The Web's Rate-a-Lawyer

Finding and vetting a good lawyer can be a challenge. To make the process more consumer-friendly, Mark Britton, a former general counsel at Expedia.com, is trying to tear a page from the travel Web site's playbook in creating his year- old site, avvo.com. Avvo (from the Italian word for lawyer, avvocato) rates lawyers on a scale from 1 to 10 by scrutinizing their professional and disciplinary histories. The free service uses that data to create profiles that can include client reviews and peer endorsements.

Britton, a lawyer for 16 years —he rates an 8.2 on the site—hopes to offer more transparency and better guidance than a popular resource for many consumers: the Yellow Pages (T). For the growing number of Americans grappling with foreclosures, bankruptcies, and other legal woes, Avvo has a forum where consumers can anonymously ask legal questions and get personalized answers from real lawyers (though without attorney-client privilege).