Legal Technology

Fake Law Firm Web Site Mirrors Reality

  •  
  •  
  •  
  • Print

A fake law firm Web site created to promote a new television legal drama at least arguably is uncomfortably close to some real-life versions.

Streaming video makes the “Hewes & Associates” site difficult to navigate. The 15-year-old fictional Manhattan firm promotes itself in over-the-top (albeit satirical) terms as “one of the country’s most highly respected—and feared—law firms,” proclaiming its “unparalleled skill” in handling “some of the highest-profile class action suits in recent U.S. history”—while at the same time maintaining a “substantial” pro bono case load. The realism is further enhanced by an anonymous law blog maintained by a disgruntled “senior associate,” as the Wall Street Journal Law Blog notes.

The new FX show the Hewes & Associates site promotes, Damages, starring Glenn Close as a lead litigator, has divided journalists at the WSJ Law Blog, Ashby Jones writes. “Some of us find it ridiculously compelling. Others of us find it, well, just ridiculous.”

Give us feedback, share a story tip or update, or report an error.