#2: Third-year law student wonders if it's a bad idea to give legal advice on the net

Randy, I'm a third year law student with no degree and without a bar certification. I would like to start giving out legal advice over the internet. Can you think of any reasons why this would be a bad idea?

Thank you in advance, 
Patrick D. 


Patrick, do you remember the Romanian gymnast Dominique Moceanu of the gold-winning USA squad in the 1996 Summer Olympics?


 Moceanu was a member of the "Magnificent Seven"; she was one of the greatest gymnasts in the world. And you know what? She was fourteen years old at the time.


Dominique Moceanu was fourteen years old. 


There were thousands, maybe millions of gymnasts during those glorious weeks of the summer of 1996 who had more experience than Moceanu. They had spent more hours in the gym, more hours studying every nook and cranny of the balance beam. But for all their experience and all their studying, they could only watch as someone far younger and with far less experience wowed them and taught them about excellence. 


What I'm striving to do with my site, "Randy McDowell's Legal Advice- Not Your Ordinary 1L," is to be the Dominique Moceanu of legal advice. I'm not some crusty, been-there, done-that attorney who thinks he knows everything because he passed the bar in 1972. My eyes are on the bar now, just as Moceanu's eyes were on the balance beam. 


Why can't you too be the Dominique Moceanu of legal advice? Before I proceed, please take the following in the spirit in which it was intended. 


As a a third-year student, you're like the teammate of Moceanu's in 1996 who just missed the cut for the Olympics because you had a few too many miles on your body. About to enter the workforce, you think your professors and your summer jobs have given you the knowledge to dispense legal advice. 


To you, I say wait. We cannot all be virtuosoes. And that's not a bad thing. Life is richer when everyone knows the role he or she has to play. 


Best of luck in your legal career, Patrick.


Caveat: My answers very often will indicate the law as I feel it should be perhaps more than what the law is today. I am not responsible for any actions you take upon the advice I deliver you.