This week, the newswire has been inundated with jail time updates. In a 7-2 decision, the Supreme Court gave judges discretion in crack cocaine possession sentencing which could lead to the early release of some 19,500 crack convicts. Not expecting early release? Michael Vick, who scored 23 months from US District Court Judge and dog owner, Henry E. Hudson.

In more sentencing news, Conrad Black, will be spending the next 6 1/2 years in the slammer for looting millions from his company Hollinger International. His co-defendant and former GC at Hollinger, Mark Kipnis escaped time in the cell thanks to the work of his lawyer, Ronald Safer who called Kipnis a “modern day George Baily.” Nothing like invoking the Christmas spirit in the defense of white collar crime.

Speaking of NOT being in jail, Scotter Libby who is definitely NOT in jail courtesy of George Bush, has dropped his appeal, despite the assurances of his lawyer, Ted Wells, that “we remain convinced of Mr. Libby’s innocence.” Yes, me too.

Ok, I will just start by saying I’m not a lawyer; and I don’t play one on TV or on YouTube for that matter. I’m the new “people person” at Avvo, or more officially the Community Manager. What does that really mean? Well, it’s my job to help users of Avvo successfully contribute and navigate within the opinion portions of the site and beyond. Some days I’ll help start conversations about legal topics and other days I will assist lawyers expand their profile or load the new Avvo Ratings Badge (if you’re a lawyer, there is a link under your profile pic).

How did I get here? Working for nearly six years for a national health non-profit organization gave me exposure to social media by accident, starting in online fund-raising. I was surprised at how easy it was for volunteers to create their own fund-raising pages with little hand-holding. The power of user created content made my job easier, but even better it freed up the volunteers to raise money in a simple way. Then came the craziness of Myspace, Facebook, Linkedin. So, of course my organization wanted to get our brand out there, so I got recruited to take a national position and start developing an online community specifically for our volunteers. We used the modular open-source product, Drupal. Needless to say I learned a lot, and found that there really are jobs out there that combine technology and enhance relationship building. And, this English major definitely found her niche.

What excites me most is how anyone can create a profile or interest group on the Internet, based on their affinity for a product or idea. Its especially compelling to watch how often people turn to opinion sites first to decide what kind of camera to buy, house or where to get the best margarita in town. Empowering word-of-mouth with technology is really cool! It used to just be something you overheard at a party or on the street. Now, we can hear what people think in a few clicks of the mouse. Where we go from here is only limited by the creativity of users.

As I get myself more grounded in the online legal world, I plan to extend Avvo’s reach beyond the confines of Avvo.com into the spaces where people hang out. When it comes to Avvo our reach is broad, yet quite specialized. I will focus on making access to legal resources as seamless as possible. I know it won’t be possible to do this on my own. Fortunately Avvo has been developing quite a fan-base that’s already helping to spread-the-word. I won’t be shy…please email me if you want to help. It’s my goal to make sure Avvo continues to provide and encourage transparent communication between the legal community and individuals with real legal issues. To me it seems the only time people seek legal help is when they are in crisis; so it must be simple, approachable and honest.

I’m really looking forward to learning more about the ins-and-outs of the legal profession, so drop me a line sometime.

Avvo Community Manager,
Erin Anderson (erin at avvo dot com)

It is with great pleasure that I announce the launch of two new Avvo features: Avvo Answers and Track Record. Both of these features deliver on Avvo’s promise to provide free information and guidance to consumers to help them choose the right lawyer, while also enabling lawyers to set themselves apart from other attorneys and attract new clients. Allow me to say a word or two about each of these new features.

Avvo Answers

In its simplest form, Avvo Answers is a free legal questions-and-answers forum that allows consumers to ask specific legal questions and lawyers to answer them. I call Avvo Answers our “hat trick” (think hockey rather than magic . . .) because it offers consumers personalized answers to their specific legal questions, while at the same time allowing lawyers to both help consumers and demonstrate their legal expertise to potential clients. Three victories for the legal marketplace that are pretty cool.

Possibly even cooler is that, with Avvo Answers, Avvo is the only website where consumers can see not only the answer to their question, but also how the Avvo community rates each answer. Users can also assess the qualifications of every lawyer answering questions through the lawyer’s Avvo Profile, which includes the lawyer’s Avvo Rating, client ratings, peer endorsements, disciplinary history, etc., etc.

One neat thing about Avvo Answers is that non-lawyers can also answer questions. This allows consumers to share their own experiences with others struggling with similar issues. If someone comes to Avvo and asks, “I am getting ready to file for divorce and am not sure what to do,” a consumer that has been through their own divorce may be able to offer some unique advice and support that helps the questioner through his or her ordeal. Each answer identifies whether it was provided by a lawyer or non-lawyer.

See the hundreds thousand of legal questions that have already been asked and answered

Track Record

In the middle of the night roughly four months ago, one of our developers, Justin Chan emailed me with his epiphany that is now Track Record. One of the things I love about working at Avvo is that all of our employers are constantly thinking about how we can improve legal marketplace.

Avvo’s Track Record provides a free and easy way for lawyers to showcase their best work through cases and other matters posted to their Avvo profiles. Consumers tell us they want to know the experience a lawyer has with cases like theirs, and lawyers tell us that they would like a place in Avvo to list their cases and transactional work. Track record delivers on this but takes it a step further in that it enables any lawyer who worked on a case to identify co-counsel or opposing counsel of the same case, providing both sides equal opportunity to express their own perspectives of the case. Over time, as more connections are built between lawyers and cases, Avvo users will be able to view an individual lawyer’s experience working with and against other lawyers.

A great examples of a lawyer already utilizing Avvo’s Track Record feature.

You won’t see that on Martindale Hubbell . . . at least not for another six months. :-)

Feedback

Once again, any feedback you have on Avvo Answers or Track Record, please send it my way. You can comment on this post or email me via my Avvo Profile (the email link is in the upper right hand corner of my profile). You talk, we listen. It has been our promise from the beginning.

Send us your questions, your answers and your huddled cases longing to be free . . .

Onward!

Mark

Last month, J Craig Williams, wrote a guest blog here on legal recommendations for the victims of the California fires. I’m looking for a Washington lawyer who is interested in writing a similar post for Washington residents who have been impacted by the recent devastation. If you are interested, comment here, or give me a call at Avvo – 206-734-4111.

I’d like to extend an early invitation to readers of this blog to our techie infused networking event Tuesday the 18th from 4-6 in our new office.

Come hear about Avvo from our CEO, Mark Britton, rub elbows with some of the brains from Ignition Partners, share a cocktail with Seattle’s smartest developers (umm, that’s “code”, not “condo” developers) and see what 11,000 square feet of teal carpeting really looks like.

The guest list is limited to 100 people, you can sign up here.

(Oh, and for the record, we’re not doing sign-ups via a publically editable wiki – we learned our lesson the last time.)

Celebrity divorce lawyers have fallen entirely off the list for the first time since we started tracking this!

1. Roni Deutch, North Highlands, CA – Widely known Tax Lawyer, Roni Deutch has started advertising directly on Avvo through Google’s Adwords system. We’ve been getting questions from Lawyers about this and I’ll post later about how (I think) she’s doing this.

2. Elizabeth Powell, Tacoma, WA

3. Mark Britton, Seattle, WA

4. John Browne Seattle, WA
5. Briteney Mercer, Seattle, WA

6. Ruth Bader Ginsburg Washington, DC
7. Don Heyrich Seattle, WA

8. Richard Ackerman Temecula, CA

9. Joe Campos Seattle, WA

10. Paul Clement Washington, DC

I’m returning after a two week hiatus, due to Thanksgiving and our recent move, which kept me too busy to keep up with this column.

1. Trademarks Gone Wild – You will be among a minority of web users if you haven’t seen the clip of the NFL’s Dennis Green after the loss to the Chicago Bears, in which he states emphatically of the Bears, “they are who we thought they were”, during a ludicrous meltdown that became the basis of a mocking Coors Light ad. Well, seems that Mr. Green has hired attorney, John Alspaugh, to trademark his verbal gaff.

2. Dickie Scruggs is losing co-defendants like he’s Michael Vick or OJ Simpson. Tim Balducci has reached a plea agreement that includes cooperating with the government in their case against Scruggs (pictured below), who allegedly tried to bribe a state court judge with $40K regarding the split of $26.5 million in Katrina related legal fees.

3. Barry Bonds failed to score the services of $900/hour John Keker and is now trying to woo Cristina Arguedas to his legal team, which also includes Michael Rains and John Burris.

4. The alluring Teri Hatcher has been accused by Hydroderm for violating their $2.4 million endorsement agreement and hired Alan Wertheimer in her defense.

5. Florist Fights Back – Remember Elena Elbogen , the lawyer/bride who sued her florist over the specific shade of her flowers; we wrote about her here. Well, the florist is fighting back asking for sanctions against Elbogen for filing a frivolous and malevolent lawsuit.

As I write there is an unusual amount of commotion in the Avvo offices. We’ve moved from our home of the past 18 months, in Seattle’s historic Pioneer Square, to new and larger digs in the heart of downtown.

Why did we move? Quite simply, we needed more space. While we’ve always been pretty conservative with space (Mark and I have shared an office since we started the company), last month we were forced for the first time to put an employee’s desk in a hallway rather than an office. Our new space, while not having quite the same character as our offices in Pioneer Square (where previous tenants included Internet companies Redfin and Real Networks), gives us alot more room to spread out and to grow. And being just a block from Macy’s and Nordstrom, it should help with the holiday shopping.

Even though we had a freak snowstorm during the move this weekend everything went smoothly. Except there seems to be no heat. But, as always, our team has adapted, as you can see from Sachin’s winter wardrobe.

Our new address is:
217 Pine Street, Suite 300
Seattle, WA 98101

1. Anne Kiley Los Angeles, CA
2. Roni Deutch North Highlands, CA. Note that tax-lawyer superstar, Roni is now using display ads through Google Adwords that are showing up all over Avvo.com!

3. Mark Kaplan Los Angeles, CA
4. Mark Britton Seattle, WA. Check out Mark’s post for an explanation on why Avvo’s CEO keeps showing up on this list.

5. Laura Wasser Los Angeles, CA
6. Ruth Bader Ginsburg Washington, DC
7. Elizabeth Powell Tacoma, WA

8. John Henry Browne Seattle, WA
9. Shelly Crocker Seattle, WA

10. Briteney Mercer Seattle, WA