the Mark Pike

I recently received a few emails from students at my law school alma mater who were looking for career advice. I thought I’d go ahead and post one of my replies publicly in case anybody else was interested in it. I know I would have appreciated the opportunity to read about somebody else’s input during the grueling job search process. Hopefully this helps, and please feel free to get in touch if you’re interested in any of the work I’ve done.

Do you actually have a web/tech background?

Prior to law school, I wouldn’t say that I had a technology background in the computer science / coding sense. Throughout college, I was pretty fascinated by the web as a medium for sharing information. Napster was in its prime during my freshman year and I signed up for Facebook during my last week of classes. I dabbled in some HTML in between (and ever since). As this was happening, I was studying at Duke’s Public Policy school and became interested in technology from a policy perspective.

More generally, was there anything specific in your background (or a combination of factors) that you emphasized when you applied for the EPIC internship?

I emphasized that nearly every job I had after graduating from college had something to do with technology, policy, and the intersection of the two. While at the Center for American Progress, I worked in online communications and helped out with a lecture series on topics like net neutrality, creative commons, and the wealth of networks. Whether working with an innovative digital music distribution service, campaigning for a national election, or interning for a non-profit devoted to empowering technology, all of my employment experiences made me confident that I could research and write about everything from consumer privacy lawsuits, e-voting fraud, and the digital divide.

Based on the work you’ve done for each organization, how did your summer with EPIC compare?

My summer at EPIC (an EPIC summer) gave me the opportunity to work on a bunch of different issues. Each week the IPIOP fellows were given new and engaging assignments and we got to explore a lot of different subjects. As a watchdog group, a lot of what we did was staying up to date and reacting to new policy issues. It’s fast-paced, fun, and you feel like your contribution makes a difference both internally for the organization and for the larger cause.

My summer associate job was a great opportunity to learn about private practice. I researched case law and wrote memoranda on a variety of legal matters including technology, corporate, real estate, and contracts. I never knew what I’d be working on next, and that was exciting. But, the work itself was fairly traditional and I was more interested in working on cutting edge technology issues and bigger picture policy work— things that my current position provides.

My fellowship at DHS helped me get a feel for how larger government agencies operate. It felt very stable, but very slow moving. It was difficult to quantify the impact I was making in such a large organization and that can be disorienting. But, in reality, the work you do in these types of agencies do make a large impact. I was working in the procurement office, and I learned a lot about legislation and regulations that deal with competition issues.

Lastly, I’m curious about the kind of work you do now for Facebook. Your job title (Platform Operations, Specialist) sounds more like a tech position than a legal position. Is that correct, or are you involved with the legal side of the company?

My current position does not require extensive coding knowledge, but it does require some level of literacy in order to talk about the issues. A large part of my daily job is to communicate policies to the developer community in order to ensure the best possible Platform user experience. I work cross-functionally with a number of teams at Facebook, including the Legal group to discuss issues like privacy and intellectual property. I’m not of counsel, but I do use skills learned in law school regularly to provide analysis. I love my job and I’m excited by the work we do at Facebook.

When I wrote my law school application essays several years ago, I talked about my interest in technology policy and where I wanted to be when I graduated. I just took a another quick look at my application again and it surprised me.

First, I’m lucky the admissions committee let me into school with the cheesy, sophomoric, idealistic essay I sent them.

“… I once read an article in Wired magazine about telecommunications firms that were buying railroad routes and installing fiber optic cable, and how they were using archaic laws from the Wild West to solve new legal issues. This was probably the tipping point, the moment I realized I want a legal background. The parallels in American history became apparent: the San Francisco gold rushes, the dot-com bubble bursts, the Pacific railroads, and the Silicon Valleys. There’s a new high-tech frontier, and I want to be a part of it.”

It’s funny how things work out.

Tomorrow morning I start a new job at Facebook in Palo Alto, CA.

I’ll be joining the staff on the Platform Operations team where I’ll participate in policy discussions and help identify ways developers can make applications that will give users the best possible experience.

I’m really excited about this new opportunity and I look forward to working with so many talented people. The ‘app economy’ is just getting started and it’ll be an amazing learning experience to be in the middle of things.

“You and I, my dear friend, have been sent into life at a time when the greatest lawgivers of antiquity would have wished to live.” – John Adams, in a letter to George Wythe (1776)

Early on, our William & Mary law school education was placed within the context of history. During the first week of class—affectionately referred to as “law camp”—we walked from the Wren Chapel down Duke of Gloucester Street, tracing the footsteps of scholars. My class sat in the Kimball Theater as Professor Douglas regaled us with tales of Jefferson, Wythe, Marshall, and Tucker. He spoke of great men debating laws, studying classics, and laying the foundation of a new country— America’s first citizen lawyers.

Quoting heavily from his work “The Jeffersonian Vision of Legal Education”, Douglas explained how Jefferson and his generation saw how well suited lawyers were to “exercise public virtue”. In preparation of their legal careers, not only did Wythe’s students participate in moot court, but they also held debates about government functions in the old colonial capitol. After such an introduction to our great expectations, we were eager to begin. Books in hand, heads held high, we walked into the entrance of the school past the bronze statues of Marshall and Wythe where it is inscribed: “Here we will form such characters as may be useful in the National Councils of our country.”

During the founding of this country, Alex DeTocqueville observed, “In America there are no nobles or literary men, and the people are apt to mistrust the wealthy; lawyers, consequently, form the highest political class.” As such, we have a tremendous responsibility to be statesman-lawyers. So many lawyers who have come before us have fought for those who have not had the privilege to make choices, for those who have not had these opportunities to serve. Women, such as Ruth Bader Ginsberg who graduated at the top of her class, were once faced with law firm interview sign-up sheets that said “men only”. As I reflect on America’s first generation of citizen lawyers, those men in Wythe’s classroom, those men now in bronze, I cannot help but think that we can be greater. We can build on their progress. Our generation will be asked, “When you die, will you have left the law better or worse than you found it?” If we are to be true citizen lawyers, we will make it better.

Excerpted from my final essay in W. Taylor Reveley III’s seminar on The Citizen Lawyer. I also had the privilege of interviewing Reveley, the college’s president, about the future of William & Mary during my last radio show (and, we videotaped ourselves dancing in the studio, which became a viral hit on campus).

P.S. Did I mention I graduated!?

During today’s episode of “Headphones Are Stethoscopes”, my weekly radio show at the College of William & Mary, I posted a quick plug on Twitter to let my listeners know we were featuring music from bands showcased at SXSW.

I was pleasantly surprised when I got a reply from Peter Berkman, a member of Anamanaguchi, who apologetically self-promoted by requesting one of his own songs since they had just returned from playing SXSW. I promised him we’d play one of his songs if he let me interview him on the show. Deal!

Anamanaguchi is one of the biggest groups in the “bitpop” or “chiptune” movement— a musical genre that appropriates the synthesizers from video game technology. Essentially, they’re creating symphonies from the soundscape of my childhood.

In the interview, I mention to Peter that I once used his music as an example in one of my Intellectual Property law classes during a discussion of Lewis Galoob Toys, Inc. v. Nintendo of America, Inc. In that case, the district court wrote:

“Having paid Nintendo a fair return, the consumer may experiment with the product and create new variations of play, for personal enjoyment, without creating a derivative work.”

I really enjoyed discussing the issue with Peter and hearing about Anamanaguchi’s enthusiasm for making new things out of old things. Listen to the interview, and then check out their new album— which is best enjoyed as a visual experience.

The William & Mary Law School student chapter of the American Constitution Society (ACS) was recently selected as the national “Chapter of the Week”.

To earn the honor, we planned tons of events with prominent progressive speakers, maintained an extremely active policy blog, and much more. As the chapter’s president, I was very excited because this was a goal we had set as a group at the beginning of the school year. *High-five*

When I first started law school, ACS had only been around for five years. I was familiar with the group because their offices were located just upstairs from the Center for American Progress, where I was employed just prior to school. Before I even stepped foot on campus, I knew I wanted to join the club. Now, I am completely amazed with the progress of the organization— not just in Williamsburg, but all over the country. It is a testament to the forward-thinking scholarship and leadership within ACS’s ranks that a number of members have been tapped to serve in the Obama administration.

Personally, I have thoroughly enjoyed the opportunity ACS gives me to explore policy arguments while I’ve been in law school. Just this week, I posted some analysis about fuel-efficiency on our group’s website. Although a large percentage of law school consists of reading and taking notes about case law that has already happened, ACS provides an outlet to see how we can shape our legal policy for a better future.

In under 24 hours, I recently designed and built a web presence for a symposium on green building law. The entire process was one of the most exciting experiences I have had in law school

As the Technical Editor of William & Mary’s Environmental Law & Policy Review, my main job description is to maintain the journal’s online resources. The journal publishes several volumes a year, and each article’s citations and sources must be checked by our staff and uploaded to a shared server.

Prior to this year, the journal did not have much of a public face on the Internet. We are mentioned on William & Mary’s website, but the administration controls that space. This makes it very difficult to promote our scholarship and comment on how our work is applicable to contemporary environmental policy issues. Without an online publishing interface, we were locked out of the discussion; constantly playing catch-up with an archaic printing press process.

Now, with our newly designed website we were able to host a symposium that instantly put us in the mix. The summaries of the panels we hosted this past weekend have been getting views from all over the globe. Our old journal articles are getting a second-wind. We are influencing the policy discussion.

And, I learned a ton about Web 2.0 during the process. In an effort to give symposium attendees the chance to broadcast their commentary onto the site, we not only had comments enabled, but also embedded a box that featured a stream of live Twitter messages.

I had no idea how powerful Twitter was before the symposium. I’ve long been a fan of Facebook’s status messages and assumed Twitter was just another overlapping service. It’s not. By utilizing a “hashtag”, Twitter users at the symposium could essentially create an impromptu digital huddle and share their reactions with fellow-attendees, as well as folks thousands of miles away. This is something Facebook fails at because of its reliance on the friend-based social network instead of an interest-based network. Eventually, I see the two services merging and Web 2.0’s collective knowledge offerings will be even more powerful. Very exciting.

After an intellectually stimulating weekend, the journal has a permanent online home; and, I madesome new friends in the field of green building law!