Legal Authority

I began my final project by researching local Intellectual Property (IP) lawyers and attempting to make contact with them.  The instructions were to obtain the contact numbers of at least ten IP lawyers, in hopes that one among them would entertain an interview to field questions we were also tasked with asking.  I began the running down the list of names to see who would be available.  This would prove to be harder than initially anticipated.

             
I first tried making contact on a Friday, thinking most of them would probably have court earlier in the week, and therefore less apt to take my calls.  I was wrong on this assumption.  For those who had receptionists answer, the lawyer(s) were already heading out for the weekend or indisposed.  The rest simply went to voice mail.  I abandoned my search and tried anew the following Monday.

             
Several of the IP lawyers were said to be at court that morning and others took my information to have the lawyer call me later.  I asked one of the receptionists, who was also a paralegal, if I could ask her some questions that she might have the answers to.  She would listen to my questions, but then she’d abruptly say, after each question, “I can’t answer that, I’m not a lawyer”.  I decided I’d just save my questions for the pros.

             
 I found it was not advantageous to let the attorney’s know that I was a student trying to get interviews.  A couple receptionists said their boss wouldn’t even speak to me without payment.  I tried a new approach, which ultimately worked for me.  I told them that I was starting up my own clothing line (which isn’t far from the truth), and that I was contemplating representation.  I said I had a couple questions to ask and they, for the most part, obliged.  So I basically had several mini-interviews with three different IP attorney’s and was able to obtain answers to the questions I had.

              
 In the end, I think I may have found an attorney that I will call on if I do end up needed representation.  This exercise was a good way to filter the attorneys who want to really assist you, from the ones who only see dollar signs.  For those attorneys who were unhelpful and cold, they just lost a potential client.  Don’t bite the hand that could potentially feed.