http://www.lugaluda.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/10/mark-Dreier-mark-drier-mark-dreier-swindler-.jpgI know one personally. She’s a terrible lawyer. She can’t read and understand a court opinion. She misreads statutes. She’s an embarrassment in court. Her pleadings are poorly drafted. Her correspondence is filled with errors. She says things in chambers that make her look like an idiot. Her objections are overruled. Her court appearances are dominated by illogical arguments.

She’s a really crappy lawyer.

Her clients, however, love her. They refer business to her like crazy. She spends nearly nothing  on marketing and is making a freaking fortune. She can’t see a new client for weeks because she is solidly booked.

How is it that she is such a bad lawyer yet is so successful?

Here’s the deal. She does things that make it clear that she cares about her clients. She rants and raves in court, like a maniac, on behalf of her clients. She crosses over every line and gets personally involved with her clients. She laughs with her clients, she cries with her clients. She returns calls, she calls at night, she stays on the phone forever. She loves her clients and it shows. She knows it and her clients know it. She’d do anything to help them. They are her friends.

Her clients love her. They love her when she wins, they love her when she loses. They know she’s committed to their cause. They know she did her best, even when her best isn’t good enough.

It all makes me wonder whether she’s really a crappy lawyer or whether I have ideas about what’s important that might be irrelevant. Who sets the standard for crappy? Lawyers or clients? Maybe my idea of crappy doesn’t really matter?

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Happy Saturday! Every Saturday I publish links to some of the things I’ve come across that might interest you. These are things that caught my attention this week. I’m publishing these links without much comment so you’ll have to click on them if you’re curious. I also include a picture I like.

By the way, I’m going to be at ABA Techshow in Chicago and would love to chat with you if you’ll be there. I’ll also be, very briefly, at the ABA Family Law Section meeting in New Orleans. Let me know if I might see you at one of these events.

Dining Etiquette: Don’t Spit Food on Your Prospective Client and Other Basic Rules – another of my articles for SmallLaw on Technolawyer.

The Choice between Yes and Yes: A Psychological Revelation – old stuff that you should never forget.

How to Give Yourself a First-Class Online Business Education – great stuff.

Google’s Click-to-Call Advertising Goes National – folks keep telling me I’m wrong about the importance of mobile to our practices. I really think I’m right, but what do I know?

The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Web 2.0: Top 25 Applications to Grow Your Business – great list of products that will help you get away from your dependence on the I.T. guys.

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“My name is Lee and I’m addicted to gadgets.” I admit it. Everyone who knows me, knows it. My wife has started pricing the gadgets on Amazon so she’ll know what I’m spending. You’ve probably known about my addiction for as long as you’ve been visiting this site.

I end up with piles of stuff lying around. Last week I checked and between the home pile and the office pile I had 2 rack mounted servers, 2 laptops, 1 desktop, 30 landline phones, 2 cell phones, a video camera, a tripod, 1 camera, 15 earbuds, 3 other headsets, a server rack and a bunch of other stuff. This is not the good stuff. This is the junk that I needed to get rid of. This is the useless garbage pile.

I’m sure you’ve got some stuff that needs to be sold, recycled or trashed. It’s tough to get rid of this stuff because it feels like there should be some value to it and doesn’t feel right to throw it away. In fact, some of these gadgets are dangerous to throw away as they have components that contaminate the landfill.

So what do you do with them? I’ve tried eBay. Sometimes it works, often it doesn’t. I’ve sold a bunch of stuff there but, when all is said and done, it’s frequently more trouble than it’s worth. The prices are low, the customers complain about the stuff and the shipping is a pain. I’ve given up on that route.

I recently tried Gazelle.com. They offer cash for your old gadgets. It’s not much, but it’s better than nothing and they make it really easy. You go to their site and enter your item and it’s condition. They immediately make you an offer. If you accept, they send you packing material and handle the postage. You send in the item and they send you payment. It worked perfectly for me.

I’ve also tried craigslist. It works and it, usually, involves local buyers so you don’t have to deal with the shipping issue. You do, however, have to deal with the logistics of meeting the seller. Another option is FreeCycle. They provide an email list to enable you to offer your items for free. Some city and county governments provide free, or cheap, recycling. That’s another possibility.

Finally, and this is what I did with most of the computers last week, is to find a charity that needs the stuff. We found a local charity, Purple Elephant, that recycles computers and gives them to kids.. They clean things up and get the machines to kids that need them.

Whatever route you choose, be sure to wipe your data from the device before it moves on to its new life.

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