendation and via the Yellow Pages.
Both versions are fraught with bias, or at the least, lacking in objective information. That's where Avvo CEO Mark Britton comes in with an algorithmic based, allegedly (you have to use "allegedly" right?) objective rating system.
Before we get into how many of us might have predicted that some lawyer(s) out there wouldn't be pleased with their rating, and thus might have the inclination and sure-footedness to sue, let's look at the Top 10 Things I Will Never Ever Do to see where creating a lawyer rating website ranks:
Top 10 Things I Will Never Ever Do
10. Think rock climbing, running, or math are "fun"
9. Answer the door for two young guys in short sleeve white button-ups
8. Trust Whitey
7. Get a GoldenPalace.com tattoo on my forehead
6. Create a lawyer rating website
5. Put my head in a lion's mouth
4. Wrestle a crocodile
3. Play leapfrog with a unicorn
2. Invest in a "Prince Albert"
1. Ask a woman if this is her PMS week
Number 6, it looks like, just above putting my head in a lion's mouth.
My guess is that Britton has attempted at least two of these other bad ideas, most likely out of brazen disregard for his own well-being, and not out of stupidity. In fact, the website seems like it would be a great resource for us clueless consumers in the event that we need (and we all do, eventually) legal services.
So I'm guessing there's an element of altruism here, if indeed we can use that word and "lawyer" in the same sentence.
Avvo's rating system is based on a 10-point scale, according to the plaintiffs (John Henry Browne and Alan Wenokur of Hagens Berman Sobol Shapiro):
9.0-10.0 Superb
8.0-8.9 Excellent
7.0-7.9 Very good
6.0-6.9 Good
5.0-5.9 Average
4.0-4.9 Concern
3.0-3.9 Caution
2.0-2.9 Strong caution
1.0-1.9 Extreme caution
Eric Goldman, who teaches Cyberlaw and Intellectual Property at Santa Clara University School of Law, notes this was probably a bad idea:
The distillation of attorneys into a single numerical rating is inherently fraught with peril, and the media has picked up on numerous examples where the ratings are out of sync with common sense.
There could be a number of reasons for this, including insufficient data to make accurate ratings or miscalibrated components of the rating algorithm.
Either way, the numerical ratings look much more like a work-in-progress than a finished product, and I sure hope consumers aren't actually relying on the numerical ratings….
Goldman continues at his blog about the philosophical and transparency issues, as well as what this means to interactive websites and rankings by search engines.
Plaintiffs say the ranking system is flawed, ranking highly respected veterans below disbarred and even jailed attorneys. They write:
Avvo's fallible system for rating and promoting attorneys has produced wild discrepancies in ratings rather than the reliable consumer benchmarks for making decisions about legal representation that Avvo claims.
For example, the Dean of Stanford Law School, Larry Kramer (Avvo Rating 5.7 of "Average"), is rated lower than Lynne Stewart, a disbarred New York lawyer who was convicted of conspiracy and providing material support to terrorists, who received a 6.5 or "very good" rating.
The Avvo founder and CEO, Mark Britton, who was been a member of the Washington State Bar for just nine years received an 8 or "Excellent Rating," higher than the Dean Kramer.
Ouch. On the Avvo blog, Britton defends his website saying the plaintiffs are looking to squelch freedom of speech. Britton writes:
This lawsuit is an effort to censor and to chill Avvo’s analysis, commentary and opinion in order to protect attorneys who have disciplinary actions in their backgrounds. It seems to reflect a belief, on behalf of the lawyers bringing this lawsuit, that the First Amendment doesn’t apply to the dissemination of opinions and information about them.
Whatever the outcome, this Lawyer vs. Lawyer case will be interesting to watch – in the same way "Crocodile Hunter" and "Jackass" were always cringingly fun to suffer through.
| Article by Jason Lee Miller, a WebProNews editor and writer covering business and technology. |
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Yahoo: The Next Day
 By David A. Utter
Staff Writer | WebProNews
The morning after Yahoo's Terry Semel resigned the CEO task has founder Jerry Yang doing two interim jobs and newly minted president Sue Decker a step closer to the top.
Whatever fruit the new advertising system at Yahoo will bear won't be of any help to Semel's approval among investors. His long-expected departure from the CEO position finally took place.
It means Yang will wear two hats, as CEO and CTO, though he says the CEO job is his. Yang took the CTO role after Farzad Nazem abruptly resigned. Nazem's departure had been described as planned out in advance, yet Yahoo had no one in position to step into the job.
Decker's continued move up the Yahoo leadership ladder persists in intriguing us. Yang isn't going to do a couple of combined jobs forever. We're inclined to believe Decker has a shot at Semel's old office, and her close confidant Hilary Schneider will be nearby, perhaps taking Decker's current president's role.
Yahoo had begun consolidating some of its duplicate services in recent months. That strategy looks necessary, but may go on hold as Yahoo finds people to take the CEO and CTO roles over the coming months.
We're not convinced Yang will keep the CEO job for long. It's not a fun job right now, and Wall Street has much more interest in Decker. "Yahoo! has an incredibly bright future and I make this move with deep conviction and enthusiasm," Yang said on Yahoo's official blog. He will need that enthusiasm on July 17, when Yahoo reports its quarterly numbers, if Panama still hasn't made a big impact on the bottom line.
Article by David A. Utter, a staff writer for WebProNews covering technology and business. |
Annoying Things About SEO
As a somewhat-new Webmaster, I am struggling with the workings of SEO.
I have a product I try to promote via the web. And I need my site to
perform better in searches. Of course, that's why everyone's here. I
think.
In addition to writing about my product, I do my best to create a page with high-quality content (free informative articles).... I put my most important keywords in the headings..... I use appropraite title tags... I even waste my time writing well-thought-out meta tags..... I've even written a bazillion emails to other web masters to request my link be added to approariate resource pages to bring up my PR.... And all this work for what? To be listed waaaay back in the Google searches. So far back that I might get 6 hits a day from Google organic search..... 6 hits on a good day.
My Niche: Teaching Jobs
Now, I type in "Teaching Jobs" into google... and look at the garbage the comes up on the first page of the search:
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Inc. 2549 Richmond Rd. Lexington KY, 40509
