Personal Injury Solicitors and Ironic Slips, Trips and Falls

We went back to my university city for a shopping spree (again) this weekend. While rambling up one the main streets, I stumbled across a promo-van (kind of a caravan for promotions…. obviously) for a little-known firm of personal injury solicitors.

The two workers (both sporting jackets in the colours of the law firm they represented) were wandering about in front of the promo van with little sense of purpose and looked thoroughly cold and fed-up. I guess different types of advertising works for different firms but this seemed entirely hopeless from a mile off!

Then, at the end of the day, having sat through the monolithic film, Avatar, (yes, I finally got around to seeing it) we were walking back down the now darkened street when I tripped over the tow-bar of the injury lawyers’ promo-van.

So now I know what it’s like to suffer an accident that wasn’t my fault. Just typical! :p

Law Actually Search Terms

"burst llm 2008" - seriously, how can you burst an LLM?

"llb law cheats" - Nothing like obtaining your degree on merit, is there?

"flying busicuit and lawsuits" - Oh please.

"what can i do with a lousy law degree" - hehe... don't be so defeatist.

"advice on setting up personal injury firm" - How about don't?

"snuggie injury" - Well I guess you could trip on it, set fire to it, start choking on it... but you'd have to more or less try you hardest to do one of the above.

"highways agency problems" - too numerous to document I suspect.

"personal injury lawyers bite my butt" - wow.  Just hope they didn't bill you for it.

"how many ipods in washing machines" - Well just 1, personally.  I kind of learnt my lesson after that and I suspect that most other people do the same.

“are people who own fountain pens lawyers” - yeah, everybody else just rents them!  :-|

"(abercrombie or a&f) and (jeans or shirt or jacket or sweaters or polo or pant or skirt or shorts or camis or dress or tee or t-shirt)" - Ho-ly cow!  Surely there's a more efficient way of searching?!?

"abercrombie and fitch topless assistants london door" Sounds like I should head up to A&F pretty sharpish! ;-)

"law students are annoying" - you're telling me!!

"funny legal jargin phrases" - Can't beat a bit of ‘jargin’.

“how much of the windscreen do i have to clear” - More than this.

“santa claus legality” – Oh I give up!

“has studying law changed your perceptions about the law” - No, I was always a cynic from birth.  I’ve got a perpetual glass half empty approach to law.

“x-ray vision laws” – There’s probably a couple of articles floating about in the Cretins and Halfwits Law Review (C.H.L.R).

“how to cheat for exams with statute book” – work it out for yourself.

“laws regulating strawberries” – I’m speechless.

”talk to law students on conveyancing practice” – An alternative to counting sheep I suppose.

“law dessrtations for undergraduates” - oh boy. we've got a right one here.

“how to get semen out of pillow” – oh Lord.

"hur får jag sarkmark i min pc" - Man kan klicka här .  Oh it brings my Swedish flooding back!  :D

Legal Reality TV

Just a few ideas for legally themed reality TV shows:

Strictly Come Advocacy

So You Think You Can Litigate

I'm a Solicitor.... Get Me Out of Here.

Total Wipeout: Lawyer Edition (... I suspect this would give the general public no end of joy, seeing lawyers suffer a miserable and ignominious beating).

Advocacy on Ice

Law Idol

The Law Factor ... hmm, good name for a blog there.

Lawyer Academy

Negotiation: Deal or No Deal

Any others??

Happy Birthday Law Actually

Yes, today marks the 3rd birthday of my blog.  It’s been a fairly tumultuous year in the ‘sphere and we’ve seen some blogging stalwarts disappear all together.

Still, Law Actually has battled on and I hope I’ll be about for a while yet.  Here’s to another year, eh?

The verdict’s in on juries

From the Law Society Gazette 19/02/10:

Critics of the jury system often recite the argument that trial by jury equates to trial by the prejudiced and ignorant, suggesting that juries are all to [sic] often made up of the long-term unemployed because anyone clever enough can get out of jury service. They question whether jurors can be trusted to go beyond the defendant’s appearance and see through the obfuscation, confusion and clever arguments advanced by lawyers, to determine the truth.

Research published this week by the Ministry of Justice does seem to vindicate the jury system. The report, Are Juries Fair, compiled by Cheryl Thomas of the University of London, concluded that juries are fair and do not discriminate on racial grounds, convicting in around 60% of cases.

The research did show that many jurors did not fully understand their responsibilities or the legal directions given by the judge before they retire. The blame for this cannot be attributed to the juror system or the stupidity of jurors, but surely indicates that judges should try to be clearer in their directions.

As someone who isn’t particularly pro or anti juries, I’ve always been able to see the benefits of having defendants tried by their peers whilst being mindful of the drawbacks inherent in using them. I think this report has confirmed that juries still have a vital role to play in the modern criminal justice system but they aren’t some kind of panacea. I for one certainly don’t have an issue with use of juries being restricted, though I know I’m inviting a barrage of abuse from pro-jury advocates in just saying so. Oh well – bring it on!

As for judges needing to be clearer in their directions to jurors, I think that was largely self-evident in courts up and down the country well before the research was commissioned. There’s plenty of room for improvement with suggestions for greater use of plain language in oral direction and wider use of written directions – similarly clear – and perhaps more innovative use of aides-mémoire.

Graduation

I graduated on Wednesday (about 15.15 local time :p)!! It turned out to be a very nice ceremony, despite having our eardrums blasted to pieces by some slightly over-zealous organ playing.

The weather was pretty crappy but I guess it was a good day on the whole – it’s certainly one that I’ll remember for a long time to come. Most importantly, it reminded me of a bunch of great memories and, as I said before, I’d go back and do the LL.M again like a shot.

As so much time has passed between submitting my dissertation and graduating, I thought I’d put my LL.M experience all behind me.  But having been through the ceremony, I seems slightly surreal now to think it’s finally all over.

And slightly sad, too.

**Update** Also, I should have mentioned that the graduation goody bags we received were slightly disappointing but maybe I shouldn’t grumble.   :-)

The life expectancy of a blawg

From Drug and Device Law 24/08/2009:

Talking about the high attrition rate of academic law blogs written by those in academia, the drug and device law came to some startling conclusions about blawgs.  In essence: we're all doomed!

 

Even the academics can't do it! The professors can't feed their blogs; it's too much work.

And those guys spend their lives wearing tweed jackets, smoking pipes, and thinking great thoughts!

So today's question was this: How long does the average practitioner-blogger last?
...
Four months.

So, the life expectancy of many of the blawgs out there doesn’t look too great.  What I've witnessed in the UK student/graduate blawgsophere certainly bears that out.

This brings out a number of other issues – such as why different people keep a blog.

When I first started my legal blog back in February 2007, I’d had an F1 blog for 3 years though I had only been posting frequently in the last few months of that.  I was finding that my F1 blog had become a dumping ground for all kinds of topics.  I was in the final year of my LL.B and all was going well and had intended law actually to be an outlet for my legal musings.

Over time, though, I think the reasons behind why I blog have evolved but the principal reason hasn't changed.

So why do we all blog?  There are a lot of reasons, I suppose, including:

Sense of community; debate and feedback from like-minded folks; sense of release; sense of creativity; self-promotion; financial gain and so on.

I think those blogs are that created solely (or at least mainly) as a means of self-promotion, where the blogger doesn't truly enjoy wallowing in the subject matter are at the greatest risk of failing quickly.  To build a decent readership takes time and effort and, on top of a day at work or studying, can't really be forced.  Or at least not for long.

Even now, I don’t pretend to fully understand the lure of blogging or what's the driving force behind that sense of 'I really should get a post out today'.  And I know that's not just me, having heard other bloggers say much the same thing.

The sense of creativity is definitely one of the main reasons why I still blog.  This was particularly the case when I used to tinker around creating/modifying pictures for each post which I do far less of now.  But I carry on posting nonetheless.

Maybe there's still some cathartic effect that's inherent in posting to a blog - even though Law Actually doesn't take the form of a journal or diary.  But whatever the reason, it boils down to one thing - enjoyment.

Ultimately, you need to blog because you enjoy it.  Academic blogs which aren't a labour of love, like any blog, I guess, will ultimately fail.  Should blogging become more of a chore than enjoyment I wouldn’t hesitate in retiring from the blawgosphere for good.