You know something is for real when some corporation uses its cash to drag it down into the gutter. And so the blawgosphere has entered the mainstream of corporate filth when Lexis/Nexis, ATM for that dinosaur Martindale-Hubbell, used its “sponsorship” to pull the plug on Kevin O’Keefe’s panel spot at LegalTech.
In that LegalTech is one of the premier legal technology events of the year, I readily accepted. It was an honor to be invited. I was to appear on a panel in the trek on how to use ‘Web 2.0 Technology to Gain a Strategic Advantage for Your Practice.’ The person from Incisive went so far as to say they were really excited to have me on the panel.
This morning I get a call from an Incisive Media employee that they’re very sorry but that the panel I was invited to speak on was full. They ‘didn’t know what to say,’ but were ‘very sorry.’
I responded that it appears that LexisNexis, the sponsor of the panel, did not want me on the panel because of my recent commentary on LexisNexis Martindale-Hubbell so bumped me. I doubt they ran out of chairs. Their response was basically ‘can’t comment on that, there’s a lot of politics involved.’
So now we’re “silencing the critics” in the blawgosphere, are we? I’m not at all surprised that Lexis wants to shut Kevin down, given how badly he burned them and how much they deserved to be burned. Honest criticism stings, and corporate wonks really hate it when someone gives them a nice, sharp well-deserved smack across the chops. Kevin landed a good blow.
But what I don’t get is that LegalTech, put on by Incisive Media, owner of America Lawyer Media which is deeply involved in the blawgosphere, is willing to sell off its credibility for the price of a Lexis panel discussion sponsorship. For crying out loud, ALM, if you’re selling integrity, at least get a decent price for it.
Kevin, because he’s truly a really nice guy and believes that you catch more flies with honey than vinegar, tries to explain why Lexis is wrong to throw him off the panel because of his criticism of M-H, which he contends helps them to improve their product and hence keeps on top of their game. I, on the other hand, prefer to ignore the flies altogether, so that I can write whatever I want without worrying about whether anyone invited me on a panel.
This corporate politics approach is a disgrace, and the blawgosphere should do two things: Let both Lexis/Nexis and Incisive Media know that we know that they are going to punish blawgers who don’t suck up to them. Kevin O’Keefe is one of the most techno-savvy and knowledgeable guys I’ve ever met, and his absence from the panel is a near-condemnation of anything this panel has to offer. You don’t toss the guy who knows what he’s talking about and expect to have any credibility.
The second thing to do is let Incisive Media know that they have a choice to make, whether to let web-wannabes like Lexis dictate their integrity by playing internal politics at LegalTech. Frankly, if ALM doesn’t blow the lid off this crap, they are every bit as complicit in this effort to silence M-H critics as Lexis is.
A while back, an ALM blawger proposed that Simple Justice join the ALM “family” of blogs. Failing to see any meaningful benefit to doing so, I respectfully declined, though my buddy Turk decided to sign up. Now, I’m certainly glad I dodged that bullet. While Kevin may feel constrained to make nice with the powers that run LegalTech in order to avoid burning another bridge, I still have the ability to call it as I see it.
Lexis is using cash to silence its critic. Incisive Media is selling its integrity cheap. And the efficacy of LegalTech hangs in the balance. Make your choices, folks. Just how much is your integrity and credibility worth?
Update: Kevin O’Keefe is back on a panel at LegalTech:
 | kevinokeefe Am on LegalTech panel now – What’s Twitter? How do you use it? How do I use for client development? 3 pm, Monday Feb 2. |
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This makes me that much happier that last year, when Lexis told me they did not care what I thought about having my local rep removed from my account because I wasn’t a large enough account, I stopped buying Lexis products. Seems dictating to others is their business plan.
Scott,
I saw your post, and wanted to make an effort to clear up any misunderstanding. LexisNexis is actually sponsoring several panel sessions at Legal Tech this year. The Web 2.0 track sessions are:
· “Five things every practice should know about Web 2.0 technology”
· “Best practices for online networking”
· “Adopting Web 2.0 capabilities into your Web presence”
As you know, Legal Tech works with sponsors to secure panelists for various sessions. The conference organizers at LegalTech reached out to Kevin O’Keefe in particular – as he is very vocal and well versed on the web 2.0 topic – and invited him to participate in the “Adopting Web 2.0 capabilities into your Web presence” session before the holidays. Our understanding was that before Kevin confirmed his participation, the conference organizers secured a full panel, and informed Kevin yesterday that the session was full. We’re sorry for any mis-communication or misunderstanding.
Professional networking and web 2.0 technologies are very important topics for us, and admittedly we still have a lot yet to learn. We look forward to an interesting dialogue, and hope to see you at Legal Tech.
regards,
– dave
I dunno, Dave. The “session was full?” It wasn’t LN, but Incisive Media who blew it? I dunno. Maybe Kevin can clear up the logistics, but it seems to me that there’s always room at the table for one more seat, and that you don’t send out more invitations than you plan to fill. I dunno.
I wonder where my free blawger LegalTech admission badge is? Maybe it’s lost in Royal Mail with my ermine cape?
Dave, I have to call BS on you.
I confirmed my availability a long, long time ago. I agreed to come and told Incisive I was honored to be there. LexisNexis needing to approve the panel with the outcome being me being bumped off after me being invited and accepting was total crap by LN. Now you’re spinning this line of BS. Either you are uninformed or it is no sweat of your back to mislead people. You’ve really sold out for the title, salary, and pension plan.
Good stuff. Quite right to point this out – I shall do the same by posting about your piece on my blog
Regards
Charon
I can’t imagine who the panel could’ve been filled with better qualified to talk about those topics than Kevin O’Keefe. His name anywhere on the panel would be a huge draw.
To all,
I have to be fair to Kevin and explain a little about my source of information. As I explained to Kevin in private, I was concerned that LN not be involved in using unfair influence a panel or to keep someone off because of disagreements. This was a very hot issue here in LN yesterday. But, I left my investigation comfortable that LexisNexis did not seek to get Kevin off the panel. I would personally argue that Kevin’s voice should be on the panel – that the audience deserves all opinions, not just the ones that agree with us.
I know that I am not known on this blog and therefore my voice/bias is suspect but all I have no way of convincing anyone who is inclined to believe that LN conspired but I would offer the following to support my statements:
– LegalTech is a show that is the focused on by our Practice Management business unit and is not the focus of the Client Development group (especially M-H) with the possible exception of the Redwood Analytics group
– because of the above point, most people in the Client Development/M-H group have no knowledge of the panels, featured speakers, etc. The only common group that is aware of this is our PR team
– I specifically asked the PR team (after checking within M-H and Client Development) to see if there was any attempt to keep Kevin off a panel and was assured that this was not the case.
– Through these inquiries, I also learned that the position of LegalTech is that Kevin was a known potential panelist but was not confirmed. That was the basis for my statement.
I have expressed to Kevin personally and will do the same to the community here that if I have misstated facts due to misinformation and/or caused negative impact to Kevin professionally, I apologize – that was not my intent.
So, I’ll end the long note there but felt that I owed it to Kevin to publicly state what I (and many others) sought to find out in LN yesterday, what we learned and why I said what I said.
I hope this explanation helps.
regards,
dave
Kevin,
Now that I’ve stated that, I have to comment to you directly in that I have attempted to treat this conversation and disagreement (along with past posts) with respect and avoid personal attacks. I will continue to behave that way but I must say that it’s unfortunate that you have decided to personalize this. When it comes to my salary, title, pension plan and all of the *unnecessary* steps I took yesterday to get assurance that we had not tried to keep you off a panel, you don’t know what you are talking about – so I would expect more respect from you.
I understand why you are upset – in 20+ years in the tech indistry I have had a few screwed-up panels myself but I have never decided to go attack people because I was angry. Also, if you knew anything about me you would know that I would never intentionally mislead a personal or public group on an issue like this. My personal integrity is more important to me than LN or you.
I’m sure we’ll continue to have civil conversations but with your last post, I’m disappointed.
– dave
Hold on there, buckaroo. First, this is my home and I’ve allowed you a chance to get on your soap box and try to weasal your way out of your hole. But that wasn’t enough for you, and now you are going to claim that you are disappointed in Kevin? That’s way over the line.
You never bothered to say that you were merely passing along false information when you tried to cover Lexis/Nexis scam. You presented your excuse as if you knew what you were talking about, despite the fact that it stunk from the start. But only Kevin called you on the lie did you come clean and admit that you were blowing smoke. So you’re disingenuous to all of us, proving that you can’t be trusted, but you’re disappointed in Kevin?
Kevin didn’t make you a liar. You made yourself a liar. Kevin just called you on it, as he was right to do since you tried to deceive all of us by shifting the blame onto Kevin.
And spare us the next round of excuses. You had the chance to tell the truth the first time around, and chose to brand yourself a liar. Now live with it.
This explanation helps enormously. When you get caught passing along baloney that you present as if you actually knew what you were talking about, you shift it onto someone else to try to cover your own butt.
Very helpful explanation indeed.
Fair enough – your house and I’m a guest. My apologies to the host.
But why the venom? And why are you so sure that I am a liar? I am trying to reflect what I know from what I have dug into internally. I was not trying to shift any blame, I will take responsibility for what I wrote – my efforts were only to explain context. Apparently I should avoid the details in the future to avoid any misperceptions. I’m going tone down now and see if I can step back from some sort of battle that I never intended.
I would also like to be clear – and I have stated this to Kevin personally – that I respect his opinions, agree or disagree, and would not be a party of any effort to restrict him or anyone else from a panel discussion. In order to improve we must be willing to hear criticism for any/all.
Thank you for the opportunity to let me “weasel out of my hole”…(seriously, I appreciate the forum you provide)
– dave
Dave,
You mistake frankness for venom, which is understandable given that you function in a corporate culture where spin is an acceptable substitute for good old honesty. I don’t call you a liar, but Kevin has facially disputed your “explanation” and you’ve responded by admitting that the details you provided, under the “our” umbrella, has now turned into mere “information” provided you by “someone else” that you were just passing along. Had you said that in the first place, rather than say this was “our understanding,” thereby putting your own veracity on the line, the reaction would have been toward LN, but not you personally.
But you did include yourself, and thereby your veracity, in offering the explanation. Perhaps it was an inadvertent choice of words, going back the whole corporate omniscient mindset that gets so many businesspeople in trouble. Perhaps you weren’t lying at all, and inserted yourself because it’s one of those corporate mechanisms for making things appear accurate when they are just the company line. Either way, when you undertake to handle the corporate spin, and insert yourself as the honest broker, you end up taking the weight when the truth comes out.
I’m about as likely to be critical of Kevin as I am of M-H. But Kevin carries a lot of street cred around here, and when the explanation implicitly makes Kevin out to be either a liar or a fool, expect to be challenged. Credibility counts, and while Kevin can be almost as cranky as me, he’s never been less than forthright around here.
Debate is important. Incisive Media, I believe, owns the UK legal magazine Legal Week. It would be interesting to see what the UK arm of IM would make of this.
As George Bush would say… Human beings and fish can co-exist… but it is best that they do so on the basis of open, honest and rational debate.
I suspect that mainstream media may find it difficult to cope with the fact that bloggers are independent – and long may that continue – and, in my experience, are fair…. for the very simple reason that most bloggers have no piper who calls the tune… whereas most mainstream legal press magazines have advertisers to consider.
(I also run a small and very modest online magazine and have advertisers who sponsor the modest and moderate costs involved. I am grateful, in that capacity, for support. I would be appalled if any advertiser… whether publisher, bookshop, university, law firm or chambers tried to exercise control over free comment. I would simply remove them as sponsors and take the hit. However… I am fortunate in having advertisers and sponsors who would not do this… of that I am confident.)
I now see why you would see my post as out of left field and likely to be corporate spin but what I failed to explain was that earlier this week on Kevin’s and other blogs, I simply posted that at the risk of the need for fire-retardant clothing, I was going to attempt to be a more regular commenter in the blogging community. This was originally in relation to LN not participating actively in Twitter and I have read similar “LN/M-H does not seem engaged/interested” posts so I felt that someone (I can only soeak for myself) should participate. This just happened to coincide with the post about the panel discussion. Hopefully there will be opportunities to discuss marketing/communication issues relevant to the legal community in the future.
regards,
-dave
Well then, welcome to this corner of the blawgosphere. I look forward to hearing from you more often. By the way, no need to sign your comments, as you name appears at the top. I know it feels weird at first, but you will get used to it.
Just remembered Dave that last week I mentioned to you in comments exchanged in my blog – http://tinyurl.com/9bjy8o that I would be presenting at LegalTech on a panel in which LexisNexis folks were involved. Then this week you’re telling the world I had not confirmed I would be one the panel?
Also appears it took a day and a half after I voiced concern on the net about being bumped for LN MH to respond. I did not get an email from you until from you until this morning. Looks to an outsider that this time was used by LN MH to spin a PR response to pulling a rock. A PR response that basically says what I blogged about being bumped was not true.
Kevin,
I understad why you say this and what it looks like – I can only say that this is not true in my case and the time was spent by me (and others) to find out what happened. I felt it was important to post and did so as soon as I could. If I could do it again, I should have qualified the post with “I have looked into this internally and what I am being told is…” as opposed to stating as fact. I believe what I wrote but it should have been qualified to be fair to all. I tried to get this point across in my next post regarding being fair to Kevin and restating. (I think that’s where the heat got turned up)
– dave (understand I don’t have to type this – just a personal ownership thing, I guess – I’ll refrain going forward)
As I mentioned in an email Dave, this whole thing is nuts. Should have been avoided in 2 seconds. When issue came up, someone should have said, we’re not uninviting someone we invited to present already. And if they made a mistake in un-inviting me because of pressure they felt from LexisNexis, then LexisNexis should have corrected the situation when LN first heard last Monday I was uninvited because of LN. Correction being put ‘OKeefe back on panel.’ That’s a snap decision from a leader and one I would have made if a company I led ever got into a problem like this. LN shows total failure of leadership acting with integrity in handling this.