American Bar Association looking for best legal blogs

The American Bar Association is soliciting nominations for its annual list of the 100 best legal blogs (a/k/a "blawgs" -- as in law + blogs, get it?), said list to be published in an upcoming issue of the ABA Journal.

Per an email from the ABA Journal, the linked Blawg 100 Amici form may be used to nominate a blog "that you read regularly [and] that you think other lawyers should know about." Persons are encouraged to nominate more than one blog. But -- of course -- there is some fine print that must be taken into account:

[P]lease know that we disregard amici from:

• Blawggers who nominate their own blawgs or blawgs to which they have previously contributed posts.
• Wives and husbands who nominate their spouses’ blawgs.
• Employees of law firms who nominate blawgs with their own firm’s branding.
• Public relations professionals in the employ of lawyers or law firms who nominate their clients’ blawgs.
• Pairs of blawggers who have clearly entered into a gentlemen’s agreement to nominate each other.

The Amici form asks for comments about the nominated blogs. There is a 500-character limit -- and this may pose the ultimate challenge for actual practicing lawyers. How can we hope to say much of anything in only 500 characters?

The ABA asks nominators to keep these criteria in mind:

• We’re only interested in blawgs in which the author is recognizable as a lawyer or law student in the vast majority of his or her posts.
• The blawg should be written with an audience of lawyers or law students—rather than potential clients or potential law students—in mind.
• The majority of the blawg’s content should be unique to the blawg and not cross-posted or cut and pasted from other publications.
• We are not interested in blawgs that more or less exist to promote the author’s products and services.

While Second Effort boasts a lot of original content, I don't know that I am "recognizable" as a lawyer in the majority of my posts. This blog aims for a general readership, rather than being 'pitched' specifically to lawyers or law students. But some of these have happened by anyway, from time to time. So I pass the information along.

Blawg nominations are due by September 9.