Jonathan B. Wilson hosts #41

Not many corporate attorneys are both specialists in their field and keen observers of the broader body of law. Fewer still have written a book that diagnoses and prescribes cures for America’s legal excess. And of that number, very few have taken their views to the blawgosphere.

Jonathan B. Wilson, who is hosting Blawg Review #41 on his eponymous blawg, is just such an exception to the rule. A specialist in technology law, he is Senior Vice President and General Counsel of Interland, Inc., a company that helps small businesses develop internet platforms.

Jonathan founded and chairs the ABA’s Internet Industry Committee, and has published numerous writings on information technology, intellectual property, and ecommerce.

Last year, Jonathan broadened his focus, penning Out of Balance: Prescriptions for Reforming the American Litigation System, one of the most thoughtful recent treatments of our civil justice system gone awry. Out of Balance chronicles the high costs of litigation from the corporate lawyer’s inside perspective, but its treatment of law and economics, while erudite, is accessible to the novice. In addition to documenting the problems stemming from America’s lawsuit culture, Jonathan proposes solutions—namely limitations on punitive damages and a “loser pays” approach to shifting legal costs.

Jonathan’s foray into the blawgosphere includes his own weblog, where he covers a variety of legal and political issues, from litigation to foreign affairs to judicial nominations. Jonathan Wilson is also a regular contributor to Point of Law, a litigation-focused group blog and web magazine edited by Walter Olson of the Manhattan Institute, who is well-known to law bloggers everywhere as the founding editor of the Overlawyered.com weblog.

Having had the good fortune to get to know Jonathan Wilson over the past year, I am regularly struck by both his depth of knowledge and his breadth of interests. I eagerly anticipate his Blawg Review #41.

this preview was written by James R. Copland and