Wednesday, January 23, 2013
NLRB refines position on employee social media and workplace criticismMy personal policy is to refrain from discussing work on social media. In all my years of Twitter-ing and Facebook-ing, I’ve posted only a very few work-related updates, invariably focused on interpersonal minutiae like elevator …Tuesday, January 22, 2013
‘Escape from Tomorrow’, filmed in Disney World without permission, debuts at SundanceSteven Zeitchik of the LA Times: To make the movie, [Randy] Moore wouldn’t print out script pages or shot sequences for the 25 days he was filming on Disney turf, instead keeping all the info on …Thursday, January 17, 2013
Non-interfering citizens should be able to videotape on-duty policeIf someone is videotaping a police incident, but not interfering therewith, there is no lawful justification for police interference. I’m not always in agreement with the ACLU, but this harassment must end. A nation where state …Thursday, January 17, 2013
Panetta Ties Delay of Aid in Mali to Legal QuestionsAs I learned in that international law class I took last semester (for which, in case you were wondering, I earned a very respectable grade), there are Administration lawyers working feverishly behind every such move to ensure that we’re complying …Wednesday, January 16, 2013
Shawn Blanc explores Simplenote alternativesThe Simplenote/nvALT sync issues recently scared me away from Simplenote sync. I use Byword on the Mac and iPad, and Epistle on Android to sync notes with my Dropbox account. PlainText is also very good for this. I haven’t had any problems since going …Tuesday, January 15, 2013
Facebook “Graph Search” mines your network in response to plain-language queries I predict it will be panned because it’s not “sexy” enough for the expectations Facebook raised, but that it will also be widely-used. It looks to me like one of those things people don’t know they want …Tuesday, January 15, 2013
Designer Eats EngineerLaurie Voss: It’s getting easier for designers to become engineers. That’s a good thing, but it should be even easier. Design should be the hard part. This is a great post, and something I think about often. I can read and write a lot of HTML and CSS, and can read some …Tuesday, January 15, 2013
The Verge picks the best reads of 2012This is a great list, and includes only a few that missed, which probably means I read too much about tech. But what I particularly like about it is that most of the stories would appeal in one way or another to even to “normals”who don’t obsessively follow the …Sunday, January 13, 2013
More House of Representatives data available in XMLO’Reilly's Alex Howard reports that both House floor summaries and bulk downloads of all House legislation are now available in XML. It doesn't mean everything Congress does is available yet, but it’s a great progression. I really hope some …Sunday, January 13, 2013
Larry Lessig on the suicide of Aaron SwartzIt’s a tragedy, as suicide always is, but Mr. Lessig asks important questions about one of the undoubtedly myriad experiences that led Mr. Swartz to his final act. The internet can express our condolences, but only Aaron’s family and friends can truly …Friday, January 11, 2013
TechCrunch’s John Biggs on how to cover the Consumer Electronics ShowJohn Biggs, in a great post at TechCrunch about how they approached their CES 2013 coverage: But when you take a step back and look at CES from an innovation standpoint, and with the expectation that the big money here makes …Friday, January 11, 2013
Lions Gate abusing DMCA and ignoring fair use doctrineYou’ve got to click through and read this Techdirt article by Jonathan McIntosh of Rebellious Pixels. Also consider reading my article "The Pinterest (Er, Tumblr) Problem, Fair Use, and a Suggestion for Change". I argue that fair use, which is an …Friday, January 11, 2013
UPenn criminologist Richard Berk’s recidivism-prediction algorithmWired's Kim Zetter: To create the software, researchers assembled a dataset of more than 60,000 crimes, including homicides, then wrote an algorithm to find the people behind the crimes who were more likely to commit murder …Thursday, January 10, 2013
Law and the Multiverse analyzes ‘The Hobbit’ ContractI love several things about this: This is only the first in an ongoing series, with three other parts as of the moment I published this post. You can buy the contract from Peter Jackson’s film adaptation of The Hobbit on Amazon. James …Thursday, January 10, 2013
US suspects Iran behind DDoS attacks on banksThese look a lot like “feeler” operations, meant to gauge the reaction attackers can expect from victim institutions and nations. The United States (read: Congress) must act immediately to ensure that we’re ready when attackers stop slowing down or …Thursday, January 10, 2013
Lawyers on QuoraFormer Facebook CTO and Quora co-founder Adam D’Angelo, talking to Om Malik at GigaOM: The real reward is in the response to your answer and the fact that millions can read it. You already see more people giving and sharing knowledge for free. Lawyers and other professionals are …Wednesday, January 9, 2013
Witness intimidation reform on the horizon in PhiladelphiaThe Philadelphia Inquirer’s Craig R. McCoy reports on a recent special commission report on the problem and some suggested solutions. In a city where street wisdom warns that “snitches get stitches,” this is an encouraging development.Wednesday, January 9, 2013
Introduction I hesitated to change themes because, well, it’s one of those things people do instead of writing. But while my customized version of Quite Big theme had treated me very well, I hate using Tumblr’s default mobile theme on phones, or seeing my desktop-optimized layout on a tablet. I also …Wednesday, January 9, 2013
Student loses suit over school ID requirementWired's David Kravets reports that: The girl’s father, Steven, wrote the school district explaining why removing the chip wasn’t good enough, that the daughter should be free from displaying the card altogether. “‘We must obey the word of God,” the …Wednesday, January 9, 2013
California Scout group recommends openly gay member for EagleThe Scouts’ central authority is unlikely to honor the recommendation because of their culture of fear and hate toward LGBTQ people. And the law may be on Boy Scouts of America’s side, at least for now, but history is not. Future …Tuesday, January 8, 2013
App to App HandshakesFred Wilson: This morning I was at the gym listening to the Django Unchained Soundtrack on my phone in the SoundCloud android app. I decided I wanted to make Trinity my song of the day on Tumblr. I hit the share icon, up came a list of apps, I selected Tumblr, and I was taken …Tuesday, January 8, 2013
Seldo’s Tumblr: Another awesome US immigration experienceseldo: So a little over a month ago I finally got my green card. So for the first time in 7 years of living in the US and periodically leaving it to visit my family, I wasn’t terrified that my visa documents wouldn’t be in order and I’d …Monday, January 7, 2013
Subscribe to The Brief if you like concise daily updates on the tech news that mattersThe ads weren’t working, so The Brief is now accepting $3/month or $30/year memberships. The incredibly useful site by Richard Dunlop-Walters will remain free to all, but it’s continued existence is now predicated …Monday, January 7, 2013
Keycard: A neat little Mac app that secures your computer by detecting the proximity of your mobile device - The Next WebMatt Brian writing at The Next Web: In our tests, I had mixed results. Initially, my iPhone continued to remain in range, meaning that if I was to walk around the office or …Monday, January 7, 2013
Antivirus pioneer John McAfee spying on BelizeNate Anderson, at Ars Technica: You will not be shocked to learn, dear reader, that McAfee’s massive spy operation didn’t just reveal some petty corruption or embarrassing secrets but rather the existence of a Hezbollah trafficking network that funneled …Monday, January 7, 2013
Airrand mashes up tasks, Foursquare, and SMSThis is a brilliant and elegant use of Foursquare. It’s just a web app, at least for now, so it doesn’t really fit my use case. But it looks impressive and I’m going to give it a try.Saturday, January 5, 2013
CIA Comments on Zero Dark ThirtyDeborah Pearlstein of the law blog Opinio Juris shared the statement of Michael Morell, the Acting Director of the Central Intelligence Agency, on the film Zero Dark Thirty, about the hunt for and capture of Osama Bin Laden. Its interesting that he would feel …Friday, January 4, 2013
At least one Ars Technica reader agrees: Rdio > SpotifyArs Technica reader jamieskella, contributing to Chris Foresman’s reader recommendation round-up for all those newly-gifted iPads out there: How and why is Spotify still being recommended when Rdio (free) boasts 18 million songs and is …Thursday, January 3, 2013
Learning by ShippingFormer Windows executive Steven Sinofsky, explaining the name of his new blog: The title comes from something impressed upon me early in my career, which is that learning as an engineer comes from the process of starting, then finishing, and iterating on products–getting …Thursday, January 3, 2013
An interview with Mailbox founder Gentry UnderwoodAbdel Ibrahim, interviewing Mailbox founder Gentry Underwood at The Tech Block: Any plans for an Android app? Definitely. Startups focus or die, so we picked one device (iPhone) and one platform (Gmail) to start, but we’ve designed our …