As part of today's roll out of the newest and most powerful change to the Google search engine, the Caffeine update, ( their name, not mine ) creates an entirely new and more relevant search technique that will dramatically improve search relevance.

You can read about the details of the change by clicking here for the InformationWeek article.

Why this is important and exciting for Legal Broadcast Network and our clients is that this new methodology favors those of us who produce original, daily, relevant content that is widely syndicated and viewed and shared across multiple platforms. We already dominated most of the key search parameters and metrics we have clients or shows in, but with this modification we can now expect to have an even more immediate impact for clients looking to create original programming and have that programming get great search engine results.

I have used this recent example before, but take a look at our content and interviews on the BP Oil Spill Litigation. We have done two interviews, TWO, and when you go to Google today and type in BP Oil Spill Litigation our content shows up in 4 of the 10 page one results. In video search we are TEN for TEN in page one results.

Do you have any idea how much it costs to obtain those type of results from your typical "Search Engine Savant" who tells you they can get you front page Google results or what it cost in pay per click? I can tell you it costs a lot and even more in line with this commentary, most of the SEO junk content that was on page one last week is now pushed back even further.

My point being this. The power of Google, Bing and to a lesser degree Yahoo to stay ahead of the SEO scammers and game players who work the system for short term gain has never been more obvious. The strategy of paying a firm for SEO is going to become a more and more discredited practice as the months go by and firms are going to have to realize they need a comprehensive, thoughtful online media strategy that is centered around original content, consistent posting/broadcasting and on going media development.

Anything less is destined to fail and be rendered irrelevant by Google.

At Legal Broadcast Network and in our LB Network Studios division we do nothing but create original, high quality content and show people how to syndicate it and get it in their prospects hands. We have commentator packages that start as low as $500 a month all the way up to full enterprise solutions from LB Networks at $10,000 per month. Which ever fits for you will be obvious, but at what point in time are people going to stop being jerked around by SEO firms and take control of their message and social media campaigns? Give us a call or sit back and watch your competitors and associates run past you to number one in the search engines.

Well, today brings us another prime example of a city council with too much time on it's hands, when the city of Austin, TX decided to join the moralists of Los Angeles and San Francisco and passed resolutions that eliminate contracts or forbid doing business with Arizona.

You can read the Houston Chronicle report here.

What cracks me up, and brought to mind the boys of Animal House, is what a stupid and futile gesture this is and how incredibly typical of your standard city council, in that they decided to dictate economic policy for an entire city when "two people showed up to comment for the resolution" and the city projects to spend a grand total of $2500 in the coming year on a seminar on Phoenix. I could almost see the council standing up and charging out of the room with no one following them like John Belushi.

Couple this with our esteemed US Attorney General Eric Holder admitting today in front of a congressional hearing that "he hadn't had time to read the bill", but that of course hasn't stopped him from saying it might require legal action from the Federal government and calling it dangerous.

Look, agree or disagree with the bill, but how about before you decide to file legal actions, pass economic sanctions or other equally "stupid and futile gestures" you read the bill?

Click here for a full copy of Arizona Bill 1070.

It's only ten pages and if you read it you will be one of the few people who actually have and are thus somewhat qualified to comment on it. My single biggest source of amazement in all of this is the number of lawyers who express an opinion on this law, but have failed to actually read the law. Again, you may read it and still disagree with it, which is totally your  right but at least you don't fall into the Animal House category of commentators.

Could we at least start to have an educated conversation on this instead of symbolic gestures of "support" or "disapproval" from both sides of the issue who haven't bothered to read the bill or visit the southern half of Arizona.

As an Arizona resident I can attest to the sometimes wacky nature of the standard Arizona state house politician. However, there is nothing funny about a situation where people are smuggled across the most dangerous terrain in the US to die in the desert, or be murdered, raped, kidnapped, extorted and blackmailed, all so businesses can have a cheap source of easily exploited labor and thugs can become rich exploiting these peoples economic desperation. There is also nothing funny about ranchers being murdered by drug smugglers on their own land, cops being shot and killed by illegals and the massive cost to the states as a result of the Federal governments failure to secure the borders.

So go ahead Austin, Los Angeles and San Francisco, pass your resolutions and keep your money. At least Arizona is attempting to restore the rule of law before our Southwestern border cities start to resemble the war zones of Juarez and other border cities that have become killing fields in the control of  the drug and human smuggling gangs.

Until then, enjoy our friends from Animal House and realize that the actions of most of the city councils and others municipal groups are just about as mindless and futile and their actions have now become a source of amusement here in Arizona. Almost 75% of the state is in full support of the bill, which when you consider Arizona is over 40% Hispanic means that over 30% of the Hispanics in the state support the bill as well. Could it be because they know the dangerous, ugly turn human smuggling has taken in the last few years and that if it remains unchecked the human and financial cost of continued Federal neglect of the border could destroy our state.

Read the bill...and enjoy John Belushi. I apologize for the few expletives, but it's nothing our last two Vice Presidents haven't said more than once.

The BP Oil Spill, already shaping up to be one of the nations worst environmental disasters in terms of total dollars of damage, is going to be the focus of an ongoing series of updates, commentaries and information from the lawyers heading up one of the most prominent legal teams.

The two videos we are posting here are featuring Frederick "Rick" Kuykendall of the Murphy Firm of Baltimore, MD and also a native of Fairhope, AL. If you are looking for the most current and comprehensive legal view of what is occurring on the BP Oil Spill litigation from one of the top lawyers in that area of specialty, be sure to watch both videos and come back weekly for updates on the case, litigation, judicial rulings or information on how you as a property owner or attorney in the Gulf Coast region can hear more from Attorney Kuykendall.

Frederick Kuykendall III has practiced law for over 25 years. The Murphy Firm, MD, along with Frederick Kuykendall was listed in 2009 Edition in Maryland’s Super Lawyers, and he has been included in multiple editions in The Best Lawyers in America and is AV rated by Martindale Hubble.  Kuykendall has been lead or co-lead trial and settlement counsel in cases resulting in over two billion dollars in relief to injured parties, in the areas of Class Action Litigation,  Environmental Litigation, Insurance and Consumer Fraud, Personal Injury and Wrongful Death, Prescription Medications, and Products Liability. He is a member and was appointed a Commissioner of the Alabama State Bar, serving on a variety of committees, and most recently was Co-Chair of its’ Judicial Liaison Committee.

Nationally, Kuykendall is also a member of The American  Association for Justice (formerly ATLA), serving throughout the years on its most important committees, such as Public Affairs. Kuykendall is a member of the Leaders forum and was the recipient of The National Award for Special Skills as an Advocate. Other notable accomplishments include, his longstanding position on the Board of Directors of The Committee for Civil Rights Under Law and the Board of Directors of The Trial Lawyers for Public Justice. He has served on the Alabama Governor’s Commission on Environmental Initiatives and is an honorary member of  the Board of Directors of Mobile Baykeepers. He helped found the Pensacola chapter of The Riverkeepers, and has a long standing commitment to protecting the environment. He is also a frequent speaker at state and national seminars and was recently appointed to the Board of Governors of the Maryland Association of Justice.

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Kuykendall has extensive experience litigating environmental damage cases, and has extensive experience litigating against the oil industry.  In 2009, he was co-lead counsel against Constellation Energy in an action that resulted in pollution abatement and damages to citizens whose water had been contaminated by chemicals.  In major cases against Weyerhauser Paper, Shell, Exxon, Hoechst Celanese, Conoco and others, Kuykendall has demonstrated a "no fear, no nonsense" approach.

" We are witnessing the beginning of what may very well become the largest environmental disaster in the history of the United States. The source of the spill is still spewing upwards of 50 million gallons of oil a day into the spawning grounds of shrimp, snapper and oysters in areas of the Gulf waters. If the spill isn't contained, it will soon threaten critical gulf beaches and marshlands. The impact on individuals and small businesses still recovering from a series of hurricanes is incalculable. The oil industry, like the financial industry, asked the citizens that populate the Gulf coast to trust them with our most valuable resource and they breached that trust. They must be held accountable and I, along with the group of dedicated environmental lawyers, have the skills and resources to do just that. While we all pray for a good ending, the courthouse doors of the Gulf Coast must be opened to protect our citizens and ecosystems."

Kuykendall’s commitment to environmental concerns is evident. He was appointed by the governor of Alabama to a select Commission on the Environment, is an Honorary Member of the Board of Directors of Mobile Bay Keepers and Co-Founder of the Pensacola River Keepers. Combining his concern for the environment with his legal expertise and resources Kuykendall has successfully brought polluters to justice. 

Be watching The Legal Broadcast Network each week for this comprehensive review and analysis of the BP Oil spill and the legal issues surrounding it.

In yet another of my personality quirks, I annually treat the NFL draft as a minor holiday and spend hours with my son Eli lining up our draft picks and projections for the Arizona Cardinals. This has evolved into our latest objective, which is to see which of us can get the most picks correct and top Mel Kiper Jr and Todd McShay in their projections, proving that our part time analysis is at least as good as their year round expertise. Lets face it, we work cheaper then they do, so lets see how our picks stack up this year:

Selection      Team                Mark                      Eli                Kiper                  McShay

1st              Rams             Sam Bradford                               Bradford

2nd             Lions           Ndamukong Suh                               Suh

3rd             Tampa          Gerald McCoy                                 McCoy

4th             Redskins       Trent Williams                              T. Williams

5th             Chiefs           Russell Okung                                Berry

6th             Seattle            C.J. Spiller                                    Okung

7th             Browns            Eric Berry                                     Morgan

8th             Oakland       Anthony Davis                                 Clausen

9th             Buffalo         Bryan Baluga                                   Davis

10th           Jaguars        Earl Thomas*                                  Spiller

11th           Bronco's      Maurkice Pouncey                            McClain

12th           Miami            Dan Williams                                   Kindle

13th           San Fran      Joe Hayden                                      Baluga

14th           Seattle         Dez Bryant                                      Thomas

15th           N.Y. Giants   Rolando McClain                              Weatherspoon

16th           Titans           Derrick Morgan                                Paul

17th           San Fran       Mike Iupati                                      Hayden

18th           Steelers        Kyle Wilson                                     Pouncey

19th           Falcon's      Jason Pierre Paul                               Graham

20th           Texans        Kareem Jackson                                Matthews

21th           Bengals      Jermain Greshom                               Bryant

22nd          Patriots      Brandon Graham                                Greshom

23rd           Packers      Rodger Saffold                                   Iupati

24th           Eagles          Tim Tebow**                                   Wilson

25th           Ravens         Jared Odrick                                    Thomas

26th           Cardinals    Nick Weatherspoon                          D. Williams

27th           Cowboys    Charles Brown                                  Saffold

28th           Chargers     Ryan Matthews                                Jackson

29th           NY Jets       Sergio Kindle                                     Joseph

30th           Vikings       Devin McCourtney                              Tebow

31st           Colts          Dymerious Thomas                             Hughes

32nd          Saints        Jerry Hughes                                      Odrick

The toughest calls are the Bills, who have an entirely new front office that has never drafted and the team is a mess, Jacksonville which clearly wants to trade down, Baltimore because they always pick the best talent regardless of need and Seattle because of two picks and a brand new staff in place drafting. I believe that teams will always reach for offensive tackles so expect all of the possible top talent to go quick and to even have a few filter into the end of the first round to restock Green Bay and Dallas. The run on offensive tackles is going to push Jimmy Clausen into a free fall if the Bills don't take him, which I pray they don't.

Seattle with their new front office is going to look to get good on one side of the ball and drafting where they are they need to get impact players. Grabbing CJ Spiller and Dez Bryant would give Pete Carroll his QB of the future and two big time home run threats to rebuild an anemic offense. They will go get their OT and defensive players in the later rounds.

Buffalo is in no man's land and will have to decide if they want to finally draft a real offensive tackle or grab a NT in Dan Williams that is solid but won't win them one extra game this year. Count on Chan Gailey pushing to build his offense and he needs a tackle badly.

Jacksonville will give Philly the chance to come up and get the impact safety they desperately need in Thomas and allow Jacksonville to move down the board and set up the Tim Tebow pick. He's not the best pick for anyone at that point, but he literally could be the reason football is saved in Jacksonville and the team isn't moved. It's a no brainer at that point in the big picture, much the way giving Jake Plummer a huge contract in Arizona was key in winning the  stadium tax vote that finally built the Cardinals new stadium. Economic reality often over rides football decisions and he could turn out to be a good pro quarterback.

Baltimore is slotted in every other mock draft as taking another receiver, which makes little sense given the off season trades. However, there will be talent there for the Ravens but I see them going defensive line or corner here with Jared Odrick looking like a Raven to me.

The Cardinals will have a choice between Sergio Kindle and Nick Weatherspoon, but I think they are happy with their picks last year, Cody Brown and Will Davis and that they know they have a huge hole at inside linebacker. Weatherspoon could start right away and dramatically upgrade the position by being a three down linebacker that fills the Dansby hole right out of the box with even more upside then Dansby had.

Anyway you look at it, the end of the round is a crap shoot, but I like my chances over McShay and Kiper, the one that will be tough to beat is Eli.

I am pleased to announce that The Legal Broadcast Network has entered into a production agreement to develop and produce for The Shurwest Financial Group a unique Network broadcasting platform titled The Annuity News Network. This production concept was developed by our creative and development team in our LB Networks division and is the first of several similarly creative broadcasting and marketing platforms.

We will be announcing further details of the channel, the shows, commentary and audience but the launch date is set for May 3, 2010 at the www.annuitynewsnetwork.com location.

As The Legal Broadcast Network has expanded it's expertise and unique tools for video and audio broadcast, our companion skills of show development, production, syndication and SEO have grown exponentially as well. Our clients at Shurwest are looking forward to the cutting edge production, syndication and reach of our networks in educating their agents, clients and the general public about issues of interest in the annuity markets, a market conservatively estimated at $50 billion per year for all different varieties and brands of annuity contracts. This material will be non-infomercial, high quality informative content and we look forward to this being the first of many niche, national networks to be rolled out in 2010.

Earlier today while watching CNN I was intrigued to see an interview with the former Toyota counsel, Dimitrios Biller, who had turned whistleblower and provided Congress with over 6000 documents related to the cover up, fraud and illegal activity. However, I was left frustrated by the shallowness of the interview, the lack of questions related to the legal obligations  and ethics he had as an attorney and other questions.

After switching off the interview I had our production staff at the Legal Broadcast Network work to contact Mr. Biller and bring him on our daily legal news show, Speaking of Justice, to try and obtain greater understanding of the issues this lawyer faced in first resigning his position at Toyota and then turning over this crucial evidence to Congress. In a matter of hours our staff not only had Dimitrios Biller on the phone, but conducted an intriguing 10 minute video interview that looked into his ethical duties as a lawyer, his knowledge of the alleged scheme and how he has held up under the constant pressure to sit on the information he had in his possession.

With in the hour of the interview our staff of editors and syndicators at Legal Broadcast Network had this video produced, aggregated and syndicated through our proprietary network and with in three hours we were the number one result on Google news and standard search under the topic's related to Toyota, Dimitrios Biller and other relevant searches. With in 48 hours after we further syndicate and distribute this unique, original content on a powerfully searched story such as the Toyota sudden acceleration crashes, I fully expect that LBN will totally dominate the video search metrics, news metrics and standard Google search.

It is clear that The Legal Broadcast Network has not only turned into one of the primary sources of original legal news content, but that virtually no online or specialty news organization can match our immediate and long term dominance in search engine results on the content we create.

Check out our  interview with Dimitrios Biller on the Toyota sudden acceleration crashes and the ethical and legal issues he faced as an attorney working inside Toyota. Judge for yourself, but shouldn't you be considering becoming a commentator or guest on The Legal Broadcast Network?

I have to confess when I read the headline from the NY Times online this evening I was taken aback. Not that Air America Talk Radio was shutting down, but that it still was operating. Somehow I figured the prior bankruptcy filing had ended the network, but apparently it has been struggling along with 100 affiliated stations carrying their content.

I don't bring this up to be cynical or critical of the concept. Just as I believed growing  up in Boston in the 1970s and 1980s that there was a place on radio in that city for conservative talk that challenged the absolute lock on news held by the overwhelmingly liberal media, I similarly believed that progressive or liberal talk radio deserved a shot in the market place over the last decade in which most talk shows are overwhelmingly conservative.

However, just because they deserve a shot doesn't mean that they would succeed with the over top liberalism and mediocre impersonation of what theyperceived conservative talk to be. The times I listened to Air America for the short period it was broadcast here in Phoenix, it was dull, predictable,formulaic and essentially unlistenable. It played to a very small, very narrow audience of super liberals and leftists and the fact is America is a center/right nation. Just as excessively conservative shows that have no sense of humor and take themselves too seriously typically fail, the same was and is true of liberal talk radio.

My point in bringing this up is that as traditional radio continues to suffer from a steady drain of advertisers and audience, the expensive hosts and shows are  shutting down, scaling back and being let go. However, online offerings that are economical, on demand and targeted to specific audiences are thriving. Of course I think my company, The Legal  Broadcast Network, is a perfect example of what is thriving and succeeding, but there are countless other demonstrations of how the online broadcast world is booming while "regular radio" collapses. Take a look at how popular Adam Corolla's online broadcast is every day, compared to the shut down of his successful show on CBS radio when his numbers didn't meet Howard Stern's numbers who immediately preceded him on CBS morning radio syndications. You also have guys like Bill Simmons, The Sports Guy, from ESPN who continues to expand his online radio broadcast and building off his solid career as a writer,  with his the online audience growing every week to listen to his unique take on sports. Adam Corolla

The lesson is that the real innovation and talent isn't occurring under the tent of the insanely expensive traditional radio format, it is occurring online and to a lesser degree on satellite as a result of the democratization of broadcasting. The monopoly that existed for years where you were forced to listen to boring talk radio, lousy top 40 and inane sports talk are over. People have choices now that never existed before, so offerings like Air America and other similarly dull concepts finally have to prove their value in a highly competitive marketplace where people can seek out the talent and topics that actually interest them. I will be very interested to see which if any of the Air America hosts or shows move to online and find success there were a smaller but more focused audience might attract sufficient sponsors.

So, if you are interested in becoming a commentator and taking a shot at broadcasting yourself, you just need to contact our studios and we will be happy to show you how to get started. It isn't easy but it is incredibly rewarding and I encourage you to look into it and get started. It is cheaper then you might imagine, but as Air America shows, you better bring something that people actually want to listen to or it will be a long, quiet, slow slide to obscurity.

As we continue to build out our capacity here at The Legal Broadcast Network I am excited to unveil our new, twice daily, legal headline news update.

The guys at the studio have done an excellent job developing this concept and we will be updating our video and audio legal headline news feed at 12:00 pm EST and 4:00 pm EST every day of the work week, Monday through Friday. As we continue to expand the studio and resources we will soon add a morning update as well.

The best part of this update is you can capture our video widget starting next week by visiting our Legal Broadcast Network widget page, thus allowing you to put this live feed on your web page, blog, podcast site, etc. It costs you nothing and the twice daily update makes your page more dynamic, adds value to your viewers and readers and brands you as a member of The Legal Broadcast Network.

We will soon be rolling out our Facebook and Iphone applications for Legal Broadcast Network as well, where you can subscribe for free to either our Legal Headline News updates or any of our branded shows such as Speaking of Justice and Voices of the Law.

Let me know what you think and be sure to contact our studio if you want to add this to your site, they will be more then happy to help you out.

Legal Headline News

As we close in on the end of 2009 and I am looking back over what is soon to be the 5th calendar year of operations for The Legal Broadcast Network, I am amazed at several key statistics and observations on the data that jump out at me. As some of you no doubt know, The Legal Broadcast Network started out in 2005 as a weekly live streaming broadcast with two shows that proved the concept that internet content focused on lawyers, law students, journalists and consumers had a future.

However, as subsequent years showed, there were no shortage of firms looking to graft an "old media" model and pricing of services on to what should be a largely free service to consumers and lawyers. The first battle was insanely expensive production firms that wanted to exploit their technical monopoly creating audio broadcasts. We solved that issue by moving production off the coasts and into Phoenix, AZ and drawing from the incredible talent being produced every year by the ASU Cronkite School of Broadcasting. No more rip off rates, limited access or faux "tech wizards" to inflate the cost of producing audio and subsequently video broadcasts. Our all digitial studio is state of the art as our content clearly demonstrates.

The next element was the thieving "web guru" firms that looked to build our web sites, launch marketing campaigns and do "web promotion". To look back on what was delivered and the cost that was charged, not to mention the attempts to latch on to and leech off our business model by some of our early firms, it is amazing we survived or even had a web site to operate from. Finally developing internal expertise and cutting loose web consulting firms that had a vested interest in keeping us confused, in the dark and dependent upon them was liberating to say the least. The Scream, Stop wasting your marketing dollars!

So as our network evolved into a full blown production, news gathering, broadcasting and marketing platform, the on going process of developing our expertise and cutting loose firms that looked to suck the life out of our cash flow and sponsors was completed, so that in 2009 The Legal Broadcast Network can confidently control it's own destiny minus the old media dead weight and destructive thinking that threatened to kill our model at various points over the  years.

What this experience taught me as we developed our advertising, marketing and broadcast packages for lawyers is that most if not all lawyers are being brutally ripped off by the "new media" experts that work the convention and trade show circuit and dupe these attorney's into spending huge money for little or no practical results. The products may come with "new media" wrappers and brochures, but they are really nothing more then old radio hacks along with print and trade associations frantically looking to suck the naive and desperate lawyers into propping up their failed and failing business models.

Lets face it, legal publications along with other media are collapsing in the rush to new media and just like local news papers, business to business publications and services are losing their grip on pricing and performance. They are desperate to graft their old pricing model on to their new media offerings, charging insane rates for billboard display, to sponsor podcasts and god forbid you want to actually create a legal show or commentary, you better back up the Brinks truck! Plus, all of this new media "coverage"  they supposedly create has almost no search engine value and no one ends up reading, hearing or viewing the insanely expensive media they create and try to justify as a valued spend for the naive lawyers they pitch their wares too.

Let me, a guy with real battle scars in new media, put it to you in very simple terms.

If you and your law firm are spending more than $500 a month to produce, host and syndicate a monthly audio podcast, you and your partners are idiots.

If you and your law firm are spending more than $1000 a month to produce, host and syndicate a monthly video podcast, you and your partners are idiots.

If you and your law firm are spending more than $2000 to create, produce and edit quality finished videos for your law firm, you and your partners are being ripped off.

If you and your law firm are spending ANY money to SEO firms to move you to first results in Google you are like a crack addict who can't  stop paying them because the day you do, your Google ranking will drop like a stone. You guys are at the mercy of firms doing things that can't be sustained as Google continues to evolve and squeeze out the SEO scammers who sell juiced links.You have no strategy other then throwing money at something you don't understand but think everyone else is doing.

Folks, if I can share one bit of wisdom in looking back over the last 5 years and provide some serious advice, the only way to effectively market your firm and services is to get a top quality MARKETING person who realizes the internet is a big part of your over all efforts and who effectively purchases new media tools that are demonstrably effective, low cost, high value and leverage their over all marketing for your firm. Develop an integrated strategy, stop wasting money on expensive SEO, email and other efforts that aren't tied into an over all plan. Stop buying the nonsense being pitched on the legal convention trade show circuit that purports to "get you on the air" but is nothing more then money used to prop up their old media cost structure.

If you want new media and you want it to be cost effective, efficient and for it to make the phone ring, drop me an email or call me at the Legal Broadcast Network studios and I'll put you in touch with some of the best legal marketing firms and experts in our business. These independent professionals can help you decide if new media is right for you. Just do me and your firm a favor, stop dumping money into these  rip off services and "broadcasters" who promise much, charge more and deliver next to nothing. We will all be better off for it.