A few months back, Judge Richard Posner and Professor Albert Yoon posted their draft of What Judges Think of the Quality of Legal Representation, their forthcoming paper in the Stanford Law Review.

Legal scholarship is prone towards omphaloskepsis and metadiscourse, so it’s refreshing to see a paper coming out based on real, honest-to-goodness

Bench trials, in which the judge decides both the facts and the law, are often considered to be less demanding than jury trials, but as I finally come to the surface for air after several days submerged in the preparation of a "Proposed Findings of Fact and Conclusions of Law" for a bench trial that

[UPDATE: The lawyer called me and asked to "restart" our relationship, including by removing the more provocative elements, so I did. Water under the bridge.]

Yesterday I received an email which said:

Pursuant to New Jersey Rule of Court 1:4-8, please allow this correspondence to serve as notice that Defendants intend to file

[Update: I somehow missed Ron Coleman’s earlier take on the article, but it’s required reading if you’re interested in the subject. Coleman and Walter Olson both seem on board with, as Olson words it, "steering rights owners into agency complaints or arbitration as an alternative, or at least precondition, to court action."] 

Via

At Electronic Discovery Law:

Last month, the Seventh Circuit’s Electronic Discovery Pilot Program Committee released its report on phase one of its Electronic Discovery Pilot Program.  Initiated as a “multi-year, multi-phase process to develop, implement, evaluate, and improve pretrial litigation procedures that would provide fairness and justice to all parties while seeking to reduce