The only reason I took a copyright course in law school was to (try) to understand the rules behind sampling in music. While technology today has opened ever-wider avenues for expression through sampling, remixes or mash-ups, copyright law has remained confused in its dimensions and often ham-handed in its application. Larry Lessig has a terrific post on the excesses of copyright law ” especially as applied to amateurs expressing themselves and some ideas on how to improve things (Lessig is a professor at Stanford, and colleague of Avvo advisor Deborah Rhode).

One change I keep expecting to see is some realization by corporate copyright owners that the scorched earth policy toward copyright enforcement is seriously counter-productive. No legal benefit, no economic benefit, and a big PR black eye for acting like a bully. I’d like to see more copyright owners embrace the enthusiastic use of their output by amateurs; instead we get Universal insisting that a dancing baby video be removed from YouTube.

Is this more evidence for why corporations shoudn’t let their lawyers run things? No sane business manager, marketer or PR person would go after a grainy, 29-second video of a baby dancing to a Prince song, right? Ironically, the dancing baby himself may be the one to get the aggressive copyright lawyers in line, as his case looks like it will end up embodying a requirement that copyright holders consider fair use before firing off their legal missives.

Hattip to California Divorce Blawg for pointing out this CNN Article, “Couple splits up – pet custody battle begins“. In a 2006 survey of 1,600 members of the American Academy of Matrimonial Lawyers, 25% said they had noticed an uptick in pet-custody cases in the past 5 years. Adam Karp, a Bellingham attorney and an animal law pioneer, was quoted in the CNN article regarding his representation of Ashley Wilson in 2004. Avvo Blog had the chance to interview him and he had this to say about Animal Law in Washington State:

Most judges still make rulings on technicalities (i.e. who paid for the animal, who is listed on the animal’s license) but increasingly, judges are starting to weigh the equities (i.e. who regularly takes care of the animal, spends more time with the animal)

1. Their divorce was bitter, but post-divorce still more so. Christie Brinkley prevailed in securing a restraining order against her ex-husband Peter Cook on the issue of allowing their children to watch Peter Cook’s intervew with Barbara Walters – in which he blames Brinkley for their marriage’s demise. Robert Stephan Cohen represented Brinkley.

2. Only two days after its October 7th launch, the Daily Beast, a Tina Brown/Barry Diller joint venture, was sent a demand letter by Philadelphia Newspapers LLC. The letter demanded that Daily Beast cease using its potentially trademark-infringing logo, which is “virtually identical in shape, color, font and style to our own Daily News logo.” The letter added that “our readers could easily be duped into thinking that your Web site is somehow affiliated” with the Daily News. Hang in there Daily Beast, we feel your pain.

3. Record Label Brookland Media was granted a temporary injunction preventing Lil Kim from recording any new music while the New York court adjudicates Brookland’s $2.5 Million breach of contract lawsuit against the female rapper. Lil Kim’s lawyer Londell McMillan seems unworried: “We’ll work it out around a conference table, in front of a judge or over some martinis,”

Cheers to this Eugene, OR attorney Kent Anderson for making a real difference in a client’s life! It’s always great when a story like this crosses my desk:

Client Review: Late in 2007 my wife and I were facing foreclosure on our home. We were eleven payments, nearly $30,000 in arrears on the mortgage and property taxes. We were paying nearly 12% interest, seven years into a thirty year adjustable rate mortgage. We owed three years of property taxes. Things looked bleak, to say the least. Since I operated a business from my home even my business was in danger of being shut down. Mr. Anderson saved our home and our business by renegotiating a flat-rate mortgage for us and shaving off nearly 4 points from what we were paying on the adjustable rate. He also negotiated payment of our property tax arrears with the mortgage company. Mr. Anderson allowed us to make our payments for his invaluable help on a very fair schedule. It is literally true that Mr. Anderson saved us and our three children from catastrophe. If a person never needs help like this then consider yourself among the fortunate, but if a person ever DOES need help like this, then also consider yourself fortunate that there are exceptional people on this earth like Mr. Anderson who have the experience, the character and the genuine concern for the welfare of others to help us so much when we need help so badly. I’m sure Mr. Anderson knows who I am from my comments here and I give my permission to Mr. Anderson to allow anyone to contact me if they would like to hear these same comments from me in person. I have enduring gratitude for what he did for us and have no hesitation at all to express this to anyone who feels they would like to describe my gratitude for Mr. Anderson’s help in person.

You can request your own client reviews from the Overview or Review tabs in your profile. Or simply send your former and current clients a link to the attorney review page on Avvo.

The CEO and CFO of local software company Entellium have been arrested by the FBI and charged with fraudulently inflating the firm’s revenue in order to bring in tens of millions in VC investment. Apparently, $3.7 million in revenue over the last three years was represented as $15.4 million. God knows why these guys did this, or thought they could get away with it. Even if the business became a smashing success, there’s no question auditors (or IPO underwriters) would have discovered the fraud.

Some choice quotes from the one-time darlings of the CRM business:

[former] CEO Paul Johnston, in 2004 – “We are the old-fashioned type of entrepreneurs where you have to get revenue in order to spend.” (Assuming “get” means “make up”, that is).

[former] CFO Parrish Jones, in 2007 Entellium is preparing for “hockey stick type growth.” (no doubt traced on an actual hockey stick)

Johnston again: “Sell customer gratification, not things.” (because reality is so over)

The sad part about this for the rest of the venture community is the inevitable erosion of trust. So many companies are fast-moving, without the audit committees and corporate governance structures found in large public companies. For the most part, such structure should be unnecessary, given the competence and focus of management on making the business grow (and the relative simplicity of the revenue structure of early-stage growth companies). However, all it takes is a nasty case like this to show investors how easily that trust can be spoiled.

Kudos to Entellium’s attorneys at Wilson Sonsini for proactively coming forward to reveal the fraud. As for Johnston and Jones? Here’s a tip – check Avvo’s list of top Seattle criminal lawyers.

Word to all the Twitterers out there – you can now find Avvoblog on Twitter! Here is a list of some of the Avvo Attorneys I follow and who follow Avvo Blog:

• Randall Moeller
• Derek Linke
• Michael Atkins
• Patti Spencer
• Jessica Foley
• Leanna Hamill
• John Harding
• Josh King (our learned GC)
• Danie Jaffe
• Adrianos Facchetti
• Greg Beck
• Scott Wolfe
• Thomas Lamb
• Steve Worrall
• Douglas Cornelius
• Nicole Black

If you are on Twitter and think that Avvoblog ought to be following you, just tweet or comment below.

Late last week, I was in NYC to moderate a panel at the Corporate Dealmaker Forum. There was rain in the skies, and a sense of gloom in the air, given what’s going on with the world of finance right now. Nonetheless, and perhaps because these times necessitate a certain focus, the forum was even more engaging and interesting than usual. One fascinating section was an interview of Parag Saxena, the founder of Invesco Private Capital & New Silk Route Partners, and an advisor to the Prime Minister of India on foreign direct investment (FDI). Saxena, like the speakers who discussed FDI in China and Brazil, underscored the importance of always hiring savvy local counsel in the geography in which you are doing business.

What was really interesting, however, was Saxena’s perspective that it is easier from a local regulatory perspective (zoning, business licensing, etc.) to open a business location in India than it is to open a location in the U.S. Conclusion? Whether you’re doing business in Bangalore or Bakersfield, you need counsel who intimately know their way around the local processes.

An amusing aside to our all-too-somber corporate forum was the PR Awards gala going on in the ballroom right next door to ours at the Grand Central Hyatt. Peter Shankman, founder of the wonderful “Help a Reporter Out” service, was the keynoter I could hear the laughter from next door; all while Jim Grant (of Grant’s Interest Rate Observer) was keynoting our group with the grimmest assessment of our current economy I’ve heard yet. Not surprisingly, there wasn’t much laughter coming from our side of the wall.

On my way back to Seattle, I stopped by ABC News for an interview on Avvo’s survey of top bankruptcy lawyers, and their opinion on which candidate for president offers more hope for the economy.

If a thirty-day wait until Election Day is too long for you and you crave some political excitement, rent Recount. Here is what Ann Althouse had to say about the movie:

I thought it was quite good. Though the story was mainly told from the Gore side, the Bush point of view was represented fairly, and there was a good overall balance to it. Complicated legal issues were explained surprising well without belaboring through through the use of various actors playing characters shown working out their next moves and real TV reporters seen in old video clips, telling us the news as it happened 8 years ago. It was especially exciting to see those old news clips, because, perfectly edited in, they stirred up the emotion that I felt when I saw them the first time.

I really liked the movie as well. By the end, I understood why the butterfly ballot was confusing, why hanging chads, dimpled chads and pregnant chads were all important, and how Al Gore would probably have won the Presidency had the Supreme Court not intervened.

Here are the top viewed lawyers on Avvo for last month. The common thread seems to be that unless you are mired in scandal or a fictional lawyer played by William Shatner, you need to be an avid fan of Avvo Answers.

1. Gabriel Schwartz of Denver, CO: Unsurprisingly, Mr. Schwartz tops the list – having lived large at the RNC

2. Amy Tanne of Mount Kisco, NY: Kirkland & Ellis partner Frederick Tanne has filed suit against his ex-wife, her alleged lover and father-in-law, claiming that she gave him herpes

3. Nora Dannehy of Hartford, CT: Attorney General Michael Mukasey has just appointed Dannehy to oversee the probe into whether Alberto Gonzales and his deputies fired prosecutors for political reasons

4. Scott Erwin of DeKalb, IL: Erwin learned from the Illionis ARDC that he could not accept lapdances nor stripteases in exchange for legal fees – who knew?

5. John Kaman of San Francisco, CA: The indomitable top Avvo Answerer is one of the few repeats on this list

6. Anthony Cappuccio of Doylestown, PA: This Bucks County prosecutor has been charged with inappropriate conduct with a teenage boy in the parking lot of a shopping center

7. Denny Crane of Boston, MA: Denny is pro-life, pro-death penalty, anti-tax and feels that elevators are for Democrats – you may recognize him from Boston Legal – some have taken issue with his Avvo Rating

8. Thuong-Tri Nguyen of Renton, MA: Like Jon Kaman, Thuong-Tri is a champion participant in Avvo Answers

9. Lisa Hayes of Washington DC

10. Stuart Reich of New York, NY: Another champion participant in Avvo Answers

With this year’s presidential race between two lawyers and two non-lawyers, Avvo is asking readers to weigh in on whether lawyers make better presidents.

Take the poll below and then discuss the issue at Avvo Answers!