A new blog has magically appeared, with built in mahogany paneling and a raging fire in the limestone fireplace.  Big cushy leather Chesterfield chairs and Queen Anne side tables, with sifters of brandy scattered around the room.  It’s the Faculty Lounge.

I can hear  Gideon asking already, “Why do I care?” But I know his devilish attitude will force him to stop by, even though he’ll hide behind the curtains.  The lawprofs have been the antithesis of the practical blawgosphere, blogging about scholarly subjects from their Ivory Tower offices, opining about our clients when they’ve never shaken hands with an accused murderer or listened to why someone has chosen heroin over gainful employment.

But lawprofs have something that us working lawyers don’t: time.  And, while I say this begrudgingly, some are awfully darned smart and bring some incredible ideas about the law to the blogosphere. 

Up to now, many of the lawprof networks try to structure their blogs as if they were mini-law reviews, their discussions mired in jargonistic lawprof-speech and weighed down by needlessly lofty sounding ideals and philosophies.  The subjects are often interesting, but their discussions can be boring.  They are often strained and pretentious.  Then commenters come on board, trying to out-pretentious each other to prove their superior intellect is the match of any academic. 

The Faculty Lounge is self-described as

When I was a student, I always romanticized the faculty lounge as a place where big ideas, witty repartee and afternoon tea came to meet and mingle–a combination of Claridge’s, the Algonquin Table, college literary societies and the Keats-Shelley House in Rome, with a little Bloomsbury thrown in for good measure.  But the average faculty lounge nowadays is often empty or barely populated, as we all fall prey to the  incessant demands and overload of modern life.

Hence *this* Faculty Lounge:  online, 24-7, easily accessible, open to anyone who wants to talk ideas or ponder questions large and small.   Although you’ll have to provide your own sherry and biscuits, there’s no need to don your tweed blazer with leather patches or velvet smoking jacket (but do feel free!).  I’ll be in that far corner in the big leather chair, sipping my Makaibari Estate Darjeeling (milk, two sugars) and holding forth on topics from juries and sentencing to late-Victorian literature and verse.   See you there!

Can the lawprofs break away from their tightened collars and sphincters?  I hope so.  In my mind’s eye, I see them letting their hair down, talking like normal people and having conversations that the rest of us will want to hear, and maybe even engage!  Yes, the witty repartee part strains credulity, but my thought is to let them indulge in their own fantasy as long as it helps them to relax.  Instead of sherry, have you considered just tapping a keg?

Welcome to the blogosphere.  And maybe even the practical blawgosphere.  Let’s see whether you guys can blow off a little steam, or whether this is just another “lets pretend we only think important thoughts” blog.  Your choice.