Lawyers in the driver's seat

Let me start by saying that many attorneys are perfectly fine people. With that said, attorneys should, in most cases, be behind the news, not making the news. This week is interesting in having three major stories that involve lots of lawyers. Nokia and Qualcomm are bringing in a judge to help their patent licensing negotiations. Some AT&T Wireless customers (that's the original AT&T Wireless) want a judge to become involved in their customer-service problems with Cingular, which is now AT&T Wireless (that's the new AT&T Wireless). And if you don't think a whole herd of attorneys are going to be involved with the 700 MHz spectrum auction that's been set for January, then you're just not paying attention.

I suppose that lots of attorneys are a sign of an industry moving out of the initial engineers-and-entrepreneurs stage of development. In this transition, though, companies have to make sure that they keep the engineers working as hard as the lawyers or they risk losing it all--just ask SCO if you don't believe me. I'm not worried that we're about to run out of innovation in the wireless industry, but I do think that C-level executives have to keep their priorities straight--and innovation has to remain priority number one in a still-developing industry. -Curtis