Is Your Lawyer on YouTube?

No? That might be a good thing according to law firm marketing guru Kevin O'Keefe. According to O'Keefe, Lawrence Lebowitz, vice president of Marketing at the law firm of Cohen & Grigsby found out the hard way that not all publicity is good publicity. Waxing philosophic on the best way to comply with the letter of the immigration law, while circumventing its spirit, Mr. Lebowitz told a roomful of potential clients how to prevent qualified Americans from getting jobs, while at the same time obtaining green cards for foreign workers.

While that kind of talk may go on more often than we would like to think, this particular bit of advice was captured on video and posted online by the law firm itself. After seeing the video, Lou Dobbs and Iowa Senator Chuck Grassley got involved. Cohen & Grigsby wiped the egg from its face and pulled the video, but not before the Programmers Guild, an organization dedicated to higher wages and better working conditions for software programmers, highlighted the most damning excerpts in their own YouTube video.

I understand the need for law firm marketing, but lawyers should be cautioned to observe restraint when it comes to offering advice which so clearly violates the spirit of the law. If you still feel the need to offer such advice, at least tell your audience that most other law firms would not advise you to so openly skirt the spirit of the law. I mean I appreciate your desire for online self-immolation in front of tens of thousands of YouTube fans, but at least have the common decency to offer me a fireproof suit before you light the match.

Brett Trout

YouTube Programmer's Guild Lawyers

Is YouTube Dead?

Multi-media Leviathan Viacom has just filed a $1 billion copyright infringement lawsuit against YouTube. Others have sued YouTube in the past, but this is the first lawsuit that could actually bring down the entire YouTube business model. I am actually surprised it has not happened sooner.

Historically, YouTube has taken refuge under the Digital Millenium Copyright Act (DMCA). The DMCA protects Internet Service Providers (ISP) from infringement claims under certain circumstances. Viacom apparently seeks to limit those certain circumstances to something other than an unlicensed YouTube type business model.

While it is unlikely YouTube would disappear altogether, Viacom's lawsuit could force YouTube to get out of the house and get a job. If Viacom is successful, it will not be long before smaller copyright owners all pile on. There are undoubtedly thousands of copyright owners that want YouTube to be more pro-active in filtering out copyright infringing videos, but are just waiting for Viacom to take the heat and do all of the heavy lifting.

Lat month Viacom forced YouTube to remove much of its copyrighted content, such as "The Colbert Report." Then Viacom inked a deal with YouTube competitor Joost. Viacom appears to be pushing its chips "all in" on this one. Just like copyright claims stopped the Napster free ride in its tracks, so too may a judge turn YouTube into a mere shell of its present incarnation. Although this would obviously be a blow to YouTube, even more importantly it would mean I would have to look for a new hobby to fill up what portends to create a twenty hour vacuum in my work week.

Brett Trout

DMCA copyright YouTube Viacom