On the heels of my most recent Avvo post, over the past week, I received the following communications from an attorney who wishes to remain anonymous and who has had his own difficulties with Avvo’s bizarre rating and registration system.  My chief criticism, and why I primarily think it’s a scam, is because you can’t cancel your membership/registration (which is utterly ridiculous), and it’s a system which is biased against solo practitioners and small firms because of the amount of time and labor it takes to complete a profile.

Fri, Mar 19, 2010 at 5:33 PM

I would like to provide you with information on AVVO to update your blog.

I just rated a lawyer who did wonderful work for me and the rating was declined as not acceptable under AVVO’s “community standards.”  My clients have tried to rate me and their rating[s] have been declined.

AVVO gave me 1 star without knowing anything about me except that I had been disciplined for political activities during the farm crisis in 1986.  The discipline originated in Timbuktu and Xanadu was required to reciprocate.  The discipline in Timbuktu is over 20 years old, longer than either Mark Britton, AVVO’s founder, and Joshua King, AVVO’s in-house counsel, have even been practicing law.

I am attaching my CV for your information.

I look forward to sharing my research into AVVO with you. This organization claimed freedom of speech to avoid a damages claim at its inception.  There is now overwhelming information that AVVO libels lawyers and its secret “community standards”  prevent client ratings.  The ratings of Britton and King are from cronies.  These men have never litigated a single case as far as I can tell.

Thank you for assisting in the exposure of this scam organization.

Anonymous

P.S.  I have a telephone conference scheduled with AVVO’s general counsel Joshua King next week.  I refused to even talk to customer service.  I will keep you advised.

Tue, Mar 23, 2010 at 11:58 AM

I will be talking AVVO’s general counsel, Joshua King, tomorrow.  He is rated by his own company as 10:  Superb.  I will send you a complete posting for your blog after that.  You have my permission to post my recent e-mail to your blog and I would like to send you another posting after the discussions with Joshua King.  I am forwarding an e-mail discussion with one of my clients, who is a paralegal and an IRS-EA.  You might find it interesting.  I have deleted her name from the correspondence.

Tue, Mar 23, 2010 at 12:05 PM

Thanks so much, XXX!  Yours is one of 8 known reviews that was actually accepted by the system.  Most were rejected due to their internal “community standards” which are amazingly vague.  You will love this.  AVVO claims to be subjective, but the system rejects client ratings that are not objective.  They won class action lawsuit early in their existence claiming First Amendment rights because the federal court judge gave them a pass on being “subjective” and expressing their “opinion.”  Now, let’s get this straight:  they are “subjective” but client ratings must be “objective.”

Thu, Mar 25, 2010 at 2:45 PM

My legal assistant listened to the telephone conference between me and Attorney Joshua King and myself today.  He is also a computer programming expert and knows how algorithms are created.  It appears that Mr. King and Attorney Mark Britton created the algorithm based upon how they would rate themselves.  Please note that Mr. King is rated 10 and Mr. Britton is rated 9.5 on their subjective rating system’s algorithm.

Many fascinating admissions were made by Attorney King.   Suffice it to say for now that AVVO started out with a subjective rating system.  This was admitted in a U.S. District Court action in the Western District of Washington. See complete decision on link:
http://docs.justia.com/cases/federal/district-courts/washington/wawdce/2:2007cv00920/144356/18/0.html.

Attorneys King and Britton imposed their subjective system on all other attorneys objectively.  Some of what Mr. King told me is outright hilarious.  He certainly does not deserve his self-created rating of 10.  Among other things, his admissions clearly demonstrate both fraud and reckless disregard for the truth.

Anonymous