Sentencing Law and Policy

Slate starts impressive (and confusing) new blog called "Convictions"

I got the news today that Slate.com has launched a group legal blog, called Convictions. According this this post at Volokh by Orin Kerr, the blog boasts this amazing group of contributors:

Ben Wittes, David Barron, Deb Pearlstein, Adam White, Dawn Johnson, Doug Kmiec, Diane Amann, Judge Nancy Gertner, Jack Balkin, Kenji Yoshino, Marty Lederman, Orin Kerr, Patrick Keefe, Eric Posner, Richard Ford, Tim Wu, Viet Dinh, Walter Dellinger, Dahlia Lithwick, Emily Bazelon, Phil Carter, and David Feige.

Though the content is already amazing, the blog's format and plans are quite confusing.  Though I have seen two reports that the Convictions blog launched today, there are posts going back a week.  In addition, what is right now the top post seems to just be "borrowed" from Jack Balkin's home blog, rather than "fresh" materials.  And I cannot find any official list of contributors or any explanation of why Slate.com — which is already kind of bloggy — decided to start a group legal blog.

I have long been hoping that the "technological infrastructure" of blogs would improve and advance with new entrants, but Convictions seems to be a step back technologically.  Still, this blog is clearly to be a must-read because of its participants.  And, if the Slate folks ever decided to do a follow-up blog called Sentences, I hope I will be asked to join in the fun.

Where the bugged water cooler must reside

A couple of years ago, at a law blogger conference at Harvard Law School where folks debated the scholarly potential of blogs, Kate Litvak derisively described law professors blogs as a "bugged water cooler."  As suggested by my paper for this conference, I have never thought much of this analogy; but this great-looking new group blog by law professors, because it is titled  "The Faculty Lounge," makes me now think Litvak was perhaps on to something.

The Faculty Lounge, which is sub-titled "Conversations about law, culture, and academia," has a great group of contributors.  Also, its first four category archives all involve topics dear to my heart: Blogs and Blogging, Constitutional Law, Criminal Law, Law School Hiring.  I am already looking forward to frequently visiting TFL.

My bloggy interview at LexBlog discussing start of OSJCL Amici

In this post at LexBlog, Rob La Gatta has put up an interview we did last week discussing, inter alia, how my blogging here (and the thoughtful comments of so many readers) inspired me to help create OSJCL Amici: Views from the Field.  Here is this part of our Q and A:

Rob La Gatta: How did the idea for Views From The Field first develop?

Doug Berman: I’ve been blogging on my Sentencing Law & Policy Blog for a while, and have been inspired by the number of thoughtful practitioners who will say things in comments and through e-mails that give me really distinctive views on the federal sentencing world.  Being involved with the Ohio State Journal of Criminal Law, I thought we ought to have an online supplement, one that avowedly focused on getting the perspective of thoughtful practitioners (rather than just providing opportunities for law professors to write smaller versions of longer ideas). That was the model.

I lucked out that there was a very capable student who had just joined the journal, who indicated an interest in getting involved in some new projects. He helped us run with it and put together a lot of the infrastructure. I’ve [also] been lucky — through my work on federal sentencing — to get to know a number of federal judges....I sent out an e-mail to a bunch of district judges and said "Hey, we’d like you to write for this." Fortunately, out of the 10 I wrote to, 4 not only wrote back, but actually wrote...and wrote really interesting stuff that, in a sense, comprised our first issue.

A shout-out to great blog work getting noticed

Scott Henson has started 2008 on fire at Grits for Breakfast, and some of the powers-that-be are taking note.  Specificaly, on Friday in this post, titled "Court of Criminal Appeals Workload Declining under Judge Sharon Keller," Grits documented a caseload decline in Texas's highest criminal court and suggested that "CCA judges just don't work as hard as they used to."  Within 48 hours, Grits had received and posted this thoughtful response from a judge on the court.  This passage provide a flavor of the overall response:

The total number of petitions for discretionary review that were filed with the CCA in fiscal 2007 was 1,661.  The court has no control over that number.  Both defendants and the State have a statutory right to file such petitions.  The Court granted 149 petitions–that is, it agreed to hear 149 new discretionary cases in 2007.  By comparison, the total number of cases filed in the U.S. Supreme Court during its 2006 Term was 8,857, and it heard 78 civil and criminal cases.

Beyond my interest in the substantive specifics of this debate, it is great to see a serious reform advocate and a prominent judge engaging on these important topics directly in the blogosphere. 

Further, as the links below document, Scott is off to a flying start in 2008 covering a number of other important criminal issues dear to my heart:

• Partisan labels provide little guide for identifying criminal justice reformers
• Federal corruption investigation includes Harris County Jail contracts among targets
• Clergy seeking to respond to violent crime should look to restorative justice
• More on what clergy can do to respond to and reduce violent crime

A little weekend campaigning

This post is a weekend pitch asking readers to go over to the ABA's Blawg 100 list and vote here for this blog as among your favorite criminal justice blogs.  This is my first campaign post, precipitated by the fact that I have now fallen to third in the voting behind a "blawg" that only does about one or two posts each week.

Thanks!

UPDATE:  As of Sunday morning, I've jumped to first place.  Thanks everyone, and keep stuffing this virtual ballot box on my behalf.

An intriguing new blog focused on judicial independence

l I received an e-mail from folks at the Justice at Stake Campaign announcing an interesting looking new blog.  Here part of the pitch I received:

A new legal blog, Gavel Grab, [will] focus on attacks on the independence and impartiality of the courts — in judicial elections, in legislatures, and on the airwaves.  We launched this week with posts on the Supreme Court’s Guantanamo cases (by Slate’s Dahlia Lithwick), growing calls for a Wisconsin high court justice to recuse herself from a campaign supporter’s case, and a look at how the Terri Schiavo episode continues to ripple through the Presidential primaries.  And each day our staff provides links to interesting legal stories and blog posts.

As regular readers know well, sentencing decisions are often the focal point for judicial attacks.  I'll be reading this new blog regularly.

A helpful list of blawgs from the ABA Journal

As How Appealing details here, the ABA Journal has created this "Blawg 100" list.  Though I am biased toward the list because I am on it (and because it describes my commentary as avant-garde), I think it is fair for me to assert that the list provides a terrific "blogroll" for lawyers looking to keep up with legal news and ideas. 

Relatedly, the magazine has this feature entitled "ForeBlawggers: Seven lawyers who started the blawg revolution."  I'm sold on most of ABA Journal's picks for founding bloggers, though I think a few other law professor bloggers (e.g., Althouse, Banbridge, Balkin, Leiter, Lessig) might have merited a place on the ForeBlawggers list.

Conclusive proof you are smarter when reading this blg

According to this website, the fact that you are now reading this blog reflects very well on your intelligence.  Not surprisingly, another blog I contribute to does not score quite so high.

My favorite and most regular blawg reads

The folks at Blawg Review have created this meme throughout the blawgosphere urging the creation of a "list of blawgs that are 'simply the best.'"  Because I think a "best" label is inapt for a medium that is so diverse, I am going to categorize my list and label it a bit differently.  (Also, for conflict-of-interest reasons, I am leaving off various members of the Law Professor Blogs Network, even though CrimProf Blog and White Collar Crime Prof are regular reads.)  Here goes:

MY FAVORITE AND MOST REGULAR BLAWG READS

Sentencing/crim justice issues:

• Corrections Sentencing
• Crime and Consequences
• Capital Defense Weekly

General (and almost exclusively) law:

• How Appealing
• SCOTUSblog
• WSJ Law Blog

General law-related chatter:

• Althouse
• Concurring Opinions
• TalkLeft 
• The Volokh Conspiracy

As I look over this list (and consider other blawgs that did not quite make the list), it is clear that I am especially drawn to blawgs that post frequently and that generally provide a good deal of original content (and links) concerning issues that are not being thoroughly covered in the mainstream media.

Blogosphere shout-outs

Upon my return from a very interesting panel on blogs at the 16th Annual Meeting of the Conference of Court Public Information Officers, I have three blog-tastic comments to make:

1.  Happy belated birthday to Corrections Sentencing, which has a bunch of great new posts including this post with notable praise for the Missouri Sentencing Commission.

2.  Curses to any evil or misguided bloggers who harass or unduly burden court public information officiers and thereby give us not-so-evil or misguided bloggers a bad name.  Upon hearing various war stories about how some bloggers have bothered CPIOs, I now better understand why not all blogs and bloggers are beloved.

3.  Kudos to Dan Solove at Concurring Opinions for continuing to update his "Law Professor Blogger Census" with a new 2007 Version.  I also was intrigued by his follow-up post here about "Deadwood Bloggers."

Criminal law blog survey

Jamie Spencer at Austin Criminal Defense Blog is taking a survey here by asking readers to send him a list of their favorite criminal-law-related blogs.  Suggested categories include blogs written by defense lawyers, prosecutors, professors and judges, with both established and new law bloggers encouraged to participate.

To Chicago to go "Back to the Future of Legal Research"

I am about to head to Chicago to participate tomorrow in this conference at the Chicago-Kent College of Law entitled "Back to the Future of Legal Research."  The very interesting conference schedule can be found at this link, and I am on an afternoon panel titled "Web 2.0: New Tools for Doing & Teaching Legal Research."  I am heading to Chicago a bit early with tentative plans to indulge my inner Howard Bashman by attending the final game of this big-city series.  Blogging likely will be light over the next two days.

Great post on legal media and blogging

A fellow named Simon, at the blog Stubborn Facts (which has a great Twain motto), has this extraordinary post (with pictures and 41 endnotes) providing comprehensive coverage of traditional/new media panels at the Seventh Circuit's recent judicial conference.  Simon's long post both reports and comments on the legal media and legal bloggers in thoughtful ways; his great work justifies the time needed for a full read (including all the endnotes). 

Disclaimer: My assessment may be a bit biased because Simon repeatedly quotes my law blogging article and also references one of my favorite recent posts.

A pleasing pro-blog comment from the judiciary

As chronicled here, Howard Bashman has recently been up in arms about "Ninth Circuit Judge Alex Kozinski's take-down of blogs."  Consequently, it was quite pleasing to receive from a reader this report on the thoughts of a higher authority:

I was at a gathering with Justice Sam Alito this afternoon. He spoke briefly about the dearth of useful material in law reviews, and in response, he was asked if legal blogs might be a more helpful secondary source for judges.  He immediately responded that "there's a great sentencing blog" -- but he wasn't sure about the others.

I'm blushing (and thinking that this post with a photo of Justice Alito in fine form got me in good with the new guy).

More grist for the blog-scholarship debate

Today's New York Times has this interesting "Sidebar" column by Adam Liptak entitled, "When Rendering Decisions, Judges Are Finding Law Reviews Irrelevant."  (Howard Bashman has the link and thoughtful early commentary comes from Jack Balkin and Orin Kerr and Dan Solove.)  The article confirms my instinct and experience that judges find scholarly blogs much more relevant and user-friendly than traditional law review articles.  Here are some excerpts:

"I haven't opened up a law review in years," said Chief Judge Dennis G. Jacobs of the federal appeals court in New York.  "No one speaks of them. No one relies on them."  In a cheerfully dismissive presentation, Judge Jacobs and six of his colleagues on the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit said in a lecture hall jammed with law professors at the Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law this month that their scholarship no longer had any impact on the courts.

The assembled professors mostly agreed, though they differed about the reasons and about whether the trend was also a problem.  Some suggested, gently, that judges might not have the intellectual curiosity to appreciate modern legal scholarship. 

Articles in law reviews have certainly become more obscure in recent decades. Many law professors seem to think they are under no obligation to say anything useful or to say anything well.  They take pride in the theoretical and in working in disciplines other than their own.  They seem to think the analysis of actual statutes and court decisions — which is to say the practice of law — is beneath them.  The upshot is that the legal academy has become much less influential.

In the 1970s, federal courts cited articles from The Harvard Law Review 4,410 times, according to a new report by the staff of The Cardozo Law Review.  In the 1990s, the number of citations dropped by more than half, to 1,956. So far in this decade: 937.  Patterns at other leading law reviews are similar....

Even when courts do cite law review articles, Judge Robert D. Sack said at Cardozo, their motives are not always pure.  "Judges use them like drunks use lampposts," Judge Sack said, "more for support than for illumination." 

The assembled judges pleaded with the law professors to write about actual cases and doctrines, in quick, plain and accessible articles.  "If the academy does want to change the world," Judge Reena Raggi said, "it does need to be part of the world." 

To an extent, her plea has been answered by the Internet.  On blogs like the Volokh Conspiracy and Balkinization, law professors analyze legal developments with skill and flair almost immediately after they happen. Law professors also seem to be litigating more, representing clients and putting their views before courts in supporting briefs.  Law reviews, by contrast, feel as ancient as telegrams, but slower.

Along with the article, the NYT provides this link to the referenced Cardozo Law Review analysis entitled "Trends in Federal Judicial Citations and Law Review Articles."

Some related posts:

• Updated list of cases citing blogs
• On blogs, clinics and court advocacy
• Blogging about scholarship about blogging and scholarship
• The power of legal blogs
• Judges on blogs and blogging
• Kind blog words from an insightful commentator
• Law review citations to blogs
• Is The Volokh Conspiracy The Beatles of blogging?

UPDATE:  Both the Cardozo analysis and the insights of the Liptak article reinforce my perspective that structural forces like new technologies and the unusual "marketplace" in which law professors operate have a lot to do with these trends.  I discuss these dynamics in detail in my recent article "Scholarship in Action: The Power, Possibilities, and Pitfalls for Law Professor Blogs."

Still hoping for more Cunningham coverage

As noted here, the Texas Law Review has joined the club of leading law reviews with an on-line companion.  This one is called "See Also," and it has in the works some commentary about the Confrontation Clause.

As I explained in this post a few weeks ago, all the major journals with on-line companions  would seem perfectly suited to foster and facilitate a quick blast of much-needed Cunningham analysis and commentary from scholars and practitioners.  To date, I have not heard any news about special Cunningham coverage in the works anywhere, which could lead me to jump on the nascent anti-supplement bandwagon.

Some related posts from other blogs:

• On-line law review companions: too much of a good thing? (from LSI)
• Five Tips for Law Review Online Supplements (from First Movers)

Exciting AFDA webcast this Tuesday

I have been working recently on an exciting new kind of web programming with Gregory Nicolaysen, the founder of the Association of Federal Defense Attorneys (AFDA). As explained here, AFDA is "an Internet-based association for criminal defense attorneys, law professors, paralegals, investigators, and all other professionals associated with the field of federal criminal defense litigation."  Greg has kindly invited me to utilize (perhaps on a regular basis) the AFDA's cool Audio Webcast System.

As detailed here, my first audio webcast is scheduled for this Tuesday (Feb. 6) at 12noon EST.  The plan for this webcast is to provide an "informal, 60-minute discussion covering key developments in federal sentencing."   Unlike other groups seeking big bucks for such webcasts, the AFDA only charges a nominal fee for participating and the webcast is made available free to all federal court personnel, federal public defenders, and full-time law professors and students. 

I am grateful to Greg and the AFDA for putting this event together, and I am eager to do these sorts of user-friendly webcasts on a monthly basis if participants report a positive experience this Tuesday.

In praise of comments

Just a quick post to praise (and recommend) the many interesting comments to posts on the Emily Bazelon article and on my federal death penalty idea.  On the many reasons I love this medium is because I get instant and thought-provoking feedback from so many informed and interested sources. 

Keep up the great work, commentors.

One effect of Saddam's execution...

has been to create an explosion in this blog's hit rate.  I'm not exactly sure why: I have not blogged about the Hussien's execution since these two posts over the weekend.  But, perhaps because of the robust comment thread here, it seems I have moved up to Google's first page if you search for Saddam execution video.  Also, it appears that the term "uncut" in the title of this post may bedriving search traffic to this blog.

I note this phenomenon in part because I am often amazed by how consistent this blog's hit rate usually is.  Most weekdays, this blog receives roughly 2000 to 2500 hits according to sitemeter, and even big sentencing events or links from other blogs rarely impact these number more than 10%.  (The one exception was the week Booker was decided; I had 20,000 hits on decision day, and roughly 10,000 hits a few days thereafter.  But the hit rate quickly returned to normal a few days later.)

I guess this is further proof that its a Google and utube world, we are all just living in it.

Is law blogging already passe?

Peter Spiro in this post at Opinio Juris thoughtfully examines whether "the blogging phenomenon may have peaked" in the legal arena, and a terrific set of commentors have enriched the inquiry.  I discuss my reactions more fully here at Law School Innovation, but I wanted to give SL&P readers a chance in the comments to express whether they think law blogs are coming or going.

UPDATE:  Anyone who wants evidence that the death of law professors may be greatly exaggerated should check out this post at the Law Librarian Blog, which documents the growth and popularity of the Law Professor Blogs Network.  The chart, which you can see better at LLB, provides details on the network's expansion.

PDs looking for a little blogosphere respect

This afternoon I received this heart-felt e-mail from a fellow blogger:

Recently there have been a slew of awards for legal blogs, the most recent being the Blawg Review Awards. The only thing the various awards had in common is that they completely ignored public defender blogs. It is something public defenders are used to, of course, being what one PD blogger described as "the dirt of the profession."

Last February I began the Public Defender Stuff blog to publish news involving public/indigent defense, and to bring together the incredibly diverse blogs of public/indigent defenders.  That led to the creation of the PD Blog Guide and a daily listing of every PD blogger who has posted since the previous day's listing. Now, in response to what Blawg Review has already described as an unfortunate oversight, Public Defender Stuff is hosting the inaugural Public Defender Blog Awards.

If you could find it in your heart to throw some poor bloggers a bone, would it be possible to mention the awards on Sentencing Law and Policy?  The link above will take you (and your readers) to the ballot, and voting is open until January 5.  Thank you very much for your consideration.

Done!

A new blog project: Law School Innovation (LSI)

Proving my blog addiction yet again, I have decided to start a new blog: Law School Innovation (LSI).   As highlighted in this mission statement, my goal is to create a forum for discussing ... law school innovations (and I am hoping LSI will develop into a group blog). 

I now have two substantive posts up at LSI: this post discusses regularly hosting real oral arguments at law schools, and this post asks readers to report on innovative law school courses.

Northwestern University Law Review starting a blog

Continuing a rapid on-line scholarship revolution, Northwestern University Law Review has announced here that it is starting the "first scholarly weblog to be operated by a major law review [which] will feature legal commentary written in the form of blog posts."  This project is being called the Northwestern Colloquy, and it is an intriguing variation on the high-profile on-line companions that have been developed by other high-profile law journals (as discussed here).

Some recent related posts:

• Yet another notable on-line law journal companion
• YLJ Pocket Part on the future of legal scholarship

Yet another notable on-line law journal companion

Others in the blogosphere here and here have noted the announcement of the American Constitution Society's new affiliated journal, the Harvard Law & Policy Review (HL&PR).  What I find most intriguing about this project is that it begins with the unveiling of HL&PR Online, which becomes yet another high-profile on-line companion to another high-profile law journal.  Others in the booming genre (in order of appearance?) are:

• Yale Law Jounal's Pocket Part
• Harvard Law Review's Forum
• First Impressions (Michigan Law Review)
• PENNumbra (University of Pennsylvania Law Review)

CORRECTION:  I received this "urgent correction" from friends in New Haven (which is now reflected in this list above):

I must request that you amend your recent [initial] post, which suggests that Harvard's Forum predates our beloved Pocket Part.  Harvard's first posting is here; please observe that the URL clearly contains the date "dec05."  Compare our first post; published two months earlier -- an eon in blog-time!

They may have beaten us to the punch in 1887, but we can't allow them to steal pride of place in 2005.

Is The Volokh Conspiracy The Beatles of blogging?

You have to check out Eugene Volokh's very kind (and cool) post to understand the title of this post. 

What's especially cool is to draw out the parallels he sets up:  SL&P involves a solo artist (like Bob Dylan) who writes many words in posts (like songs) that often seek to comment on political issues and (professional) relationships; The Volokh Conspiracy is a group endeavor that mixes long and short posts,  touching on a broader range of topics, often just to have a good time/tune, though also often with deep political and social significance.  (Also, to be more mundane, consider the parallel "The" status in titles.)

Another blog post about a piece about blog posts

I now see that a piece I put together about blogging for the National Law Journal is now available here.  Though the title selected by the NLJ for the piece makes me cringe, I am truly grateful that the NLJ asked me to assemble some blogging thoughts for its publication.  And, to return the favor, let me note that the NLJ has a lot of other interesting looking stories in this week's issue (even though the title of this post is perhaps cringe-worthy).

Hat tip: this post at 3L Epiphany (which needs a new name now that its author has graduated).

YLJ Pocket Part on the future of legal scholarship

The Yale Law Journal Pocket Part has just published this on-line symposium entitled the "Future of Legal Scholarship."  The symposium includes an eclectic set of pieces from an eclectic set of law professors, most of whom are well-known bloggers. 

Folks interested in the "blog as scholarship" debate will be drawn to this piece from Jack Balkin, entitled "Online Legal Scholarship: The Medium and the Message."  Jack's closing paragraphs echo themes I developed in my article "Scholarship in Action: The Power, Possibilities, and Pitfalls for Law Professor Blogs" (available here) presented at last April's Harvard Law School symposium.  Here is Jack's astute concluding sentiment:

The wrong question to focus on is whether hiring committees should count blogging as legal scholarship.  The right question is how we should re-imagine our vocation as professors of law in light of new online media.  Should we continue to speak mostly to ourselves and our students, or should we spend more time trying to teach and influence the outside world?  That choice will determine whether we increasingly value blogging or stick with traditional forms of scholarship.  There are many possible paths to choose from, but if you don't know where you are going, almost any road will get you there.

Some related posts on law blogging and scholarship:

• Updated list of cases citing blogs
• On blogs, clinics and court advocacy
• The power of legal blogs
• Judges on blogs and blogging
• Kind blog words from an insightful commentator
• Historical reflections on the law blogging conference
• Law review citations to blogs

Pass out the cigars, I'm a granddaddy

Thanks to Ian Best here at 3L Epiphany, I just saw this National Law Journal article entitled "Judges Cite More Blogs in Rulings: Law student survey finds 32 Web log citations in the last two years."  The article provides details and commentary on Ian's latest accounting of cases citing blogs.  I get this nice plug in the article:

The granddaddy of all cited blogs, Ohio State law Professor Douglas Berman's "Sentencing Law and Policy," focuses almost exclusively on development of case law in the circuits since the Booker and Blakely decisions.  His blog has been cited more than any other, 24 times in 19 opinions, including Stevens' dissent in Booker, according to Best's tally.

Yet another scholarly gap-filler

As noted here a few days ago, First Impressions from the Michigan Law Review purports to "fill the gap between the blogosphere and the traditional law review article."  I called this entity an interesting variation on the Harvard Law Review's Forum and the Yale Law Jounal's Pocket Part, and I wondered if other like projects are in the works elsewhere. 

Now I see that the University of Pennsylvania Law Review is getting in on the act with PENnumbra, which apparently seeks to "unit[e] the public and the legal academy."  Hmm.... whatever gap there was in short-form scholarship is sure getting filled up fast.  I have an inkling that other such blog-journal synergies may be on the way, and now I wonder if the long-form law review may be really starting to show its age.

Updated list of law review articles citing blogs

Ian at 3L Epiphany has here updated his extraordinary compilation of law review articles citing blogs.  According to Ian, there are now "489 article citations of legal blogs in this collection, with 75 legal blogs being cited."

Gordon Smith at Conglomerate has this fitting reaction: "All told, 75 legal blogs have been cited at least once in law reviews. That's more than can be said for over 160,000 law review articles."

More meta-blogging and nice reviews

Over at the WSJ blog, Peter Lattman provides a nice plug here for my article "Scholarship in Action: The Power, Possibilities, and Pitfalls for Law Professor Blogs" (available here) that I presented at last April's Harvard Law School symposium, "Bloggership: How Blogs are Transforming Legal Scholarship Conference."   And Bill Henderson at the ELS Blog follows up with this kind post.

Some related posts on law blogging and scholarship:

• Updated list of cases citing blogs
• On blogs, clinics and court advocacy
• The power of legal blogs
• Judges on blogs and blogging
• Kind blog words from an insightful commentator
• Historical reflections on the law blogging conference
• Law review citations to blogs

Another plug for a new blog

I want to urge readers again to check out Michael Connelly's new (group?) blog called Corrections Sentencing.  Mike is doing great work right out of the gate, and I found especially intriguing this latest post on the work of, and perceptions of, sentencing commissions.

Fascincating new blog for law professor baseball fans

I am quite intrigued to discover this new blog, MoneyLaw.  Here is a portion of its first post:

Inspired by Michael Lewis's book, Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game, many law professors have pondered the extent to which this profession can learn from Billy Beane's approach to winning baseball games for the Oakland Athletics. Four of those professors — Jim Chen, Tom W. Bell, Paul Caron, and Ronen Perry — will now discuss the ways in which Moneyball's emphasis on quantitative assessment of baseball-related performance can inform law school governance, academic rankings, and the overall mission of legal academia.

The second post is a long one by Tom Bell on "Reforming the USN&WR Law School Rankings."

New blog for sentencing and corrections information

I learned at the NASC conference earlier this week that Michael Connelly, who is now the Administrator of the Evaluation & Analysis Unit of the Oklahoma Department of Corrections and previously served as executive director of sentencing commissions in Maryland and Wisconsin, has a new (group?) blog up-and-running called Corrections Sentencing.

Though only started last week, CS already has a lot of interesting posts, including a series of posts at this archive with lots of links to resources and reports on corrections and sentencing.  Michael also has this recent post about the NASC conference.  A post here effectively explains the noble motivations for this new blogosphere entrant:

As participants in corrections and/or sentencing policy for over a decade now, we've found the lack of constant, consistent forums for practitioners, policymakers, and the public to seriously review and discuss what's happening a problem. I've regularly gotten questions from people in other states wanting to know about sentencing commissions and treatment research and cost-effectiveness and on and on. The same is true, I'm sure, for a lot of you regarding sentencing or questions in corrections....

There should be a place for corrections/sentencing policy readers seeking latest information and research, answers to questions and concerns, or just general conversation on shared worlds.  That's what this blog will try to be.  We'll try to keep "politics" to a minimum (good luck to us on that, we realize, but Berman has pretty much pulled it off).  But we will not shy away from relevant discussions of what both reality and illusion tell us about getting sentencing done with corrections in mind. We encourage you to help us make a community here of people who can support each other in making their corrections and sentencing policy the best informed and organized they can be. We want to hear your experiences and to share your knowledge with others. We want you to find answers to specific questions here and to provide answers to others. We want to be a place you want to visit regularly, for the info, for the ideas, for the company. We'll post open threads so you can let us know in your comments what we need to do to get all this done. And if it turns out people don't really need this very much, at least someone will have made the effort. We don't think that will be the case.

Updated list of cases citing blogs

Over at 3L Epiphany, Ian Best has here updated his terrific list of cases citing legal blogs.  Ian now chronicles, with helpful annotations, the particulars of "32 citations of legal blogs from 27 different cases."

UPDATE: Spurred by Ian's work, Belle Lettre has this interesting post and Larry Solum has this insightful follow-up on the legal blogosphere.

Strong coverage of law blogging

Thanks to this link from the Northwestern School of Law, everyone can access a strong new article on law blogging appearing The Chicago Lawyer.  Titled "Law-Related Blogging Starting To See a Coming of Age," the article covers a lot of ground that should be of interest to many in the legal blogosphere.  Here's a taste:

Lawyers who blog say the medium can offer several benefits in the practice and business of law.  Many of them describe blogging as a mode of communication unlike any other, a 21st century style of networking....

Since lawyers read, write, analyze, and argue for a living, their leap into the blogosphere seems only natural.  "A lot of them love writing and have a personality where they love to be heard. Lawyers are naturally going to be prolific in this area," said Dennis Crouch, of counsel at McDonnell Boehnen Hulbert & Berghoff.

Crouch has reaped tangible benefits from his place in the blogosphere, which has helped jump-start his career.  He attributes his newly acquired position at Boston University School of Law -- where he will teach patent law and computer law -- largely to the popularity of his own patent law blog, Patently-O.  "It turned out that several professors at Boston University read this on a regular basis. They were very excited about having me come and be a part of the faculty.  It was very magical," Crouch said.

Some related posts on law blogging:

• On blogs, clinics and court advocacy
• The power of legal blogs
• Judges on blogs and blogging
• Kind blog words from an insightful commentator
• Historical reflections on the law blogging conference
• Law review citations to blogs

On blogs, clinics and court advocacy

Thanks to law.com, here are two interesting piece about modern developments in court advocacy:

• From Tony Mauro, this piece highlights that a number of  highly-regarded law schools "are launching Supreme Court litigation clinics this fall and others, we hear, are not far behind."

• From Howard Bashman, this piece suggests that blogs help make the internet "a vast amicus brief through which legal experts who are otherwise unconnected to pending court cases may potentially influence their outcomes."

Combining the ideas from both these intriguing pieces, I wonder if any law school has thought about launching a legal blogging clinic with an emphasis on court advocacy.

Around the blogosphere (Hamdan free)

Nearly every law blog will give you a taste of Hamdan, so I'll fill a gap by noting some interesting coverage of other issues:

• Dan Markel here at PrawfsBlawg recaps the debate over wrongful conviction rates that Dan Filler and