In response to my earlier post noting that group blogs with revenue could be treated as general partnerships, and asking whether such partnerships ought to depart from the default rule that profits are shared equally, both Larry Ribstein and Gordon Smith argue for the KISS approach (keep it simple, stupid). As Gordon put it:
In constructing the compensation system, Steve is worried about incentives, but Larry Ribstein suspects that "the complexity of administering a precise incentive/reward scheme" might argue in favor of a simple system. I agree. Keep it simple, at least until the bucks get really big.
I agree, although apparently Eugene Volokh doesn't:
So the formula, which we cobloggers agreed to, is this ...: Each person is paid in proportion to the sum of the square roots of their post lengths, with the proviso that the post lengths are in words, exclude blockquoted text, and are capped at 900 words (so one gets no extra credit for words past 900).
Right. Sure. Uh-huh. Well, you know what they say about a lawyer who has himself for a client. (Christine Hurt puts the point more diplomatically, while raising some really tricky additional issues.)
