TLS WPA: Starting a Nonprofit ADA Trolling Firm Forum

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09042014

Diamond
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TLS WPA: Starting a Nonprofit ADA Trolling Firm

Post by 09042014 » Thu Nov 21, 2013 12:29 pm

Why don't the broke as a joke nojerbs start a nonprofit orgo to ADA troll. You work on contingency and reinvest in growing the orgo. You help by making the world more wheelchair friendly. You stop stop dwelling in your moms den.

Here is the genius part. You get your law school pals in firms to do your work pro bono.

Pay yourself 50k. Cop dat paye.

I call a position on your board of D.

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BarbellDreams

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Re: TLS WPA: Starting a Nonprofit ADA Trolling Firm

Post by BarbellDreams » Thu Nov 21, 2013 12:44 pm

We pitched this idea with a few people when I was a 3L. The problem with it is that there are very strict guidelines by which you need to abide to qualify as a nonprofit, and you typically need to be recognized and have connections to get grant money that nonprofits rely on to survive. With no startup money to even get a nice office and attend conferences I'm not sure how you get this thing off the ground.

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Nelson

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Re: TLS WPA: Starting a Nonprofit ADA Trolling Firm

Post by Nelson » Thu Nov 21, 2013 1:26 pm

You need capital up front which law grads don't have. You'll run out of money waiting to get your first batch of fees without IOLTA or grant support. Plus you'll need connections in the community to feed you cases. I know someone who did something kind of like this (mostly civil rights cases + indigent criminal defense) as a solo out of law school but they had lots of connections and had access to free office space so there was no overhead at first.

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Perseus_I

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Re: TLS WPA: Starting a Nonprofit ADA Trolling Firm

Post by Perseus_I » Fri Nov 22, 2013 1:50 pm

BarbellDreams wrote:We pitched this idea with a few people when I was a 3L. The problem with it is that there are very strict guidelines by which you need to abide to qualify as a nonprofit, and you typically need to be recognized and have connections to get grant money that nonprofits rely on to survive. With no startup money to even get a nice office and attend conferences I'm not sure how you get this thing off the ground.
Crowd funding?

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thesealocust

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Re: TLS WPA: Starting a Nonprofit ADA Trolling Firm

Post by thesealocust » Fri Nov 22, 2013 2:14 pm

You don't need any capital to farm work out to law firms.

ITT: DF and people DF is more cunning than.

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Nelson

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Re: TLS WPA: Starting a Nonprofit ADA Trolling Firm

Post by Nelson » Fri Nov 22, 2013 3:06 pm

thesealocust wrote:You don't need any capital to farm work out to law firms.

ITT: DF and people DF is more cunning than.
Risk averse law firms working with newbie grads with no experience or connections. Sounds realistic. Firm pro bono coordinators work with people they know already and who they know will do the hard logistical work of finding clients and training associates for them. New associates don't go around picking pro bono partners and even if they did you'll need full time people to find clients (and hence you need cash to pay those people). Why do you think people who desperately want to do this work are scrapping over the last job at legal aid instead of starting their own contingency ADA practice? ITT people who don't know anything about how pro bono practice works.

omg clay aiken !

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Re: TLS WPA: Starting a Nonprofit ADA Trolling Firm

Post by omg clay aiken ! » Sat Nov 23, 2013 3:54 am

way better idea is to file TCPA class actions and various other consumer protection class actions

09042014

Diamond
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Re: TLS WPA: Starting a Nonprofit ADA Trolling Firm

Post by 09042014 » Sat Nov 23, 2013 10:41 am

thesealocust wrote:You don't need any capital to farm work out to law firms.

ITT: DF and people DF is more cunning than.
Yea you don't need an office, secretaries, paralegals, delivery services, west law or really anything. Just a laptop with google docs and google voice or vonnage.

09042014

Diamond
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Re: TLS WPA: Starting a Nonprofit ADA Trolling Firm

Post by 09042014 » Sat Nov 23, 2013 11:11 am

Nelson wrote:
thesealocust wrote:You don't need any capital to farm work out to law firms.

ITT: DF and people DF is more cunning than.
Risk averse law firms working with newbie grads with no experience or connections. Sounds realistic. Firm pro bono coordinators work with people they know already and who they know will do the hard logistical work of finding clients and training associates for them. New associates don't go around picking pro bono partners and even if they did you'll need full time people to find clients (and hence you need cash to pay those people). Why do you think people who desperately want to do this work are scrapping over the last job at legal aid instead of starting their own contingency ADA practice? ITT people who don't know anything about how pro bono practice works.
At my firm you can bring your own pro bono work to the coordinator and they'll try hard to make it work. I could absolutely bring some bullshit ADA trolling shit and get it approved.

The hangup would be the issue about the non-profit being involved with contingency fees. I dunno if that is Kosher for a firms pro bono.

You don't find ADA troll work, you manufacture it.

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