Kirkland & Ellis Seeks Fee of $18.50 a Minute for Bankruptcy Work

Posted Jan 28, 2009, 08:09 am CST


By Debra Cassens Weiss

Kirkland & Ellis has requested a fee of $1,110 an hour in a corporate bankruptcy, a possible record amount, according to one expert.

The hourly rate breaks down to $18.50 a minute, Bloomberg reports. The law firm is seeking the fee for its representation of titanium dioxide-maker Tronox Inc.

Two other law firms are seeking nearly as much, requesting hourly rates in excess of $1,000, according to the story. They are Sidley Austin, in the restructuring of the Tribune Co., and Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom, representing Circuit City.

Bankruptcy law professor Lynn LoPucki of the University of California at Los Angeles told the wire service that fees for lawyers and other professionals in bankruptcy cases are growing at four times the rate of inflation.

“As the economy gets worse, the bankruptcy lawyers are charging more,” LoPucki told Bloomberg. “It seems that each month one sets a new record for hourly billing rates. $1,110 is, to my knowledge, a record for the debtor’s bankruptcy counsel.”

New software would let iPhones access iTunes libraries from anywhere

Supreme Court Debt Collection Ruling Means More Work for Lawyers

Posted 5 hours, 39 minutes ago
By Debra Cassens Weiss

Lawyers are preparing for an onslaught of collections lawsuits after a U.S. Supreme Court ruling allowing plaintiffs to sue to recover unpaid debt, even if they don’t have a financial stake in the outcome.

Dallas lawyer Craig Jordan told the Houston Chronicle he is already seeing about 10 times the number of collection lawsuits against credit card holders than there were three years ago. Many of the suits are filed on behalf of those who own debt that has been bundled and resold to investors who hope to collect the money.

Richard Alderman, a consumer law professor at the University of Houston, said the resold debt is changing the nature of collection. "What companies used to let slide, now more and more debt collectors are buying the permission and ability to go after the money and are getting more aggressive," Alderman told the Chronicle.

The 5-4 Supreme Court ruling, Sprint v. APCC, held that collection companies had standing to sue on behalf of pay phone providers even though any recovered cash would go to the providers.

Drowning in Awesomeness

The double-edged sword that comes with keeping abreast of all the latest developments in technology means that we're always aware of the latest and greatest applications and services to try...but it also means that we've tried all of them. Unlike the average user, who doesn't even bother creating a Facebook profile until several of their friends cajole them into doing so, technology early adopters are the first to sign up and create profiles on every service that launches.

Sometimes these services have value; if so, they trickle down to the rest of the world over time. For example, social networks like MySpace and Facebook changed the way people interacted online. Flickr made photo sharing fun, easy, and social. YouTube let everyone be a star. However, sometimes they're not so great after all, and they end up fading away into nothingness in that area we've affectionately dubbed the "deadpool."

These failures don't seem to dampen our enthusiasm for trying the "next big thing," though. Every day, the web is filled with posts about this new app or that great service. When you think about it, it's really rather impressive that there are that many of them out there - enough to be written about in a seemingly nonstop fashion.

For technology enthusiasts, it's not enough to just "try" the new apps and services though. If they're the next big thing (or so everyone says), we're supposed to jump on board and use them, use them, use them. Scoble even recently threatened to expose some of the so-called "A-Listers" for not being active enough, saying:

"I thought about embarrassing most of the A listers on FriendFeed, because very few of them actually read that many blogs (I can tell, they rarely comment on, or link to, or FriendFeed with other people’s blogs)"

Forecasters see weak economy, higher unemployment

The
Web needs fixing. The standards and recommendations that define the Web were
last revised in 1999. Since then, the Web has grown from a document retrieval
system into an application delivery system. We have made significant progress
since then, due to the cleverness of the Web development community and the
surprising expressive power of JavaScript, but we are at the limits. The Web is
no longer a driver of innovation. It is now a serious impediment.

The Web is
overly complex. It is visually underpowered. It is hopelessly insecure. It is
now under competitive assault by new proprietary platforms that hope to capture
the next generation of applications. Can a system as large and as open as the
Web heal and adapt itself to the challenges of the 21st Century?

"When looking for good ideas about customer service, ask around," writes Paul Williams in a post at MarketingProfs' Daily Fix blog. "Exceptional services experiences are rarely forgotten." He even asked his parents for their input on the topic, and they came up with two experiences that made a lasting impression:





• While vacationing on St. Thomas in the 1970s, they made dinner reservations at the Cafe Brittany. On their arrival the couple found two matchbooks embossed with their names. "The restaurant made custom matches for every reservation," explains Williams. "My mom still has them."


• Following LASIK surgery performed by Dr. Peter Polack of Ocala, Fla., his mother received a $25 gift certificate to Barnes & Noble with a card that read, "Enjoy your new eyesight!"





According to Williams, these examples have three things in common:





• They're an unexpected surprise.


• They have relevance for the customer.


• They foster a fond remembrance of the brand.





The Po!nt: Asks Williams, "How can you offer your customers an unexpected surprise, something relevant, and something that helps them remember your brand?"




Source: Daily Fix. Click here for the post.

No ownership, no accountability - wikis, collaboration software, social media, Enterprise 2.0 and how not to get things done.

Retail chain Sharper Image Corp. said Wednesday that it has filed for bankruptcy court protection under Chapter 11 of the U.S. Bankruptcy Code.

The San Francisco-based chain of 184 specialty stores plans to conduct business as usual as it develops a reorganization strategy.

Sharper Image (Nasdaq: SHRP) has stores locally at Pavilions in Sacramento and at The Ridge at Creekside in Roseville.

The housing industry, caught in a maelstrom of sinking demand, rising foreclosures, and bulging inventories, is in its worst slump in decades, a growing body of economic evidence shows.

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The New York Times

Sales of new homes fell last year by 26 percent, the steepest drop since records began in 1963, the Commerce Department said on Monday.