Tom Foremski: IMHO

Tom Foremski

Those MoFo Silicon Valley lawyers...

By Tom Foremski | June 9, 2011, 12:20pm PDT

Summary: MoFo lawyers are ready for the Silicon Valley boom…

I just saw “MoFo Tech” (above) an edgy-designed newsletter from Morrison & Foerster LLP, a top Silicon Valley law firm.

But I’m wondering about the title: MoFo? That’s a deliberate choice. Which leads to this question: are lawyers trying to neutralize a pejorative description that’s commonly applied to their profession?

The Gay community managed to own “queer” following the success of the African-American community, so are lawyers next?

Can lawyers grab “MoFo” for themselves?

It seems they already have. When I Googled “MoFo” this is what I found and it’s what you would expect to find:

But that was #4. All top three results were Morrison & Foerster LLP:

So it seems that with a bit of skillfully applied SEO, lawyers have managed to win the “MoFo” term for themselves, at least online. I’m sure many would agree that they deserve it.

So what happens next? Will only lawyers be able to “MoFo” each other?

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Topics

Silicon Valley, Tom Foremski, Newsletter, Law Firm, Lawyer, Morrison & Foerster LLP, Corporate Communications, Litigation, Web Site Development, Marketing, Business Operations, Internet

Tom Foremski reports on the business and culture of Silicon Valley at the intersection of technology and media.

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RE: Those MoFo Silicon Valley lawyers...

yantangseo 17th Sep

wow!!! beautiful!!! chanel bags

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They earned the right to that name

Will Pharaoh 9th Jun

many time over!

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Not so common ...

Rick_R 9th Jun

"are lawyers trying to neutralize a pejorative description that?s commonly applied to their profession?"

I wouldn't say "commonly". There are a lot of pejoratives that are "commonly" applied to lawyers (and if I listed them, no doubt this post would be deleted) but "mofo" is pretty rare. I'd say "genealogical phrases" or "excretory orifices" are much more common.

Regarding "the lawfirm is the top three", no doubt that's temporary.

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RE: Those MoFo Silicon Valley lawyers...

FrederickLeeson 9th Jun

@Rick_R

I think that we should grant that they are something quite unique in the legal profession. Any law firm that calls itself "MoFo" is demonstrating a most unprecedented degree of honesty!