Blog: Is Yours SEO and Reader Friendly?

Originally published by Cordell Parvin.

Is your blog search engine and reader friendly?

I ask because I was looking at a well known firm’s blog posts. I thought the headlines were extraordinarily too long for search engines and social media, the font was too small and the paragraphs too long.

Headline

How long should your headline be? For an idea, read: What Really Is The Best Headline Length?

• Twitter: 71–100 characters
• Facebook: 40 characters
• Google+: 60 characters
• LinkedIn: 80–120 characters

Check also: The Anatomy of a Perfect Blog Post. There you will see:

In terms of SEO, the headline (or title tag) will need to be around 55 characters or fewer in order to fit the entire title on a search results page and avoided being abbreviated with an ellipse.

Font

What size should your font be? Some say:

• 16, or even 18 is the new 12.

My blog font size has been 14 for many years. Recently I changed it to Helvetica 15. What do you think?

White Space

That post also discusses white space. The blog posts I read on the well known firm’s blog, included lengthly, dense paragraphs that gave me a headache when I tried to read them.

It’s not just about font size – though it’s important. But white space is just as important. Your content is like a fine wine – it needs room to breathe.

Width

How about line width? Check out: 5 Simple Font Changes to Boost Readers, Comments, and Shares on Your Blog:

Here’s another little-known rule that a lot of blogs break. In order for your eye to easily follow one line to the next, you want no more than 75 characters in each line. This is called the line measure. Beyond a measure of 75 characters, it’s hard to track the end of one line to the beginning of the next without getting lost.

So, go back and look at your blog.

1. Is your headline SEO friendly?
2. Is your font easy to read on line for old guys like me?
3. Are your paragraphs short?
4. Do you include a visual to break up text?
5. Is the line measure short enough to be easy to follow?

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The Least Transparent Courts of Appeals

Originally published by Barry Barnett.

Survey says

Since January 1, 2007, I’ve surveyed decisions by the 13 U.S. courts of appeals almost every working day.

The experience has highlighted for me a range of quirks — from their highly variable websites to their peculiar schedules for releasing opinions to the small-bore or high-caliber of the disputes they decide to the great range of writing talent.

I’ve also learned that they vary a lot in their openness. That trait manifests itself most obviously in the seemingly mundane information they provide (or withhold) in the captions of their opinions about the cases they decide.

Today I finally took a look at how transparently these geographically, culturally, and philosophically diverse courts deal with facts that can aid people like you and me in assessing how well they do their jobs.

[See examples from all 13 of the courts at the end of this post.]

The basics

Some things appear in all the courts’ opinions:

• The names of the judges on the panel.

• The number of the case in the court of appeals.

• The date of the court’s decision.

• The name of the district court in which the case originated.

The identities of the judges — and particularly of the judge who authors the unanimous or majority opinion — of course does provide important information, but even there the judges may decide to obscure authorship by using the “per curiam” (by the court) device. The other bits of data tell you almost nothing that could help you evaluate the quality of the panel’s work.

Lack of transparency

Most of the courts of appeals do a good job of providing additional indicia regarding the judging process. But a minority of the courts stand out for their opaqueness:

• Four (the Fifth, Eighth, Tenth, and Eleventh) do not name the district judge whose rulings they review.

• Another four (the First, Second, Fifth, and Eighth) leave out the district court case number.

• Five (the First, Fifth, Tenth, Eleventh, and Federal Circuits) omit the date of oral argument or submission.

• In yet another quad (the Fifth, Seventh, Eighth, and Eleventh Circuits), opinions make no mention of counsel.

You may not think that these information deficits matter, but if you do I beg to differ. Leaving out details like these deprives the most knowledgeable observers — other judges, lawyers, legal reporters, and bloggers — of tools that can help them evaluate the quality and persuasiveness of the appellate judges’ work.

Your confidence in a Second Circuit ruling, for instance, might turn in part on whether the modern equivalent of Learned Hand or an imperious tyrant presided over the case in the district court. You would also like to know the identity of a trial judge who did something outlandish so you could either avoid his court next time or at least take his failings into account if you wind up before him anyway.

As for the case number in the district court, if you don’t know it, you’ll have trouble finding the relevant decision online through PACER. You may not (probably won’t) bother looking for it (who has the time?).

A big lag between argument of an appeal and the court of appeals action on it also undercuts the credibility of the decision. What took so long? What effect will the delay have on the lawyers’ ability to present the merits of the case? Can you remember the facts?

Finally, the failure to identify the lawyers who briefed and argued the appeals may seem innocuous, but again the knowledgeable observer will form a judgment about the court’s decision partly from the reputation of the parties’ counsel. You can also call them if you have their names handy.

Not all bad

The Second and Ninth Circuits stand out for offering a summary of each decision. The former far outperforms in the elegance of its precis, but both get big points for making the extra effort to enhance the understanding of their audience.

All in all, the courts of appeals do a splendid job with the work they have before them. A bit more transparency can make their product even better.

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Fourth Court Finds UIW Police is not a Governmental Unit

Originally published by Thomas J. Crane.

Well, it is hardly a surprise. The Fourth Court of Appeals has affirmed the district court and found that the University of the Incarnate Word Police Department is not an “arm of the state.” It is not a government. I previously wrote about this frivolous appeal  here. See San Antonio Express News report.

UIW says they will appeal to the state Supreme Court. Who knows what the Texas Supreme Curt will do. They will go to great lengths to assist defendants in personal injury lawsuits.

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Are Personal Assistants Eligible For Overtime?

Originally published by Vethan Law.

Personal assistants are often the untouted heroes of a business. Little sleep, intense focus, and ridiculously good organizational skills are needed to be a personal assistant of CEO’s and Presidents. Many personal assistants also wear a lot of hats. They are notetakers, meeting schedulers, children picker-uppers, doctor appointment schedulers, and outlets for the people they assist.

With the title of Personal Assistant, comes the knowledge that your standard nine to five hours and forty hours per week probably isn’t going to happen. A personal assistant is often attached at the hip of the person they are assisting. Most of those people work way more than forty hours per week. This begs the question, are personal assistants eligible for overtime?

Unfortunately, the short answer is no. The reasoning is laid out in the Fair Labor Standards Act in sections where job descriptions and duties are described. According to the FLSA regulations, an employee working in a bona fide administrative capacity, earning a salary of no less than $455 per week, who does not perform manual work directly related to management, and whose duty includes an exercise of discretion and judgement is considered exempt.

This is a long way of stating that any administrative type work from a personal assistant or executive assistant is not considered eligible for overtime pay. However, there are cases in which personal assistants have fought and won in overtime pay claims. This rare situation occurs based on the description of job duties. If the administrative tasks of the personal assistant are a small portion of the actual job duties, there is a chance that a personal assistant could qualify for overtime. Performing personal work for an executive, such as picking up children from school, scheduling doctor appointments, and managing personal purchases are all considered non-administrative work. Therefore these job duties are not exempt from potential overtime pay.

When it comes to being a personal assistant, primary job roles and tasks are key in proving if you should or should not be eligible for overtime pay.

If you are in need of a Texas overtime lawyer, contact Vethan Law Firm by calling our Houston office at 713-526-2222 or our San Antonio office at 210-824-2220.

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The Mini Cooper and Project Execution in Compliance

Originally published by tfoxlaw.

The price of oil hovers near $40 per barrel. There are all manner of responses suggested to this drop from nearly $100 per barrel just a short time ago. Yet the price of oil has long been much more than a political conversation, sometimes it leads to innovation. Today we celebrate the birth of the […]

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Surge Pricing for In-Flight Wi-Fi

Originally published by Josh Blackman.

Air travel has been revolutionized over the last two years–for me at least. First, the FAA eliminated the idiotic rule that prevented me from using my phone during takeoff and landing. That would eliminate roughly 30 minutes of productivity from every flight. Second, United (my airline of choice in the hub of Houston) has expanded Wi-Fi coverage to almost its entire fleet. This has increased my productivity in ways I can’t even describe, especially on flights during the day that are more than 2 hours long. On flights where the middle seat has been empty, I’ve even been able to set up my second monitor. With Wi-Fi, I can do everything I could do on the ground, in the air. I’ve even purchased the WiFi over my phone, and tethered over bluetooth to my laptop, so I can stay online without paying again when the laptop ban goes into effect during takeoff and landing. It has been a game-changer.

United, unlike American and Delta, does not rely on Gogo. Rather, it uses its own proprietary service, United WiFi. Unfortunately, United does not allow for a monthly subscription, but the FAQ says “we may offer these options in the future.” As a result, I pay the full price every time I fly. I’ve noticed that the rate bounces around, almost randomly. Here is a sampling:

• IAH – EWR, 3 hours cost $11.97 (Friday)
• IAH – MIA, 2 hours cost $7.98 (this was a mistake, as there was no coverage over the Gulf of Mexico)
• IAH – DCA,  unlimited for $6.99 (Sunday)
• IAH – DCA, unlimited for $4.99 (Friday)
• IAH – EWR, unlimited for $3.99 (Thursday)
• IAH – EWR, unlimited for $8.99 (Wednesday)

In other words, the prices for the same destinations are all over the place, even on the same trip. I suspected some sort of surge pricing was in effect. The New York Times confirms this may be the case, at least with respect to GoGo.

Consider the following increases: Wi-Fi service on transcontinental flights — such as from San Francisco to New York, from Boston to Seattle or from Los Angeles to New York — now cost $28 to $40, up from roughly $18 in 2012, according to Gogo.

Yet those numbers rarely show up in the average price quote for an in-flight Gogo Wi-Fi session, which now amounts to about $12, up just slightly from $10 in 2012. That’s partly because on flights where fewer people are likely to use Wi-Fi, pricing has remained unchanged, which brings down the average cost per session. For example, Gogo’s Wi-Fi service on flights between New York and Fort Lauderdale, Fla., has cost $10 since 2012. In addition, passengers can choose to pay smaller amounts to use Wi-Fi for a portion of a flight instead of the entire trip.

Gogo’s prices are not just higher now; they are also more unpredictable. The company uses a method called dynamic pricing, in which it tries to forecast the demand for Wi-Fi on each flight and scale pricing accordingly. So the prices for the full durations of transcontinental flights also change each day: Gogo charges the most, $40, on Mondays and Thursdays; Tuesdays, Wednesdays, Fridays and Sundays cost $34; and Saturdays are the cheapest, at $28.

At first travelers may balk at the high prices, but there is a good reason for it–congestion and limited capacity. Wi-Fi in the air is a classic example of scarce resources.

Michael Small, the chief executive of Gogo, said in an interview that the company had raised prices because demand for Internet service in the sky had exceeded capacity.

“We’re starting to have millions of users, so it’s getting more and more congested, and we have raised prices, which you typically do when you have more demand than you have supply,” he said. “There’s nothing to apologize for. We have trouble finding a business in America that does anything differently.”

Part of the reason Gogo’s costs can be so high is that the prevailing technology it uses has hit some limits. Its in-flight Wi-Fi works like the cellular network that provides service for cellphones, in which antennas are used to transmit signals to and from towers on the ground. Adding capacity is difficult because there is a limited amount of radio spectrum available for the towers.

To improve the situation, Gogo uses satellite technology for over-water flights, and the company is upgrading to a faster satellite technology called2Ku. The new satellite technology, which received regulatory approval on Monday and will be widely released next year, should add capacity and eventually let the company lower prices, Mr. Small said.

“When we start rolling out the satellite technology and bring out more capacity, we’ll be back in the business of trying to bring on new customers and grow the business and introduce exciting new price plans,” Mr. Small said.

Consider Southwest, which does not have variable pricing.

Southwest has about 550 aircraft equipped with Global Eagle Entertainment’s Wi-Fi services, said Kevin Kleist, Southwest’s manager of Wi-Fi and in-flight entertainment. He said the company had experimented with different prices before concluding that $8 was the sweet spot.

“You don’t want to overprice and not get enough customers. And you don’t want to underprice it and get too many and too much congestion,” Mr. Kleist said.

With respect to Southwest, I recently took a flight and paid $8 for Wi-Fi. I noticed that many people on the sold-out flight were signed onto their phones. It was so slow, it became unusable.  It was a waste of money. The Wi-Fi on United is really fast. I can even search WestLaw and other cumbersome databases with ease. On Southwest, the same search was so slow it became a waste of time to even try.

I wish United offered an unlimited monthly package, which GoGO does. I would buy it in a heartbeat. Or at a minimum, give customers with status, or who are in Business Class a steep discount.

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‘Godzilla’ El Niño is Coming and Will Bring Rain, Mudslides, and Floods With It

Originally published by Charles Mathis.

As my colleague, Kenneth Kan, noted back in May in his blog post, Experts Predict a Strong El Niño This Year, climatologists have been predicting a stronger than normal El Niño for the 2015-2016 season. New data is suggesting the upcoming El Niño will be the strongest on record.
For those unfamiliar, “[a]n El Niño is an above average warming of ocean waters that form off California’s coast. This body of warm water in turn lowers the jet stream, so instead of pushing storms north and around California, the flatter jet stream sends storms straight through California resulting in an extremely wet and stormy winter.”1 To try and determine the severity of an upcoming El Niño, scientists look to the temperature of the Pacific Ocean. “[An El Niño] can be classified as “very strong” if surface waters are running at least 2 degrees Celsius warmer than average for at least three months in a row.”2

The previous…

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