Why No Free Advice

Copyright 2009 by Ronald B. Standler


Since 1998 when I established my professional website — www.rbs2.com — people who read legal essay(s) at my website have often sent e-mail to me that asks for free legal advice on their personal problem.   This webpage explains why:
  1. Nonlawyers should not use my essays as a source of free legal advice on their personal problem.

  2. I can not provide legal advice to people in the USA (except in Massachusetts, where I am licensed to practice law), unless their local attorney hires me as a consultant.

  3. It is inequitable for attorneys and employees of for-profit businesses to use my essays as a source of information and ideas on problems that they are being paid to solve without paying me a licensing fee for use of my copyrighted text.

1. do not be an amateur attorney


It is not appropriate for a reader to use one of my essays as a source of free legal advice on their personal problem.   There may be facts in a reader's situation that distinguish the reader's case from cases mentioned in my essay.   Only an attorney who is licensed to practice law in your state can interview you to obtain all relevant facts, read relevant contracts and documents, frame issues, do legal research, and then give legal advice to you.
My disclaimer, which is linked at each of my legal essays, specifically says:
Essays on this website are neither legal advice nor legal opinion.   Accessing this website, or reading an essay on this website, does not create an attorney-client relationship.   You should seek professional counsel from an attorney who is licensed to practice law in your state, before you act or rely on any information provided on this website.
Those words are really important.   My disclaimer is also part of the contractual conditions for your use of my website, as stated at the bottom of my disclaimer and also at the bottom of the terms of service for my website.
Readers — even well educated readers, such as professors — send me e-mail that shows glaring ignorance of basic concepts in law (e.g., difference between civil and criminal law; distinction between copyrights, patents, and trademarks; etc.).   I am not criticizing nonlawyers for their ignorance of law.   I am only pointing out that nonlawyers are in a poor position to analyze their legal problem.   A nonlawyer is likely to miss legally significant facts and overlook relevant legal issues.

2. advice in USA
but outside Massachusetts


I am licensed to practice law only in Massachusetts.   I must obey the rules of professional responsibility and I must obey laws in other states that forbid the unlicensed practice of law.   The only way that I can legally give advice to people in other states of the USA is if their local attorney hires me as a consultant.

Readers often send me e-mail that alleges "I am not seeking legal advice", but then they ask for my "thoughts" or my "opinions" on their personal legal problem.   It does not matter how a reader characterizes their request, such requests are inviting me to engage in the unlicensed practice of law in their state.   Such specious characterizations of their requests is another example of the ignorance of nonlawyers about the law.

The only advice I can give to people in the USA outside Massachusetts is to find and hire a local attorney.   I have posted hints for how to find a local attorney.   After your local attorney hires me as a consultant, I would be pleased to use my knowledge and experience to help solve your problem.

I am not being unfriendly — uncollegial in the case of professors — in refusing to help people outside of Massachusetts, my response is required by law.   For example, attorney Laura Morgan on her webpage written in Jan 2002 says "Rendering legal advice to laypersons would subject the author to the charge of the unauthorized practice of law (a criminal violation) in those jurisdictions in which she is not licensed."

advice outside the USA

I can assist residents of nations outside the USA with problems involving either U.S. federal law (e.g., copyright law) or Massachusetts state law.   I also consult with attorneys outside the USA about U.S. law, including legal research.

3. exploitation


Law professors commonly write articles that are published in law reviews, and practicing attorneys commonly use those articles, without paying any compensation to the law professor and without paying any copyright licensing fees. Without commenting on either the legality or ethics of such copying, my situation is different from those law professors. Those law professors have a salary, are expected to produce scholarly articles, and they have free access to Westlaw.

In contrast to law professors, I am not on salary: I earn my living as an attorney and consultant in solo practice by selling information, scholarly analysis, and advice about law, science, and technology.   I did the legal research, read cases and law review articles, wrote and revised my essays to prepare myself to earn a living in specialized areas of law that are far from general practice of law.   I post my essays at my website to show the kind of work that I do (i.e., legal research and analysis), to attract paying clients, and to raise public awareness of uncommon legal issues that are interesting to me.

After I spent hundreds of hours of my unpaid time to research, write, and revise one essay on a topic of interest to a reader — and after I spent at least $3400/year in unreimbursed Westlaw database fees — it is not fair to me for readers to ask me to do more unpaid work, such as asking me for free legal advice on their personal problem.

When I am hired as a consultant on a topic of one of my essays, part of the money I earn will sponsor a revision of my old essay.   I will delay posting my revision at my website until after my client's trial and all appeals are completed, so that I do not provide free legal research and analysis to the opponent of my client.

On the other hand, if I am not hired as a consultant on a topic of one of my essays, then it is highly unlikely that I will do more legal research and writing on that topic, because I can not afford to spend substantial unpaid time on topics that are not income-producing.   You will find essays at my website that are more than ten years old, which I have never updated because of my lack of paying work on that topic.

exploitation by for-profit corporations

I often receive e-mails from attorneys or employees of for-profit corporations seeking free advice from me on a problem that they are being paid to solve.   It is inequitable for those attorneys or employees to be paid, and to receive credit, for (1) using the information that I laboriously collected, (2) copying my original expression, and/or (3) copying the novel ideas in my unpaid work.   I expect to be paid a license fee for each paper copy of my work that is printed, as a way of being compensated for my past work.

Both my website, www.rbs2.com , and each of my essays posted there are my personal property.   The essays at my website are not publicly displayed for the purpose of helping attorneys/businesses earn money and they are not publicly displayed for the purpose of giving free legal research/analysis to anyone.

If you need my assistance, please hire me as a consultant on your project.

legal protection of my essays

Note that my terms of service both (1) forbid quoting or closely paraphrasing more than 500 words from my essays and (2) require a citation to my essay for each quotation or paraphrase.   This is a contractual condition for accessing essays at my website, in addition to legal rights that I have as the owner of the federally registered copyright on each of my essays.   If you do not agree to be legally bound by my terms of service, then do not access my website, and neither read nor use my essays.


this document is at   http://www.rbs2.com/advice.htm
first posted 26 Nov 2009, revised 9 March 2015

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