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Law School Amplifies Critics Through SLAPP Suit
An anonymous reader writes "Michigan's Thomas M. Cooley Law School recently filed a lawsuit that appears to be boomeranging in the worst possible way. A little-noticed pseudonymous blogger respectfully disagreed with Cooley's self-awarded number-2 ranking, nationwide (well, perhaps not so respectfully), and had a few other choice things to say. So, Cooley went ahead and hired some lawyers (who had graduated from Georgetown and the University of Michigan) to file a lawsuit to unmask the blogger. And EFF cooperating attorney John Hermann got involved. "
Can someone please make sense of that summary. All I can gather is a law school is suing a blogger from Georgetown?
Only the State obtains its revenue by coercion. - Murray Rothbard
As a little background, Cooley is ranked by US News and World Report as one of the worst law schools in the country; it's reputation among lawyers is pretty much the same, I believe. I've read the lawsuit and actually they probably have a decent case against 3 of the 4 defendants if the statements they made were true (very specific statements about them being under investigation, for example, are not protected as opinion). As for hurting their reputation, in my opinion their reputation is sufficiently bad that this lawsuit isn't really going to make it any worse. Kind of a funny side note, Cooley doesn't like that reputation so they created their own rankings system using supposedly "objective" standards where they ranked themselves #2, or ahead of every other law school in the country (including Yale, which is generally considered to be the best, noticeably outranking even Harvard). The standards they picked, of course, are ones that will rank them highly even though they don't really have anything to do with academic excellence (number of students, number of books in the library, number of seats in the library (seriously), total area of the law school).
If the school were any good, wouldn't it sue with its own graduates instead of those from highly respected schools?
I had a CPU in my last computer called SLAPP
Nobody's posted this yet so it's worth a link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Streisand_effect . Basically, when your complaint about a tiny amount of publicity attracts a huge amount of publicity, you've made a mistake.
They'll be back on the bar scene in 3 years, unemployable with $200k in debt. You should buy them a few drinks.
The google ad on this page right now is for Thomas M. Cooley Law School. It links to one of their student recruitment pages. No joke. I wonder if google needs to adjust their ad selection algorithm? I clicked on the link a couple of times just to pour a little salt in the wound.
Also any contract that you sign can not brake the law or force you to have to rights in a cases of fraud.
The law school community is not full of Michael Jordans. There is a minimum level of academic achievement you should have to practice law, and Cooley lowers the bar. Medical schools have an absolute minimum of who they will accept, and if you don't make it you will not get into any med schools, not even Caribbean ones. Law schools don't have that; there is always a horrible school that will accept your tuition check.
I automatically think "Cooley High Law School" http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0072820/ .
Looks like my knee-jerk reaction isn't too far from the actual academic prowess of this institution.
Absolutely. But in a league full of Michael Jordans, each Michael Jordan would be ranked last some years, ranked first some other years, and on average, would be ranked in the middle. If a particular player was always ranked last, that player could not statistically be the equal of the other players.
_
1. The real, central, issue here is actually much broader than Cooley. It involves what some (like PayPal co-founder and Silicon Valley venture capitalist Peter Thiel) have started describing as a "higher education bubble" or a "student loan bubble" -- after comparing trends in debt-financed education, to the recent collapse of the housing bubble. If the predicted collapse materializes (and the jury is out on whether it will), then you tell me whether Cooley has improved or harmed its chances to keep a low profile when stuff hits the fan. It is certainly premature, today, to predict who might be viewed, in a few months or a few years, to be the Angelo Mozillo or the Countrywide of the education industry. But you are invited to consider this subject, investigate the facts for yourself, and to make up your own mind.
2. The next level down is a phenomenon that has been called "The Streisand Effect" -- a phrase coined by TechDirt's Mike Masnick to encapsulate the paradoxical observation that lawsuits seeking to suppress expression on the Internet, routinely seem to backfire, and often result in the viral amplification of the messages of critics, rather than the result sought by companies like Cooley. Incidentally, the initial submission (which was edited a bit by Timothy) asked an additional question, which Timothy omitted, which is this: Is the example of Cooley's backfiring lawsuit such a good example of this phenomenon, the we might even want to consider updating Masnick's neologism to "The Cooley Effect," rather than "The Streisand Effect?" Personally, I vote for "The Cooley Effect."
3. The lawsuit was actually against several individuals who published material on the Internet. The principal blogger (whose handle is Rockstar05), went to Cooley and can speak from direct experience about what it is like to be a Cooley student. The blogger is a classic dis-satisfied customer. Rockstar05, at least based on published accounts, transferred out of Cooley in order to attend some other law school. The lawsuit has been filed *against* the blogger, and has been filed by two lawyers at the Miller, Canfield, law firm, at the request of Cooley law school. It is helpful to keep track of who is doing what -- the blogger used to be from Cooley, and probably had nothing to do with Georgetown. One of the blogger's adversaries, trying to unmask him or her, graduated from Georgetown University Law Center.
4. One of the delicious and subtle ironies, in this case, is how Cooley (which, presumably, had a lot of lawyers to choose among, because Cooley generates a lot of revenue and can pay top dollar) elected not to hire one of its own graduates, but rather a pair of lawyers who graduated from other programs that Cooley's own promotional literature routinely purports to rank lower than Cooley. This is a very minor issue, and I'm sorry if that's what got you confused. It is just too amusing not to point out.
5. The other, much bigger, policy issue that needs to be addressed, is truth-in-admissions standards not just for law schools, but for higher education, generally. You can decide for yourself whether Cooley's information practices toward prospective students (including, but hardly limited to, the "Cooley Rankings" issued for the past 12 years), actually meet the standards that
You are quite right. Much the same dynamic is at play, in law school admissions, as in American Idol auditions. Moreover, law schools charge a lot more for tuition, than networks do for "reality" show auditions. Price signals about the actual market demand for legal services, do not get translated very well, all the way back up the pipeline, to the point at which individuals decide whether to attend law school.
I hope its by Kate Middleton.
If not, you could still go for Elizabeth Alexandra Mary, right?
I'm down for some QILF action.
Jesus was all right but his disciples were thick and ordinary. -John Lennon
For a good laugh, have a look at the blatantly cherry-picked ranking system they built for themselves:
http://www.cooley.edu/rankings/search/report-byschool.php
Now select Harvard, Yale or whatever you think are actual good schools and do the comparison... Well, whaddaya know! Cooley comes out first overall, as well first in such important metrics as:
* Foreign National Enrollment
* Part-Time Faculty
* First-Year Section Size
* Library Hours per Week with Professional Staff
* Library Seating Capacity
* Law School Square Footage Excluding Library
* Total Law School Square Footage
* Number of States in which Graduates Employed
Here's the kicker: Percentage of Graduates Employed is only 78.8%, meaning you are roughly twice as likely as the average person in this country to be unemployed after having graduated from their program! But the median of all their useless metrics puts them at number one, because their ranking system gives equal weight to Library Seating Capacity as Percentage of Graduates Employed.
You have to pass the bar exam to practice law; certainly that counts as an "absolute minimum"?
...if they unknowingly hired the people blogging about the school as the lawyers to file suit?
Except that the persons taking the case would then know that there were a conflict of interest, because they would know that they are the defendants. So, maybe it might be hilarious, but the lawyers representing Cooley would be handing the school their disbarment on a silver platter, and thus likely to NEVER happen.
WARNING! This girl exceeds the MAXIMUM SAFE standards established by the FDA for BRATTINESS
Wait, here's what I got out of the summary:
Thomas M. Cooley Law School, claiming to be the 2nd highest rated law school in the country, is accused of lying. They got pissed because *none of their own graduates* were good enough to defend them. So then they went for the swoosh by hiring graduates from ... wait for it ... *two other schools* ... thus cementing the oppositions case that either A, they are at best Third Best in the country, or B, they purposely spent additional money hiring substandard lawyers from other schools ... to defend a *law school*, both of which now by action, PROVE that Thomas M. Cooley is not the 2nd best choice on the block!
My first Journal Entry ever, in 8 years! http://slashdot.org/journal/365947/aphelion-scifi-fantasy-horror-poetry-webzine
Hi!
You appear to be a "A little-noticed pseudonymous blogger respectfully disagreeing with Cooley's self-awarded number-2 ranking, (well, perhaps not so respectfully), and have a few other choice things to say.!"
So let me get this straight, are they in fact stumbling onto the most important free speech case of the decade? Forget the S-Effect laughter part, did they accidentally attack the entire concept of rationally expressed pseudonymous dissent on the internet? So if they lose this case, are they handing the Electronic Frontier Foundation and friends the biggest anti-censorship weapon ever?
Law School - where there are two kinds of bars.
My first Journal Entry ever, in 8 years! http://slashdot.org/journal/365947/aphelion-scifi-fantasy-horror-poetry-webzine
It shows they don't know a crap student when they interview one.
Think of staff turnover at a company.
It hires liberally from an external company, but finds that huge numbers (80%+) are sacked during the first year because they're unable to do the job.
Is the external company putting candidates up for employment that are no good a reflection on JUST the candidates?
No.
Hardly any of the staff at my school were practising lawyers, they almost all had an academic focus. One or two did some work in the real world, but hardly enough that you'd want to stake the reputation of your whole school on them in a court. Academic law staff tend to be great on the theory, but pretty lousy on the practice (well, here in the UK anyway, that's why we have the bar/LPC course follow on where you actually learn the practical side of taking a case to court).
Umm, no.
It is NOT a "conflict of interest" to want the side you are on to win. It is a "conflict of interest" to want the side you are on to lose.
It would be a conflict of interest if the blogger's attorneys were graduates of Cooley, but not so much if Cooley's attorneys' were graduates of Cooley.
"I do not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it"
At least one blogger, who is somewhat less anonymous than Rockstar05, apparently agrees:
http://alleducationmatters.blogspot.com/2011/08/eric-grimms-take-on-cooley-what-used-to.html
I will be very eager to follow this one.
From parent comment:
they (Cooley) are also the ones who make the rating system in the first place. Thus, the issue, and why people are calling BS on cooley (and quite appropriately so).
From TFA:
Meanwhile, it appears that some others were similarly flabbergasted by Cooley Law presenting itself as the 2nd highest ranked law school
What sucks more than making up your own popularity contest? Losing it.
That's kind of sad. How bad must you suck if you can't self-delude your way into the top slot?
Maybe this "law school" is trying to get some "we try harder" marketing buzz.
BTW, please don't sue me, Cooley. I wouldn't want you to embarrass yourself further.
Welcome to the Panopticon. Used to be a prison, now it's your home.
Yep, they don't get translated very well because you have unemployed 21 year olds with no credit rating being given 200k in government subsidized loans.
Good point, but that's done after the person spends all this time and money getting their JD. If the ABA was ethical it would set a minimum LSAT needed to get in to law school.
I think the hypo was for Cooley to unknowingly hire the bloggers themselves. The problem would then be that the defendant was representing the plaintiff.
-- IANAL, this isn't legal advice, and definitely isn't legal advice for you. Also, Squee!
As a Cooley alumnus who just took the bar, I will step out of the cloud of anonymity and give a hearty "this" to the above comment.
Now, it's no secret that Cooley's reputation amongst the legal profession at large may not be the rosiest. I myself am cognizant of this fact as I prepare to get a job out there. However, I'm not certain that the litigious nature of this administration (or at least in this particular case) should reflect badly on the institution as a whole.
Simply having a low ranking by US News and World Report doesn't give any real indication of how the alumni are as actual practicing attorneys. Just going to Harvard doesn't mean you're going to be a star in the courtroom. Cooley's curriculum places a heavy emphasis on the practical, rather than the theoretical nature, of the law. All professors have practiced in the past, and often tell war stories relevant to the subject being taught.
tl;dr Don't knock the students because the administration is acting irresponsibly.
If you can read this, it means that I bothered to log in.
Unlike Mayan archeology, however, to practice law you need to pass a standardized test.
It's obviously a clever ploy on Cooley's part. When they lose the lawsuit, they can say that it was because the lawyers they hired from other schools were not good enough. They can then postulate how well they would have won had they hired Cooley grads.
I like my coffee the way I like my women - roasted and ground up into little tiny pieces.