1st post on ATL at 2 in the morning...prestigious?

Too bad they misspell apologize.

Frak. I knew I'd screw something up.

Well, bit of a rush job and all. Still, point made.

I had no idea this could get better.

Just came home from a dinner during which I tried in vain to describe the whole saga. Was logging onto ATL to download the song to demonstrate my point. And I find this gem which -- PERFECTLY -- tells the whole story.

Priceless.

Lat and ChurchHatesTucker = winners.

Nixon Peabody, not so much.

Best story EVER. That theme song is so rollerdisco.

Can it really be fair use if they play the entire song? See Zacchini v. Scripps-Howard Broadcasting Co. (human cannonball).

Loyola 1L, they didn't play the whole song (the whole song, unbelievably, is over 4 minutes long). They played just enough to make you want to poke your ears out with something sharp.

Anyone think how soul-sucking that song was for the people who performed it? They're singing with gritted teeth, saying over and over to themselves, "I'm SO going to kill my agent for this. THAT'S IT. Waiting tables is better than this. I'm headed back to Chili's."

Lat and ChuchHatesTucker, totally agreed with 3:04!

Lat, if you haven't already done so, be sure to bring this whole dust up to the attention of the producers of that new ABC show, which I believe is named something like "iAbout" (it covers the stories behind interesting YouTube and other Internet stuff).

Backed off did you Lat. I see that this time you decided not to play the whole song. That's smarter than your first time around. You have to stop using commercial outlines for your understanding of the law. Doesn't Yale offer an IP course? It is an east coast law school, so maybe not. Maybe you can get the case NP files against you transferred and consolidated with Lemley's case against XOXO on the ground that it is efficient to do discovery of internet bloggers all at once - they make the same mistakes. LOL

Oh man, he didn't even use vaseline for that one.

Even if the song is forever taken down, we still all know where everyone is a winner, and thats at Nixon Peabody.

Perfection.

Granted, I took copyright law a long time ago, but I think the fair use argument for posting the ENTIRE song is for criticism purposes -- "Look, this ENTIRE song sucks."

I swear to God I can't get that fucking song out of my head.

The thing is, it kind of reminds me of "1999" by Prince.

8:10: 1. Lat didn't "back off." You can still find the full song on ATL.

2. This isn't Lat's video, it was made by "ChurchHatesTucker" (a 39-year-old who lives in Baltimore). Lat just linked to it.

3. The only way for this story to get better would be for NP to take Lat to court - and force a federal judge to listen to "Everyone's A Winner," over and over again.

Nixon Peabody: Worst. Firm. Ever.

I agree with a post on one of the other NP talkbalks that this may be Lat's finest hour. Spectacular.

has anyone heard the b-side for this?

If only only this guy could spell.

God I love this video. At the end of the video, when he uses NP's own advertisement against them -- brilliant.

8:10 - at least Lat IS a lawyer (and I think his arguments are far more than outline worthy). NP apparently relies on their PR department to make faulty IP arguments.

9:11 --

maybe that is why NP is so pissed that this got out: they ripped off Prince and now they fear a lawsuitc oming their way. Either that, or they just really really suck

9:11, I'm with you. The damn song is stuck in my head too.

I've been forced to listen to Beyonce to try and dislodge it. Maybe I can sue NP for this.

I once interviewed at Nixon before it merged to become Nixon Peabody and the place sure didn't look like the happiest place to be. That was 5 years ago. So I was like, wow, things must have changed since I interviewed if it is now the happiest place to be. But, alas, it doesn't seem to be the happiest place to be, perhaps, instead, it is the crappiest place to be. Wow, what a horrible rhyme. I don't really have any personal knowledge of Nixon, but they sure are acting like jerks and giving themselves a bad reputation.

Lat, you are going to jail, sucker! Copyright infringement is a federal criminal offense. Lets see how funny you think this is when you are behind bars.

Nixon rocks!

I think NP should license the rights to the song to other firms so more of us can be winners. We could have everyone's a winner at: Dewey Ballantine (until they merge); Cravath Swaine and Moore; Latham & Watkins; Kirkland & Ellis...you get the idea.

NP: Where not to work.

Thankfully, someone's updated the NP Wikipedia entry to link to the new video!

Poor Lat. He comes up with one good story. And then he has to lean on it, day after day, because he's not got anything better.

It was funny when you first posted a story about it. Leave while you're ahead though. Go find something new to report about.

3:04=NP Insider.

"It was funny when you first posted a story about it. Leave while you're ahead though. Go find something new to report about."

It was funny on Thursday...it got funnier on Friday...This morning I woke up and even more funny sh*t had unfolded overnight. I can't wait for tomorrow!!!

3:16 - totally agree. This may be the ATL story of the year. An instant classic.

Lat has the benefit of something the rest of us don't: his traffic statistics.

Presumably they're telling him that his readers are loving this story. Random comments from NP insiders won't change that.

What I'm wondering is: Will this affect their fall recruiting at all?

It's probably too trivial to make a difference. But it certainly is embarrassing (the firm's overblown response, more than the song itself).

This story -- and how it has unfolded -- is a legal legend in the making. There should be a permanent link to all the entries on ATL's frontpage, including to the comments some of which are very clever and quite wonderful.

This could have all died down, and been contained to one entry, had NP let things lie. But when NP called Lat to threaten him and filed a demand against YouTube, they made this story huge. It is a gem for the ages, for sure.

Seriously, can we have a "best of" category? I nominate this story and the hotties of the federal judiciary contest from UTR. (The next edition of that legal pageant should be coming up soon, no?)

And I agree with 3:16 and 3:18. This story keeps getting better. I'm really hoping NP is crazy enough to send a demand letter to Lat, or to call him again, or sue him. Things would get REALLY fun then.

The fact that this little diddy wasn't aborted at some point during the process before being widely circulated within the firm smacks of unchecked power.

Although there are a lot of HR buzz phrases in the song, I am speculating that it will eventually come out that the firm's chairman was the author of this little stinker because I have to think that if it was anyone else at NP, someone would have had the huevos to squash it before it ever saw daylight.

Apart from the obvious "who is the author of this turd?", if you are interviewing with NP, here are some questions that I would want answers to before I accepted an offer there:

1) What initiatives are being considered to make the Nixon Peabody family even more awesome?

2) Do you attribute the fact that there are only winners at NP to:

a) an incredibly good eye for talent,

b) NP's strong training program, or

c) ruthlessness in terminating employees who don't fit into the "winner" mold?

3) Did the firm have to mortgage its future in order to get Michael McDonald and Tina Turner to perform that song?

That show is "iCAUGHT" on ABC. Tip them off to this Lat.

I just signed up for a YouTube account for the express purpose of giving this video a 5-star rating. Misspelling aside, it's pretty much brillant.

The extent to which people have become involved in this very small story is hard to understand. It seems to have replaced masturbation as the exercise of choice in some people's lives. I always had assumed that most posters to this blog were lawyers, but that must be wrong. Is XOXO running a juvenilia contest to see who can degrade conversation over here the most? Did they get tired of editing Wikipedia because it was such an easy kill?

6:20=3:04=NP Insider. It's as though you think one of your "this is tired and immature" posts is going to impact public opinion.

Hey Lat, what are the IPs on 6:20pm and 3:04pm? NP by any chance?

Lat, keep this bad boy going. Def makes being at work on a saturday not as hellish as it could be.

My question is: how do the associates at NP feel about this? I would be mortified. If I had a friend that worked there, it would be their ring tone on my cel. HAHA.

I had a friend who, before this was released, had NP as her first choice. She is now declining their callback offer.

6:52 -- I'm in kind of the same boat as your friend. I really want to work for one specific group at NP that is really good at what it does, but now, I'm honestly ashamed to mention the firm to ANYONE.

Seriously, a few days ago I was ready to defend NP as an underrated firm.

I just finished a 12-hour drive... and although I had the benefit of listening to 4 different Howard Stern shows (two on 100, two on 101), and all the commercial-free music from classical to classic vinyl I could handle, I just couldn't get the fucking song out of my head:

(cue "1999"-like bass & melody line)

Ev'ryone's a winnah at
Nix-On Pee-Bod-Eee!

Whooa! Say it!

Ev'ryone's a winnah at
Nix-On Pee-Bod-Eee!

Yeaaaa!

Ev'ryone's a winnah at
Nix-On Pee-Bod-Eee!

Once again, lol.

low-income housing (a good group in NP) is still worthwhile, even if you have to be a winner to do it. I am not there, and I do hope they sue Lat (for kicks). Just saying that there are those who are drawn to the firm for good reasons - and luckily, Fortune magazine agrees!!!!

6:36 -- "impact" is a noun. You probably meant "influence." It can be both a noun and a verb. It's in the same general area of the dictionary. Next time just keep looking a little longer. Don't sell yourself short by settling for less than the correct term. Ordinarily I would let a point like this go since you probably don't frequent places where word usage matters, but I thought I could help raise your score the next time you take the LSAT. Good luck.

I hear when you play it backwards it says "Paul is dead."

Impact has been used as a verb since 1601, when it meant "to fix or pack in," and its modern, figurative use dates from 1935.

Don't verb nouns! (I app... ap..., I'm sorry, it had to be said.)

6:20 "The extent to which people have become involved in this very small story is hard to understand"

If that was directed toward NP, then we are in complete agreement.

Nixon Peabody to 190!

another blawg is reporting on the incident here at http://beckandlee.wordpress.com/2007/08/26/east-coast-law-firm-finds-itself-in-youtube-pr-debacle/

My blawg (which you can get to by clicking on my name) has a take on the Nixon Peabody incident.

First !!!!!!!!!

Everyone's got a take on
Nix-On-Pee-Buddy!

Whoo! Yeah!

I said, Everyone's got a take on
Nix-On-Pee-Buddy!

(Last time I tried posting a comment it didn't work.)

12:24 sebco - you must be a litigator, you quote so selectively. (It would have been nice to indicate that your little piece of volunteered linguistic wisdom was not your own, but I suppose small scale plagiarism is a litigator’s stock in trade.) Or maybe you just didn't read the rest of the passage in the American Heritage dictionary. If you do, you will discover that "Eighty-four percent of the Usage Panel disapproves of the construction 'to impact on,' as in the phrase 'social pathologies, common to the inner city, that impact heavily on such a community;' [and that] fully 95 percent disapproves of the use of impact as a transitive verb in the sentence 'Companies have used disposable techniques that have a potential for impacting our health.'" This disapproval may be explained, the editors speculate, by the fact that impact is used as a verb princiaplly "in the jargon riddled remarks of politicians, military officials, and financial analysts." Lawyers are trained to use language precisely, or so popular wisdom would have it, so it would seem fair to expect more from them, don't you agree? Buy a style manual, that would help you more than a dictionary. Get it on tape if reading is difficult, and while you’re at it, see if you can discover what Charlie Sheen said to Sonia Braga just before he shot her, in the movie The Rookie. It applies to you as well.

12:57...look how many words you've now wasted trying to win a thin linguistics point when the meaning of "impact" in the post you attacked was crystal clear. Not sure if you got the memo but on internet chat boards, no one give a sh*t what 84% of the American Heritage Usage Panel thinks. We are all about substance here.

Let's return to the original topic --

Is everyone indeed a winner at Nixon Peabody?

(c) Prince, fair use

I was dreamin' when I wrote this
Forgive me if it goes astray

But when I woke up this mornin'
Coulda sworn it was judgment day

The sky was all purple
There were people runnin' everywhere

Tryin' 2 run from the destruction
U know I didn't even care

'Cuz they say two thousand zero zero party over
Oops out of time
So tonight I'm gonna party like it's 1999

I was dreamin' when I wrote this
So sue me if I go 2 fast

But life is just a party
And parties weren't meant 2 last

War is all around us
My mind says prepare 2 fight

So if I gotta die
I'm gonna listen 2 my body tonight

Yeah, they say two thousand zero zero party over
Oops out of time
So tonight I'm gonna party like it's 1999
Yeah

Lemme tell ya somethin'
If U didn't come 2 party
Don't bother knockin' on my door
I got a lion in my pocket
And baby he's ready 2 roar

Yeah, everybody's got a bomb
We could all die any day
But before I'll let that happen
I'll dance my life away

They say two thousand zero zero party over
Oops out of time
We're runnin' outta time
So tonight we gonna, we gonna (Tonight I'm gonna party like it's 1999)

Say it 1 more time
Two thousand zero zero party over
Oops out of time
No, no
So tonight we gonna, we gonna (Tonight I'm gonna party like it's 1999)

Alright, it's 1999
You say it, 1999
1999
1999 don't stop, don't stop, say it 1 more time

Two thousand zero zero party over
Oops out of time
Yeah, Yeah
So tonight we gonna, we gonna (Tonight I'm gonna party like it's 1999)

Yeah, 1999
Don'tcha wanna go
Don'tcha wanna go
We could all die any day
I don't wanna die
I'd rather dance

Hey Lat, this was in the NY Times today. Does this count as a both Lawyer of the Day *and* Judge-To-Be of the Day?

August 26, 2007
The Ethicist
Sexual Politics
By RANDY COHEN

I am a lawyer. During a first date with another lawyer, we had sex, and I wore a condom. Days later, when I came down with a bad fever and couldn’t determine the cause, she revealed that she had genital herpes. A judgeship will soon open up in her county, and she’s a near lock for it. But if I report her lapse of sexual ethics, I doubt that the selection committee will pick her. Should I? — NAME WITHHELD

You should not. No doubt your paramour acted dreadfully. She should have told you that she had herpes and let you decide whether you wished to accept that risk. But the selection committee is not choosing a role model for the kids or someone to ride the express elevator to heaven; it seeks a person who will excel at a particular job. I do not believe that this sort of sexual misconduct correlates with an inability to be a good judge.

Many people whose sex lives would not stand up to ethical scrutiny do their work well. Notorious philanderers have been decent enough heads of state or C.E.O.’s or generals. Indeed, many Americans preferred President Kennedy promiscuous to President Nixon monogamous.

Some private conduct does bespeak an inability to do a job. A would-be jurist who belonged to the Klan or even one who regularly used racist slurs would not inspire confidence in his or her ability to dispense equal justice to all. You should come forward with relevant information like that. But being unscrupulous in bed does not presage being inept on the bench, and so you should keep this demoralizing episode to yourself. And your doctor.

This guy works at Nixon Peabody:

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/26/fashion/weddings/26brady.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

This firms's cluelessness about public relations starts with it's name. Why don't they just call themselves Hitler-Bullwinkle?

7:08 = Best/Most Insightful Post Ever

NP to 190k!! Anyone that makes their employees suffer through something this bad really needs to compensate for such a crappy work environment with higher wages. Plus, if they raised to 190, everybody really would be a winner at Nixon Peabody.

7:08/7:12 - did it maybe occur to you that the Nixon in NP is *not* Tricky Dick?

Richard Nixon had his own firm during the dark period between his 1962 loss in the CA governor's race and entering the 1968 Presidential race- but it was known as Nixon Mudge Rose Guthrie & Alexander. NP has zero relation to the late President.

7:08:

Before their motto became "Everyone's a winner at Nixon Peabody" it used to be: "It's Pee-Buddy dammit!!!"

Nonetheless, I'm sure it took the crooners a couple of takes to get that one down as the pronunciation belies the spelling.

Perhaps they should change their name to Nixon Agnew. It was much preferred to Humphrey Muskie.

I love the NP insiders trying to stop us all from laughing at this shit. Even better are the NP threats to Lat and YouTube, claiming copyrights over this spectacular nugget of a corporate turd.

Freedom, bitches!

It's kind of like the Howard Dean, 'I have a scream' speech. I'm a Dem, but that was some funny shit. It only got funnier when Dean's people tried to insist how immature we all are and how we shouldn't be laughing.

I'm not sure which is more horrific, the song itself or the thought of when they first played it. because you know it was at a party. a bunch of lawyers doing the white-man's-overbite dance. (shudder). or kind of awkwardly shuffling foot to foot, trying to feign enthusiasm and clapping half-heartedly.

So bring it, all you Winners at the Happenin-Place-to-Be, tell us why we shouldn't laugh. It only makes this funnier.

Lat, since we're now living in the post-NP-not-a-theme-song era, we need NP
interview stories from law students. What we really need is a law student or a lateral to ask them about the song. A law student would be better, since they're fucking clueless anyway. Then see how the Winners react. The aspiring Winner won't get an offer, but it'll be a great chance to see the NP inte-gri-ty.

To quote the song:

Whooooo!!!! Yeah yeah yeah....

7:43 here....

For what it's worth, in case 8:44 was directing that comment at me (in part), I'm neither a NP insider nor a NP apologist.

I just don't want the blessed memory of our late President Richard Milhous Nixon to be tainted by any association with the law firm responsible for this abortion of a theme song.

Now more than ever
Nixon now more than ever
Nixon now more than ever
We need Nixon now!

7:43 -- You're missing the point. It doesn't matter whether the Nixon in NixonPeabody has any relation to our most-beloved commander in chief or not. What matters is that it sounds bad. Tell me, how many people (beside yourself and all your fellow associates at NP) know, or actually care enough to do the research to find out whether NP's Nixon was the real Nixon? Zero! And that's what matters.

Just to solidify things, let's look at an example. Say you and your buddy want to start a publishing company for children's literature. Now, if you have any business sense at all, you won't go out and name your venture Heffner & Flynt Inc. Why? Because it sounds bad, regardless of whether or not those are your last names. Sure, the people who work for you would know that it's not the same people who started Playboy and Hustler. And, sure, maybe a few people who don't work for you will bother to do some research and find out the same. But, most people would just look at the name, shudder, and then move on.

The same logic applies to law firms. It just doesn't make good sense to name a law firm after a president whose lasting legacy is one of corruption and dishonesty. (Yeah, yeah, now you're going to harp on me that it wasn't named after the president, but like I just said, that doesn't matter. It only matters that people think it was.) People already have a low enough opinion of lawyers. Do we really need to push that perception any further?

Anyway, good luck to you sir. I hope you have success with Bush & Cheney LLP. Trust me, people will be beating the door down for legal services from a firm like that.

God help me for saying this.

I sort of understand & sympathize with the motives that caused this song to be produced. People on this board tend to forget that law firms are made up of more than associates -- there are partners who have emotional capital invested in their firms, and (more importantly) there are the (to associates, unfortunately largely invisible) support staff.

I sense that this song was commissioned more for the professional support staff and partners. Associates are CFBU (cynical fungible billing units); but support staff contain a lot of the institutional memory of a firm. Also, most of the support staff at my shop take as much pride in the firm as do the partners. If you've built a career as a legal assistant for a firm, seeing partners and associates come and go, you tend to develop brand loyalty to the firm...

I talked with some of my staff about this, and they thought the song was kinda cute. And it provides a certain morale boosting point (bragging point, if you will; "did you hear our song" in conversations with other secretaries at other firms) albeit in a mockingly self-referential way.

So in short, the song might not have been a bad idea. And, as I said in a prior post, I kind of like it.

On the other hand, NP's response to this news comes as a textbook example of how NOT to handle something like this. I'm unsurprised, because I've largely been underwhelmed with the NP lawyers - the ones I've dealt with have been reflexively uncooperative, and such like.

Anyway, my point is that when you look at this from a less CFBU-point of view, the song might well have been received charitably by its targets.

-- ET!

This story has hit the New York Times:

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/27/business/media/27lawsuit.html

What was with the "small scale plagiarism is a litigator’s stock in trade" dig? If the poster was a law student, I think we can all agree there is no real need for response. Otherwise, I can see why a law professor would make a comment (because he/she lives in a world where there is such a thing as plagiarism) as opposed to the real world where we deal with actual things such as intellectual property rights (which are not as broad as the reach of "plagiarism.")

If he/she was a corp attorney trying to get in a dig, then maybe it would have been better if the OP purchased a Blumberg form for the definition.

3:09 - You just don't get it, do you? NP is not "named after" Richard M. Nixon. NP was around 50 years before Nixon was even born.

I thought Nixon Peabody was named after Cynthia Nixon, the bitchy redhead from Sex & the City.

I'm gonna sound stupid, but what does YMMV stand for?

4:08 - Literally, it stands for "Your mileage may vary." Really it means something like, "I don't know what you were smoking, but s/he was not remotely attractive."

"It's all about Respect"

10:30 - So what you're saying is that if you named your children's lit. publishing company Heffner & Flynt before either Playboy or Hustler was started you'd keep the name even today and expect everyone else to do enough research to find out that your firm wasn't named after that Heffner or that Flynt. Is that it? Because if so, then may I just say that you, sir, are a business genius! Watch out Harvard Business School, we've got ourselves a gunner here.