Anita Sarkeesian asserts her right not to be in danger of being shot
Anita Sarkeesian asserts her right not to be in danger of being shot
Tim Vitale, spokesman for Utah State University, on Anita Sarkeesian’s cancellation of a planned lecture in the wake of emailed threats:
She was worried about Utah law preventing police from keeping people with legal, conceal-carry permits from entering the event. But our police were prepared and had in place extra security measures. It was her decision to cancel.
Vitale’s tone suggests Sarkeesian overreacted, that the University could somehow guarantee her safety. That, of course, is an absurd implication, particularly because the email, which Bob Mims of the Salt Lake Tribune described as “threatening bloody mayhem,” apparently came from a USU student.
Sarkeesian’s cancellation was the most responsible course of action, and the school should be ashamed of its failure to cancel, not bragging about it.
Utah citizens with permits have the right to carry concealed guns. And Anita Sarkeesian has the right to avoid the danger created by the juxtaposition of that freedom with threats on her life and the lives of her audience members.
HBO without cable coming in 2015
HBO without cable coming in 2015
Peter Kafka reports at Recode:
[HBO CEO Richard] Plepler said the company will go “beyond the wall” and launch a “stand alone, over the top” version of HBO in the US next year, and would work with “current partners,” and may work with others as well. But he wouldn’t provide any other detail.
Plepler has been pondering this possibility for a while, and a couple of years ago I did some back-of-the-napkin math which suggested there is a lot of money to be had in a web-only subscription.
I’m not known for my math skills, but it looks like I was on to something.
Correction: This post has been updated because I originally stated the year HBO plans to launch its web-only offering as 2014 in the link at the top, instead of 2015, which is the correct year. Sorry folks.
Update to iOS 8 even without enough free space
I’ve heard from many people who insist their iPhone or iPad “can’t handle” or “doesn’t fit” iOS 8. I read an article about a slow-down in updates to iOS 8. John Gruber of Daring Fireball first posited that some well-documented software bugs were making people reluctant to update.
But his follow-up post reminded me how many times I’ve been asked by “normals” how I managed to update my iPhone 5. Their phones, the common story goes, just don’t have enough free space available to perform the update.
I know this is frustrating, so I wanted to share some quick and easy advice on the topic. First, if your iOS device is low on space, it’s probably because of all those photos and videos you’re taking. Learn how to move that stuff to your computer so you can safely delete it from your device.
Second, if you have an iPhone 4 or 4s, think hard before updating to iOS 8. Some reports suggest you’ll have a much slower device after the update. There are some neat new features, but none of them are worth slowing your phone down.
Third, make sure your iPhone or iPad is fully charged before you try to update. While it will be plugged into the computer and therefore charging during the update, it’s best to be safe about these things. Make sure your battery icon is green before you start the update and you should be fine.
Update to iOS 8 with iTunes
- If you want to install the iOS 8 update but your iPhone or iPad tells you it doesn’t have enough free space, make sure you have the latest version of iTunes.
- Plug the charging cable into your computer’s USB port and then connect it to your iPhone or iPad.
- If iTunes isn’t already opened, it will open. If it doesn’t open automatically you’ll just have to open it yourself (a first-world problem if ever I heard one).
- Click on the iPhone button that appears in iTunes and, if iTunes isn’t already offering to update your phone, click Check for Update.
- Wait. iTunes will download the five-gigabyte update to your computer and install it on your device.
<
p>Check out Apple’s support page for more information.
A sense that it wasn’t design
Robert Sullivan has such a good interview with Jony Ive over at Vogue:
In other words, the secret weapon of the most sought-after personal-electronics company in the world is a very nice guy from Northeast London who has a soft spot for woodworking and the sense that designers ought to keep their design talents backstage where they can do the most good. “There’s an odd irony here,” he observes. “I think our goal is that you would have a sense that it wasn’t design.”
I’m not sure the Apple Watch is for me because I haven’t had the chance to hold one yet. But the passion and sincerity Ive exudes for his work compels me to at least check it out.
Philly will consider adding LGBTQ protections to hate crimes ordinance
Philly will consider adding LGBTQ protections to hate crimes ordinance
Randy Lobasso, writing at Philly Weekly‘s PhillyNow blog:
Last week, Councilwoman Blondell Reynolds Brown introduced a proposal along with Councilman Jim Kenney to add disability, sexual orientation and gender identity to the city’s ordinance. The proposal would add up to 90 days of jail time and a $2,000 fine if someone is convicted of hate crimes in addition to whatever other specific crime they’ve committed. It’s not much — but it’s something.
Lobasso’s piece is a great primer on the politics of bill passage, and he explains eloquently and with just the right amount of indignation why Pennsylvania has so far failed to address hate crimes, housing and other venues of discrimination with respect to the Commonwealth’s LGBTQ citizens. Go read it.
Subprime auto lenders use technology to compel payment
Subprime auto lenders use technology to compel payment
Michael Corkery And Jessica Silver-Greenberg, reporting at the New York Times DealBook blog:
Ms. Bolender was three days behind on her monthly car payment. Her lender, C.A.G. Acceptance of Mesa, Ariz., remotely activated a device in her car’s dashboard that prevented her car from starting. Before she could get back on the road, she had to pay more than $389, money she did not have that morning in March.
This is as stark an illustration of the intersection of law and technology as I’ve linked to in a while. While the tech can be a blunt instrument in a world of nuance (some borrowers are doing their best, others are surely not), I don’t oppose it. Assuming everyone was aware of the terms of the loan, it’s a valid contract, etc.
But this sentence gave me pause:
Using the GPS technology on the devices, the lenders can also track the cars’ location and movements.
Again, there probably isn’t anything illegal about it, assuming a valid contract. But in a world of automated license plate scanning and associated geo-behavioral profiling, is a GPS device overkill?
I suppose the business model itself is unnerving. After all, if you need to use a GPS device to manage risk, maybe you shouldn’t be making the loan in the first place. Borrowers using subprime auto loans probably just can’t afford to get a car.
Some drivers volunteer for activity-tracking devices as a way of qualifying for reduced car insurance premiums. Such people can already afford insurance though, and allow their provider to track their behavior as an added savings.
Maybe it’s less the tech involved and more the word “subprime,” which to me invariably suggests a corporation taking advantage of someone who can’t actually afford what they’re getting, and will inevitably default.
FBI Director dislikes encryption on Apple and Google devices
FBI Director dislikes encryption on Apple and Google devices
Encryption of data on mobile devices is a big selling point in our post-Snowden world. But FBI Director James Comes isn’t happy about it:
What concerns me about this is companies marketing something expressly to allow people to place themselves beyond the law.
David Kravets of Ars Technica reports Comey has “reached out” to the companies about the issue. Absent new or amended legislation, though, there is little he can do about it, precisely because there is such a sales incentive to marketing encryption these days.
Anonymous Instagram users role-play with stolen baby photos
Anonymous Instagram users role-play with stolen baby photos
Blake Miller of Fast Company has this chilling article:
Jenny had become a victim of a growing—and to many, alarming—new community that exists primarily on Instagram: baby role-players. Instagram users like Nikki steal images of babies and children off the Internet, give them a new name, and claim them as their own. Sometimes they create entire fake families.
The sad thing is there is relatively little protection to be had from the law in situations like this. You may be able to sue someone using your likeness in a commercial venture without your permission, but non-commercial use of the nature described above is rarely protected in the same way.
Instagram users should review their privacy settings by reading the company’s help pages about controlling your visibility and setting photos and video as viewable only to approved followers.
Keep this in mind, though: even if you set your content as private, sharing a link to a photo or video on a social network like Twitter or Facebook will allow anyone with that link to view it.
People who do steal your photos and pretend they’re your child or your child’s parent are violating Instagram’s Terms of Service, which prohibits impersonation, among other things (emphasis mine):
You must not defame, stalk, bully, abuse, harass, threaten, impersonate or intimidate people or entities […]
The Fast Company article to which I link above includes a statement from Instagram that the company does remove the stolen images when users report such activity.
This story is another lesson to be mindful of not only what you share online, but how you share it. After all, a private company like Instagram could simply choose to ignore concerns like these, and users would have no recourse. Social networks can be a rich and vibrant way to stay in touch, but we are all responsible for what and how we share.
Apple can't bypass your iOS passcode
Apple can’t bypass your iOS passcode
Apple says in the latest revision of its page on government information requests:
On devices running iOS 8, your personal data such as photos, messages (including attachments), email, contacts, call history, iTunes content, notes, and reminders is placed under the protection of your passcode. Unlike our competitors, Apple cannot bypass your passcode and therefore cannot access this data. So it’s not technically feasible for us to respond to government warrants for the extraction of this data from devices in their possession running iOS 8.
Sure enough, the company also updated its Legal Process Guidelines (PDF) to reflect the increase in user privacy:
For all devices running iOS 8.0 and later versions, Apple will no longer be performing iOS data extractions as the data sought will be encrypted and Apple will not possess the encryption key.
This is obviously good news for people concerned about the amount of our data swishing around in the binary ocean, ripe for government fishing expeditions.
However, it’s also worth noting the overwhelming majority, 93 percent, of law enforcement requests to Apple are made at the behest of the customer themselves, usually in the case of a lost or stolen device.
You can find more information about what Apple discloses to law enforcement at its transparency reports page.
Check for lint before trying to replace your iPhone's charging port
My iPhone 5 recently stopped charging, unless I propped the phone upside down against an inclined surface like a lamp stand or a keyboard. I’m not in a position to buy one of those fancy new iPhones, so I shopped around in the internet’s DIY isle.
I found a well-reviewed set of iPhone surgery tools and even a well-reviewed replacement part on Amazon. Armed with those and an instructional YouTube video, I planned to replace the part myself.
Luckily, one of my many neuroses involves exhaustively reading through reviews before I buy anything from Amazon. It’s my favorite part of the site. I don’t even consider products with less than 25 or so reviews.
In a bricks-and-mortar store, you probably only have the staff to ask for advice, and they’re obviously biased. And if you’re anything like me, you probably know far more about the product than they do. Always take advantage of the availability of reviews on Amazon.
Anyway, with the necessary tools in my cart and the video queued up in the Watch Later section of my YouTube account, I headed over to read some reviews. That’s when I found this gem by Amazon user DullJack, who wrote:
First off, if you suspect your charging port is going bad, it probably isn’t. Grab a flashlight and a safety pin/needle, shine the light into the charging port and you will probably see a bunch of lint tightly jammed into the back of the port that is preventing the cable from fully inserting.
But I had looked in there and I didn’t see anything, DullJack. So what gives? He continues:
I looked into my old port before replacing it and it looked clear, but I didn’t shine a light into it.
Ah. I shined a light into it and alas, there it was. I turned my phone off (better safe than sorry when poking around inside your iPhone with anything sharp or metal) and gently used a paper clip to pull out more lint that I would have though could fit in there. Do this over a piece of white paper to get the full effect.
So. Much. Lint.
Then, I plugged it in with the reckless abandon I had used before the problems began. A small white Apple logo appeared in the middle of the screen. The phone booted up and the battery icon showed it was charging. I moved it around in all the common ways that had been causing it to stop charging.
Fixed!
I don’t use exclamation points very often on this site because that’s just not the tone I’m going for over here. But that one was obligatory. The sense of relief I felt upon learning I wouldn’t need to expose my iPhone’s innards to the harsh light of day is something only fellow geeks can understand.
Of course, exposing an iPhone’s innards to the harsh light of day is something only fellow geeks would even consider, too.
Let this be a lesson, well, several lessons, to you all:
- Always, always read the reviews before you buy online,
- Be absolutely certain the problem isn’t lint before replacing your iPhone’s charging port, and
- Amazon user DullJack is a gentleman and scholar deserving of the gratitude and respect of fellow geeks everywhere.
Millenials won't use subpar enterprise software
Millenials won’t use subpar enterprise software
Paul Boag writes at Smashing Magazine:
Frustration will only increase as millennials enter the workforce. These people are digital natives, and they expect a certain standard of software. They expect software to adapt to them, not the other way around.
My generation were loud about the outdated software our employers used. We begged, insisted and shouted from the rooftops that efficient workload management demanded a higher level of polish, functionality and user experience.
Even massive software makers like Oracle do little if anything post-sale to ensure their products get the design and functionality upgrades they so desperately need. You can pay an army of contractor-consultants to customize the database architecture and processing flow, sure, but the interface is still all ’90s.
That was then, though. Today, the up-and-comers are just as unlikely to accept awful software and user experience. The difference is they won’t ask or shout at all, they just start using third-party tools. Sometimes this is fine, but other times there are serious security concerns with using third-party software for company work.
Read Boag’s article, especially if you manage any young folks, because this stuff is happening and you should take the opportunity to learn from them. They’re going to gravitate toward good user experience and efficiency, and that’s good for business.
The systemic failure of modern hiring practices
The systemic failure of modern hiring practices
Laurie Voss, in a piece about technical hiring that is easily applied to the legal field and hiring more generally, on asking applicants questions to which they almost certainly don’t know the answer:
The weakest candidates will try to waffle or make wild guesses. This is a terrible sign, firstly because it never works, and secondly because they thought that it would. [ … ] Strong candidates say “I don’t know” as soon as they hit their limit, and may start asking questions. The very strongest candidates say “but if I had to guess” and then attempt to extrapolate.
Yup. And what’s more, most interviewers or hiring managers who ask such counterproductive questions are actually looking for the waffles and the wild guesses. They invariably want to see someone who can obfuscate without sacrificing an air of omniscience.
It’s an astounding feat of self-sabotage, and it makes it difficult for the truly intelligent among us (like myself, all arrogance aside…) to make an impression among the din of bloviating thought-sheep.
Privacy advocates, tech companies nudge Congress to protect ‘abandoned’ e-mails
Privacy advocates, tech companies nudge Congress to protect ‘abandoned’ e-mails
The Email Privacy Act would prevent the government from using mere administrative subpoenas to access email older than 180 days. The distinction, included in the Stored Communications Act , was based on the need for users to access and download email from a service provider’s servers. The logic was that if someone hadn’t downloaded their email in six months or more, they had effectively abandoned it.
Of course, things are no longer that simple in the age of constant synchronization and push notifications on mobile devices.
Previously:
7th Circuit strikes down gay marriage bans in Wisconsin and Indiana
7th Circuit strikes down gay marriage bans in Wisconsin and Indiana
The legal momentum favors universal application of the fundamental right of two consenting adults to marry, but that doesn’t make each ruling any less exciting.
Listen: The Lawfare Podcast discusses zombies in the context of international law and national security
If you’ve ever wondered how international law, laws of war and national security policy might be applied to a zombie apocalypse scenario, listen to episode 89 of The Lawfare Podcast.
The law and policy discussed are real and interesting but the tongue-in-cheek analysis is wonderfully entertaining.
How law firms can innovate by providing third-party services to other law firms
The Economist wrote in 2011 about the end of the legal industry’s lofty heights, saying of one large but ill-fated American firm:
Howrey’s boss, Robert Ruyak, blamed two new trends for his firm’s demise. Howrey had begun acceding to clients’ demands for flat, deferred or contingent fees, causing income to become clumpy and unpredictable. And the rise of specialised e-discovery vendors hollowed out another source of revenue.
Legal services continue to unbundle as traditionally firm-based work like document review is outsourced and electronic discovery becomes more complex. Chicago-based law firm Winston and Strawn is bucking both trends, performing e-discovery for not only itself but other firms and forgoing staffing agencies to directly hire and provide benefits to its document review attorneys.
The firm’s e-discovery division brings in little revenue compared to the firm’s other practice areas. But it has seen three years of growth amid increasing demand for a la carte e-discovery services from other law firms and non-clients. This is a classic example of a business disrupting itself before outsiders irreparably damage it. Ben Thompson wrote an exhaustive case study of Apple’s own self-disruption that perfectly illustrates the strategy.
Many firms are still trying to cope with the boom in third-party legal services providers and complaints about the cost of good legal representation. Formerly bullet-proof business models no longer guarantee the luxurious profits to which so many law firms were once accustomed. And law firm leadership, like publishing and music executives before them, must find innovative ways to provide new value to clients and industry peers.
That’s why law firms like Winston and Strawn are doing more ancillary legal work in-house. I wonder whether more firms will pitch those services to their competitors. It sounds counterintuitive to provide valuable services to competitors, but I think there’s a case to be made for it as a way to revitalize the legal industry.
Many law firms could use guidance on business process improvement, e-discovery, technology, management consulting and more. No one is more qualified to provide those service to law firms than other law firms. Two factors should minimize the fear of deliberate sabotage by a firm you have hired in a non-legal consulting role. The first is a reputational consideration and the second is an ethical one.
Law firms providing their own third-party services to clients and non-clients, including other law firms, have the opportunity every business has when it is among the first to market with an innovative high-value product or service. That opportunity is the chance to become the gold standard, to set the bar high and be the first name that comes up when someone seeks out that product or service. It makes good business sense to treat that first-mover reputational advantage as you would any valuable asset, with great care and cultivation.
<
p>Law firms, via the attorneys who helm and staff them, are subject to myriad ethical requirements. The same processes currently in place at most large law firms to manage conflicts of interest, particularly with regard to walling off potentially conflicted attorneys from a given client or matter, could be easily applied to the firms consulting clients. In fact, the team within a firm which provides third-party consulting services to other firms could be completely walled off from the firms legal work, insulating the consulting services from concerns about endangering relationships with and the interests of current, former and prospective clients.
Larry Lessig fighting for campaign finance reform with Mayday PAC
Larry Lessig fighting for campaign finance reform with Mayday PAC
Lawrence Lessig’s Mayday PAC is using the very system it decries to attempt to bring that system down. In other words, Lessig et al are hijacking the virus (the influence of big donors on American politics via election contributions) to deliver the vaccine (funding for politicians committed to proposals which would limit big political contributions).
If you support the cause, be heartened: Lessig likes to fight, and is good at it.
If you don’t support the cause, it’s probably time to start taking Mayday seriously. Your candidate’s job may depend on it.
Facebook is not free
If you use Facebook, this article is a must-read. It’s now common knowledge Facebook is always watching and analyzing how you use the service. But the breadth and depth of the company’s participation in the data brokering economy is staggering. The worst part? You literally signed up for it.
Facebook obviously doesn’t charge its users money, but the mere act of creating a profile affirmatively grants the company total access and usage rights over everything you do on the site. It even shares its data about you with data brokerage firms whose business model is monetizing you.
This is all stuff I have personally known and accepted for a long time, but as the ability to easily aggregate dossiers on anyone and everyone increases, it’s more important than ever to educate yourself and those you care about. Facebook is not free, and in fact it’s worth asking whether the price most people pay by clicking a harmless-looking “I agree” button is really worth it.
Why we don't speak up at work
This piece by Claire Lew at Signal v. Noise doesn’t exactly fit into my general topics of law, technology and design, but it’s so important I that feel obligated to share it. I mention in my article about the role of metrics in editorial strategy that I’ve been present for some poor decisions and didn’t speak my mind.
Claire’s post explains exactly why I failed to speak up, and it’s an important read whether you’re a manager or not. Unlike more navel-gazing, hand-wavy articles in the management advice realm, she actually offers some practical advice.