Fri 30 Sep 2005

Well, I passed. Yea! Can you find my name?
Posted in the morning [ /law ]

Thu 25 Aug 2005

Just for anyone out there who checks this space, I have a job in a small town in Southern Indiana, and that's just where I want to be. I've been blessed, and I'm keeping busy with work. My law firm does not even have a web site, or consistent internet access, so I doubt there will be a lot of action on this blog. So, don't bother hitting refresh over and over! (har har)

Anyway, Isaac is crawling, Jacob is adjusting to first grade, and Ben is suffering a mild case of middle child syndrome. If I think of anything else to report, I will.

Isn't Able Danger just turning into the Republican's Rathergate, only without the election backdrop?
Posted later in the evening [ /home ]

Mon 18 Apr 2005

I'm working on a paper about innovation and intellectual property, and wanted to discuss the bnetd case. I was just reading an amicus brief by the software, music, and movie industry trade groups, (found here) and a sentence jumped out and bit me, it was just SO WRONG:

Faced with the steep costs imposed by digital piracy, many content providers who would otherwise engage in a profitable creative enterprise may simply choose not to invest in the creation of intellectual property at all.

OK, how about "profitable creative enterprise"? Yep, profits are a good thing, aren't they? We gotta have profits, since without profits, the world simply wouldn't go 'round! You know, a drug dealer who decides to advertise by putting tattoos on prostitutes foreheads would also be engaging in a "profitable creative enterprise", too. But that's OK, right? Right?

The point of intellectual property laws, or laws in general, is to make this world, and specifically this country, a better place to live in. Is that so hard to understand? They don't exist just so some venture capitalist has an incentive to give money to long-haired CS majors.

Oh, and the last bit: "may simply choose not to invest in the creation of intellectual property at all." Yeah, those poor people who create video games; I'm sure they'd all get up and become tax attorneys or something because of the "steep costs" imposed that are described above. Right. Or better yet, Microsoft and other big software companies will retool and become hardware companies. Geffen records will disband. And Universal Studios will focus all its energies on its theme parks. Right.

There's something seriously wrong with this country that people seem to actually agree with these arguments. Of course, the silent majority (I'm convinced -- what percentage of the U.S. online population has participated in file sharing?) doesn't, but let's be a little less silent, OK?
Posted after lunch [ /law ]

Sat 16 Apr 2005

So, when I read complaints like this one, (oh, and by the way, Jeremy, that's not a rant. To be a rant, IMHO, you need to go on a bit longer, at least three paragraphs.) I wonder why on earth anyone would want to be an academic, anyway? Sure, there's the long summers, and tenure, but...

What I'm really getting at is, if you are even considering a career in the academy, you simply must read Lucky Jim, which I had never heard of until I came across this article via Arts & Letters a while back. I found it at a used book sale later, and though it sat on my shelf for a while, I got around to reading it about the same time I was writing my seminar paper last semester. (no commenting on how I might have gotten a better grade had I not been reading novels, now!) Now that I'm writing another seminar paper, it is foremost in my mind. Really, read it. It's great.
Posted in the afternoon [ /society ]

Thu 24 Feb 2005

Yes, I'm still alive, just busy and lazy. I've been working on my plan to destroy the earth. (Thanks, Daypop! See number 8.)
Posted in the morning [ /society ]