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joeross.me

Lawyer interested in the collision of law and tech policy. Prone to geekery.



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    Rhode Island legalizes same-sex marriage

    Rhode Island legalizes same-sex marriage

    The inexorable march of time sees a tenth state grant gay and lesbian people the statutory right to marry.

    Those states who have yet to get on board would do well to hurry: you’re quickly running out of time to look like you were ahead of the curve in the common sense of twenty-first century civil rights.

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    NBA player Jason Collins comes out as gay

    NBA player Jason Collins comes out as gay

    I don’t usually cover sports here, but Collins’ coming out is a very important moment in a broader and permanent change in what it means to be and to accept LGBTQ folks. It’s a well-expressed and bold piece, and I applaud him.

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    The next generation of Instapaper

    The next generation of Instapaper

    Marco Arment has turned control of his read-it-later service, Instapaper, over to incubator-turned-company-in-its-own-right Betaworks:

    I’m happy to announce that I’ve sold a majority stake in Instapaper to Betaworks. We’ve structured the deal with Instapaper’s health and longevity as the top priority, with incentives to keep it going well into the future. I will continue advising the project indefinitely, while Betaworks will take over its operations, expand its staff, and develop it further.

    What’s really intriguing about this is that the Betaworks website includes the following teaser:

    Want early access to the new Instapaper and other products we build and invest in? Join Openbeta.

    I wonder whether the “new Instapaper” is already in the works, or this is just a clever marketing ploy to get Instapaper fans signed up for Betaworks’ Openbeta mailing list.

    All in all, Instapaper is an amazing product, and if Betaworks’ reanimation of Digg is any indication, they’re a good custodian.

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    Not a Bad Quarter

    Not a Bad Quarter

    Marco Arment, he of Instapaper, and of excellent commentary:

    If you sell a 99-cent app to just 1% of the people who bought new iOS devices in the 2012 holiday quarter alone, you’ll clear about $519,750. Not a bad quarter.

    Not bad indeed.

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    Dr. Kermit Gosnell: Philadelphia's "Abortion" Monster

    Dr. Kermit Gosnell: Philadelphia’s “Abortion” Monster

    The Atlantic's Conor Friedersdorf quoting the grand jury report (PDF) on Philadelphia “abortion” monster Kermit Gosnell:

    The Department of State, through its Board of Medicine, licenses and oversees individual physicians… Almost a decade ago, a former employee of Gosnell presented the Board of Medicine with a complaint that laid out the whole scope of his operation: the unclean, unsterile conditions; the unlicensed workers; the unsupervised sedation; the underage abortion patients; even the over-prescribing of tramadol pain pills with high resale value on the street. The department assigned an investigator, whose investigation consisted primarily of an offsite interview with Gosnell. The investigator never inspected the facility, questioned other employees, or reviewed any records. Department attorneys chose to accept this incomplete investigation, and dismissed the complaint as unconfirmed.

    Truly horrifying.

    While it’s a loaded topic that deserves more space than I have time these days to give it, suffice it to say that I am against any outright ban on abortion. Note that I placed the word abortion in quotes because the late-term procedures Gosnell did were not what legally can be considered abotions under any current law or jurisprudence: they were murders.

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    How to add tasks to Any.do or Wunderlist via SMS

    This post is exactly what it says on the tin: I’ll share two recipes from if this then that (IFTTT), the service that connects otherwise unconnected pieces of the internet together in epic productivity bliss.

    Did I oversell that? IFTTT is truly amazing. One of its most useful functionalities is the ability to send an SMS to the service that triggers IFTTT to do something else. So, you can create a “recipe” that will forward all text messages in which you include a “#t” to another internet service, like an email address. Email addresses are particularly handy because many other services use them, everything from Evernote to Tumblr assigns users an email address so you can send stuff into your account right from your email provider of choice.

    That way, an IFTTT recipe can receive a text message and, as long as “#t” appears somewhere in the message (without the quotes), it will send an email to anyone I ask. Some services that let you add content via email assign unique email addresses that can receive email from anyone. They’re secure from spam because the email address is nonsense. Evernote does this.

    Others, however, use a universal email address and whitelist each user’s own email as the only one allowed to send stuff to that account. Task management services Any.do and Wunderlist both use this method, allowing registered users to send email to do@any.do and me@wunderlist.com, respectively. If the address you use to send the message is registered, the message subject is added to your account as a task, and the body is included as a note.

    Any.do is dedicated to creating the best task management experience on a mobile device, and they’re doing a great job. Wunderlist, while they have great mobile apps, is more focused on combining them with solid native desktop apps on all platforms. While I watch them add and refine features, I’m using them both.

    I know, I need to get a life.

    Anyway, this IFTTT recipe adds a task to Any.do via SMS. And this IFTTT recipe adds a task to Wunderlist via SMS. You should be able to edit the tag if you want, but I find “#t” is conveniently short, and the recipe will remove it from the final task anyway.

    I have a couple more IFTTT recipes to share, so if you’re interested in this stuff, stay tuned.

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    Taping of Farm Cruelty Is Becoming the Crime

    Taping of Farm Cruelty Is Becoming the Crime

    Richard A. Oppel Jr. reports at the New York Times:

    But a dozen or so state legislatures have had a different reaction: They proposed or enacted bills that would make it illegal to covertly videotape livestock farms, or apply for a job at one without disclosing ties to animal rights groups. They have also drafted measures to require such videos to be given to the authorities almost immediately, which activists say would thwart any meaningful undercover investigation of large factory farms.

    This is abhorrent.

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    Philadelphia councilman introduces bill aimed at improving health insurance prospects for life partners and transgendered people

    Philadelphia councilman introduces bill aimed at improving health insurance prospects for life partners and transgendered people

    This is an encouraging development. The bill introduced by Councilmen James Kenney and W. Wilson Goode would establish a:

    6 percent tax credit for businesses that did not previously provide online pharmacy health care to transgendered employees or life partners[. This] is a key aspect of this bill and would be the first credit of its kind in America.

    The ordinance would also require gender-neutral restrooms in city building and protect the right to dress as appropriate to one’s self-identified gender.

    While the article also quotes law professor Kermit Roosevelt’s sense that the law may not survive if challenged in state court, it’s heartening to see my home city championing legislation to improve the resources available to LGBT employees. Even more heartening is the focus on transgender rights, which are often lost in the much louder debates about homosexuality.

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    California law school grads suing schools; neither party has a good point

    California law school grads suing schools; neither party has a good point

    Attorney Michael C. Sullivan, representing California schools in a spate of fraud suits brought by students over shady job-placement numbers:

    "What I find most ironic is that those individuals advertised themselves to law schools as great critical thinkers," Sullivan said of the law-grads-turned-litigants. "Now they say they never considered the possibility that employment might include part-time jobs."

    Mr. Sullivan’s statement is ludicrous. The students pay, so the schools market. His clients, if the allegations prove true, marketed themselves as producers of very employable law graduates. It is perfectly reasonable to assume that when a law school shares post-graduation employment rates, the law school is referring to legal employment.

    My incredulity at Mr. Sullivan’s absurd position does not mean that I’m ignorant of the fact that many students didn’t try very hard to get a job, or didn’t like the jobs they got, or should have known the market for legal jobs is, to put it mildly, in dire straits, and has been for some time now.

    In fact, I have little sympathy for people swindled by Mr. Sullivan’s clients’ number games. Just search "legal job market" or "should I go to law school?".

    I knew when I signed up for law school in 2009 that things were not going well for recent graduates, and that they were not expected to recover before I graduated. I went anyway because I want to be an attorney. Never do something that requires years of your life and tens of thousands of dollars without doing your research.

    Due diligence is too strong a phrase for it: it’s common sense.

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    Apple removes app curation app from App Store

    Apple removes app curation app from App Store

    "Yes, you can live here," Apple seems to say to developers, "but if you ever break one of our vague rules, or if we ever decide for any reason or even for no reason at all that you must go, you will be evicted. No appeal, no questions asked, no discussion."

    I wish only the best to the folks at AppGratis, but this is the danger in building your business, and your employees’ livelihoods, on something over which you have absolutely no control.

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    Select YouTube partners exempt from fair use policy

    Select YouTube partners exempt from fair use policy

    YouTube’s well within their rights to refuse to leave a video up, or to re-post it after fair use has been reasonably well-defended. But it’s another reminder that when stuff is free for consumers, the interests of the producers providing the content will always take precedence.

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    Google fighting National Security Letter

    Google fighting National Security Letter

    The letters, issued by federal authorities investigating national security concerns, prohibit recipients from disclosing that they have received them, let alone what they’re asking for. The Judge in Google’s case1 struck down the law’s gag order provision as violative of the First Amendment, but has stayed the effect of that decision while the government pursues an appeal.

    I should note that I essentially paraphrased the Wikipedia article for that second sentence, as my knowledge of NSLs is limited. I look forward to reading more on them, and I’m glad to see a company with the clout and caliber of attorneys that Google has questioning the legality of the NSL framework.

    At first glance, it may seem odd that a company that siphons so much data about its users would be so protective of it when the government is asking for it.

    But it makes sense for Google to defend user information: it needs that information to make its advertising products more relevant, Many accept the trade of having their documents and emails scanned and anonymized by Google in exchange for exceptional and free services. If Google fails to protect that information from surveillance via legal tools of questionable constitutionality, the balance of that trade may tip too far for many users.

    Thus, this is one of those rare cases where corporate goals and user concerns are aligned.

    1. The caption for the case in question is In Re Google Inc.’s Petition to Set Aside Legal Process, 13-80063, U.S. District Court, Northern District of California (San Francisco) ↩

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    The trolls are now trolling themselves

    The trolls are now trolling themselves

    This great post by Seattle attorney John Whitaker sums up the state of affairs in the absurd debacle that is Prenda Law’s trainwreck porn-infringement trolling.

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    Why I Chose Temple Law

    I originally posted this to one of my old blogs, The Rotten Word, in April 2009. I wanted to publish it here as well because I plan to write a follow-up soon, having graduated in January of this year. Many thanks to Philadelphia litigator Max Kennerly for his advice and kind words about this post when it first ran. Also, this post by my Temple law classmate and friend Kishwer Vikaas Barrica was humbling, so thanks to her too!

    In the Beginning…

    It’s not a choice easily made. First of all, just the decision to take the LSAT is a journey in itself. It requires research, asking the right questions of the right people, preparing for failure and, perhaps most importantly, preparing for success. It’s the success that can be most confusing. After all, if you do poorly on the test the first time, you resolve that you probably didn’t take it seriously enough, or that it was just a bad day. There’s a “choose your own adventure” feel to it. The first time I took the LSAT, my score was embarrassing. The only saving grace was that the average friend and family member has never had any reason to learn the how the test is scored, so they don’t know how poorly I did.

    I could have gotten off the train right there. I almost did. I almost decided that maybe it isn’t meant to be. But then I thought about it, and remembered that I don’t think anything is meant to be. That’s the great liberating foundation of my personal moral value system: freedom at the cost of accountability. Things happen to me because (a) I have made a decision that caused them or (b) someone else has made a decision that caused them. Thus, I can decide that I’m not cut out for lawyering, or I can decide that I am, and then act.

    So I took it again. And I did better. Much better. Suffice it to say that I am no longer embarrassed, even by my first score, because my second vindicated me. I studied harder, focused more deliberately, and made executive decisions about which questions I could answer well and which ones I could not.

    But getting a score you can respect yourself for is only the beginning.

    Decisions, Decisions

    Will you devote all of your time to your studies, subsidizing your living expenses as well as the cost of your education? Or will you retain your current employment, making the (in my opinion) far more daunting commitment to maintain your financial standing and continue to accrue work experience while you submit to the rigor of a legal education?

    On the one hand, going to school full time looks like the most sensible decision. Everything you have heard about law school is true: it’s hard. It’s not an afterthought, or a hobby. It’s at least as mentally stressful as your job, and probably more. Like any graduate school, every hour of class time requires at least an hour outside the classroom. So, the ability to go to class all day and devote your evenings to study and work is a precious resource.

    On the other hand, the economy is (still) bad, and even if previously borrowed loans are deferred while you are in graduate school, there are bills and rent to be paid, not to mention food and (dare I say) the occasional drink. Borrowing money for these expenditures is inadvisable at best. Working through law school is difficult, but, since the evening division is a part-time program, credit requirements are flexible: you must complete a certain amount, but you have summer sessions during which you can earn credit, as well. You can keep earning money, and producing promotable deliverables. But you’ll be spending a few hours a night, a few nights a week, in a classroom. And that’s before you even start your homework. It may be a part-time education, but it’s a second full-time job.

    So why did I choose Temple Law?

    Well, even taking into account the (generous) aid package Drexel offered me, I would have had to borrow more money to cover living expenses than I’ll likely need to borrow to go to Temple. Also, my 401(k) account makes me smile, and cutting it off for a few years would mean less smiles. Finally, I’ve got a good thing going at my current job: good work, good people, good benefits. These are not things to be taken lightly in today’s job market. For every lawyer making $80k right out of school, there are three more at the unemployment office. And we’re talking partners here. People with experience.

    I made the commitment to work and go to school at the same time. I want to be confident about it, even arrogant. But the truth is that it’s terrifying. After all, I might not be able to do it. Then what? I don’t know. But I know that it’s what I want, and people do it every day. People with more stressful jobs, people with children. There are really no excuses.

    Classes are technically from 6pm to 10pm. I’m going to be in danger of succumbing to my burgeoning caffeine addiction. I’m going to be in danger of burning out. I’m going to be in danger of driving the girlfriend (more) insane (than usual).

    But maybe I’ll quit caffeine and start meditating. Or running. Maybe I’ll apply my work ethic to my studies, and develop a schedule that includes class time, study time, and mental stability time. Maybe I’ll do well.

    Closing Argument

    This absurdly long post has served primarily as a “thinking out loud” session for me, in which I’ve tried to express what has been going on in my head as I near the next and most important part of my journey: actually going to law school. But this is the tip of the iceberg. This stuff takes me away mid-conversation at work, puts blank stares on my face while Meg’s talking to me, and keeps me wide awake in bed. It worries me, aggravates me, scares me. This is the stuff I always thought adults had to deal with, the stuff that I got to watch other people figure out while I wrote stories or played my guitar.

    Now I’m one of those people. I have a job, investments, credit cards, an actual (and good) credit score. I don’t think I could afford to work a side job and go to school. So it might take me longer to finish, while I take fewer classes. But my sense of financial security is young and, with the exception of some indinspensable help (for which I’ll always be grateful), largely self-wrought. Risking it doesn’t seem right. So wish me luck.

    I’m going to need it.

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