Legal Geekery » Podcasts

Episode 31: Best iOS Law Apps, New Year’s Resolutions, Police Takedown Requests on YouTube

Laura Bergus — Tue, 17 Jan 2012 04:26:14 +0000

Introduction

New Year’s Resolutions: SPOILERS! Ouij will get published, Josh will have more faith in people, and no more judges preemptively tell Laura she’s going to lose.
Law geek iTems: When your firm dislikes you helping yourself to their SMTP server from outside the office, you’d best be prepared to board the iOS ship. Josh shares his top five iOS apps for law practice.
Josh grudgingly agrees that elderly legal secretaries would trounce him soundly in a race to format chicken scratch into legitimate pleadings.
Work-mandated or otherwise “officially” encouraged social media use, and how bad it can be for your soul.

In the News

Who owns your Twitter followers when you’re — mostly, kinda — tweeting for your employer? And check out this poorly-vetted plaintiff PhoneDog’s response to press about the lawsuit. We disagree that Twitter followers = customer list.
According to Google transparency data, police agencies may begin using take down requests to hide depictions of police brutality. Incidentally, Google doesn’t break down requests for identification granularly, so we don’t know if police agencies are requesting the identification of the people who film them.
ABA has a felicitous and thorough article on the law school crisis. Should the government cap funds available to law students?

Josh points: Note how the article doesn’t even begin to suggest that the ABA could have begun to control the problem years ago by simply exercising more control over law school accreditation to ensure some reasonable parity between graduates and available careers. (by Simpsons’ “Ha Ha” Kid)

You’re Doing It Wrong

We didn’t really have time to talk about Carrier IQ, but you should learn more about it if it’s new to you.
Some good links about the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) (no, really, this one you *must* learn more about if it’s new to you!):
SOPA status update: haha: http://www.zdnet.com/blog/btl/reddit-will-enact-nuclear-option-to-protest-sopa-pipa/66739, also:

High-traffic sites, including Reddit, plan a blackout in protest of SOPA.
Here’s a good, quick SOPA status overview from @digiphile, still a few weeks old, but see the recommended additional sources in that post for follow up information.
Read the bill and its companion, PIPA, and the much-better OPEN Act at Keep the Web Open. (Laura especially likes the quick-hit info on this comparison chart.)
The anti-SOPA movement continues to gather steam…
We talk about the Supreme Court’s take on another bill that had the Internet all in a kerfuffle. Read Eldred v. Ashcroft for yourself.

Love for Our Geeks

Ouij tells us what he likes about LG and how/why other listeners should give feedback.

Like What You Hear?

If you like what you hear, please consider giving us a positive review on iTunes, leave your comments (here and/or there) and, of course, subscribe to the podcast.

We want to talk about what you want to hear about! Send questions, ideas, comments, complaints, and corrections by email to podcast /at/ legalgeekery /dot/ com.

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Episode 30: FBI Blows Cases So You Can’t See the Specs on its Little Black Box

Joshua Auriemma — Mon, 14 Nov 2011 18:31:50 +0000

Introduction

Josh grills Laura on what it’s like to be a real lawyer, and we find out what she’s been doing with herself.
Josh went to Mexico and worked on a law review article pertaining to the First Sale Doctrine.
Legal Geekery has been tweaked a bit, and now features Matthew Butterick’s Equity font!
You may have noticed, but Josh has been trying to update LG at least once per day for NoBloPoMo.

In the News

Cell phone tracking. Government is attempting to keep a portable cell phone tracking device secret by essentially giving up a case where the judge asked for information on how the device worked.
Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA). EFF is leading the charge against the SOPA bill claiming that it would threaten whistle blowing and human rights.

You’re Doing It Wrong

And here’s a link just because we love to rip on Righthaven.

Like What You Hear?

If you like what you hear, please consider giving us a positive review on iTunes, leave your comments (here and/or there) and, of course, subscribe to the podcast.

We want to talk about what you want to hear about! Send questions, ideas, comments, complaints, and corrections by email to podcast /at/ legalgeekery /dot/ com.

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Episode 29: Let Me Point Out This “Unpublished” Opinion, Because It Doesn’t Exist

Laura Bergus — Mon, 19 Sep 2011 11:25:40 +0000

Introduction

Friend, avid listener, and token representative law student Scott Kuhagen joins the ‘cast this episode.
Laura passed the bar. Whew.
Josh has a special oral argument before an appellate court at his alma mater. Aww.

In the News

Revisiting a topic we discussed last time: Eric Schmidt claims Google’s acquisition of Motorola Mobility isn’t about the patents…
More about our trolling pals at Righthaven: are they on the ropes?
Does it violate federal anti-wiretap laws to remotely take control over your stolen computer? A federal court thinks it can be.
Yay for cash-strapped state government: Amazon has agreed to collect sales taxes in California

You’re Doing It Wrong

The Ninth Circuit refuses to publish an opinion so it doesn’t reflect poorly on the parties, and draws more attention to that opinion, which will still show up in legal databases, than if it’d just quietly left the opinion unpublished.
Josh raises an ethical question about hourly billing and efficiency.

Love for Our Geeks

@ouij brought this proposed change to the iTunes Licensing Agreement to our attention — but Josh forgot to talk about it.

Like What You Hear?

If you like what you hear, please consider giving us a positive review on iTunes, leave your comments (here and/or there) and, of course, subscribe to the podcast.

We want to talk about what you want to hear about! Send questions, ideas, comments, complaints, and corrections by email to podcast /at/ legalgeekery /dot/ com.

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Episode 28: I Paid $12.4 Billion and All I Got Was This Lousy Patent Portfolio

Joshua Auriemma — Thu, 25 Aug 2011 17:27:47 +0000

As always, if you like what you hear, PLEASE support us by taking one minute of your time and reviewing us on the iTunes store, or (especially) writing a little review on iTunes. It helps people find our podcast, and more importantly, gives us incentive to keep podcastin’. Also, email us your tips and thoughts at podcast /at/ legalgeekery /dot/ com, because we without our listeners, we would cry ourselves to sleep at night.

In the News

- Google buys Motorola mobility, likely for the patent portfolio:
http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/08/15/us-motorolamobility-google-antitrust-idUSTRE77E5R620110815

Laura disagrees with her antitrust professor on the difference between open source and unfettered licensing, and thinks this deal is more analogous to Microsoft’s bias toward including Internet Explorer on Windows machines.

- Speaking of patents, how ’bout the Fed Circuit’s [Sweet] interpretation of Bilski? (Josh’s edit.)
http://www.law.com/jsp/cc/PubArticleCC.jsp?id=1202511592269
http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=20110818143312919

“Such a method that can be performed by human thought alone is merely an abstract idea and is not patent-eligible under section 101 [of the Patent Code].” I probe Laura on why she thinks this is “dangerously overbroad.”

- Josh thinks you’d be crazy not to listen to the recent This American Life podcast on “When Patents Attack!” After you listen to our podcast, of course.

-”This Is My Next” editorial on software patents and the system’s inability to handle them: http://thisismynext.com/2011/08/11/broken-patent-system/

- Do you like text messaging? Do you like paying a ridiculous amount of money? Then you’re in luck! http://www.engadget.com/2011/08/17/atandt-streamlining-individual-messaging-plans-august-21st-leavin/. AT&T is ditching their previous plans and only offering unlimited plans for $20. Way to go, AT&T. Just in time for iMessaging to kill text messages.

Love for Our Geeks

- @andyfromcornell writes in to pimp the Penn State Law Civil Rights Clinic’s recent grant of cert in Coleman v. Maryland Court of Appeals.
- Love for @typogforlawyers on ATL: http://abovethelaw.com/2011/08/small-firms-big-lawyers-a-period-piece/
(And an adorable discussion between Matthew and Bryan Garner on Twitter.)

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Podcast Episode 27: A Veritable Zoo of Copyright Trolls and Monkeys

Joshua Auriemma — Fri, 22 Jul 2011 17:00:38 +0000

In this episode:

Righthaven lawsuits: Company formed for the sole purpose of suing copyright infringers. Seemingly akin to patent trolls in the patent world. They purchased IP from Stephens Media, and began enforcing their copyrights. A judge unsealed their agreement with Stephens, and found that Stephens was receiving a 50% kickback from the lawsuits. Some people are saying that the agreement confers the copyright only insofar as Righthaven is allowed to sue to enforce it. Some are arguing that one can’t have standing to sue without ownership of the entire copyright. The Honorable Roger Hunt has opined that the company is more of a shop of attorneys masquerading as a company — and incidentally, engaging in the unlicensed practice of law. At least one of their cases has been dismissed due to the standing issue.
Police trying to force a woman to decrypt her hard drive. The DOJ is taking the position that they can compel a criminal defendant to decrypt her hard drive. Fifth Amendment be darned. Josh and Laura debate whether this is akin to the police forcing someone to hand over the keys to a safe, or whether this is entirely different because there’s a testimonial aspect. In the end, we have no idea.
Are a monkey’s pictures copyrightable? There’s been a lot of chatter on the internet lately about the above picture. For the uninitiated, this is a picture of an Indonesian macaque monkey. “What’s the big deal,” you may be asking yourself, “it’s just a National Geographic looking picture of a monkey.” The big deal, friend, is that the monkey itself took those photos. The issue is whether the picture is in the public domain. Josh and Laura discuss the implications of the Copyright Office’s policy on non-human authors, and what implications it may have with respect to artificial intelligence.

Good luck to those of you sitting for the bar exam next week! If you’re feeling sick right now, you’re on the track to success.

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Episode 26: Just riffin’ on bar exams, summering, and Bitcoin

Joshua Auriemma — Wed, 22 Jun 2011 17:56:34 +0000

Laura and I throw down for a semi-impromptu LG podcast. We’re trying to develop a more regular and frequent schedule. It may be the case when we’ve worked out the details, we’ll start hosting a livecast as well.

This week was more of a “just riffin’”¹ episode in that we only discussed one news story. For more information on Bitcoin, start out at the Wikipedia page.

Help Us Keep Podcasting!

Your five stars ratings and reviews keep us super excited to keep podcasting. If you like what you hear, please give us a positive review on iTunes, leave your comments and, of course, subscribe to the podcast.
Send questions, segment ideas, comments, news, complaints, and corrections by email to podcast /at/ legalgeekery /dot/ com

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Gavel bang to the former Joystiq Podcast for the name.

25. Does COPPA Apply to Facebook? Playstation Network Pwnage. IPs Don’t Confer Jursidiction.

Joshua Auriemma — Fri, 13 May 2011 16:01:23 +0000

Help Us Keep Podcasting!

Your five stars ratings and reviews keep us super excited to keep podcasting. If you like what you hear, please give us a positive review on iTunes, leave your comments and, of course, subscribe to the podcast.
Send questions, segment ideas, comments, news, complaints, and corrections by email to podcast /at/ legalgeekery /dot/ com

Introductory Stuff / Theme Talk

Finals are over and Laura is graduating! Yay!
We solicited finals horror stories from you: our fantastic listeners. Thanks for all the submissions. We sadly didn’t have time to cover even a quarter of them. Keep posting them in the comments!
- “i had to stop taking my bar exam and give a girl first aid last yr when proctors didn’t know what to do when she passed out. a friend submitted the story but above the law didn’t take interest. i had emergency surgery the next day myself — she came to, muttered, and went back to taking her exam.” – @debbierosenbaum
  - Ellie (ATL) says he should have titled the article “Feigning Fainting to Steal Bar Smooch = The New Killing It”
- I stayed up ’til 4 preparing the outline for my Wills & Trust 8am final. Got to the exam, pulled out outline only 1/2 printed. it was only the 1st half. I started freaking out. got up, went to the restroom, splashed cold water on my face, calmed down. went back in and did the exam. got an A! one of my few. – @ivoryblossom
- “My very last final in law school, I arrived 15 minutes late and couldn’t sign in. You would think that was the horror but it wasn’t. I was allowed to sit for my exam but I had to go into a separate room with my own proctor. She gave me my exam and instructions and I started reading. Very soon after I heard a very loud sound and I tried to convince myself that I did not not just hear my proctor fart. My denial didn’t last very long however, because her gaseous episode continued on for a full 10 minutes. Ten minutes of loud farting. Do you know how long 10 minutes of bubble guts is? It felt like hours. To make it even better, she was commenting on her farts, saying things like ‘ooh!’ ‘oh, this gas!’and ‘what is going on here?’ I just avoided eye contact and wrote my exam and got out of there as fast as I could.” – Tanya

Hear about Laura’s awesome bar exam application fiasco. Trust me, you need to hear this.

Note from Our Sponsors

Thanks to DroidLaw — your mobile solution to legal research materials on the Android platform.

——

In the News

IPs != PJX: Judge Harold Baker, a federal judge in the central district of Illinois, denied a petitioner’s motion to certify an interlocutory appeal when the judge refused to grant its motion for expedited discovery. Basically, a porn company had the IPs of 1,017 computers alleged to have downloaded copyrighted materials. The court denied the motion essentially saying that the IP addresses weren’t sufficient to establish jurisdiction. http://www.scribd.com/doc/54508329/ip-baker

DUI Checkpoint Apps: Google recently appeared in front of the senate judiciary committee for privacy and some of the senators couldn’t stop themselves from bringing up the issue of DUI checkpoint apps in the app store. Is that appropriate? Constitutional overreaching?

Playstation Network TOS May Remove Some Liability : As every serious gamer knows, the Playstation Network has been down for several weeks following a gigantic hack and data theft. Section 15 of their TOS may help them limit some liability. But should it? We talk about why Josh hates terms of service. http://us.playstation.com/support/termsofuse/index.htm.

7.5 Million Facebook Users are Under 13: A recent Consumer Reports survey revealed that 7.5 million Facebook users were under the age of 13 and more than 5 million were under the age of 10. The problem with this is the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA), which applies to general audience websites that have actual knowledge they’re collecting personal information from children. Problems Facebook may have with this include: having to get a signed form from parents via fax or mail when distributing personal information to third parties. Facebook could do that when selling ads, but will they? No way, Jose. Story at http://news.cnet.com/8301-19518_3-20061298-238.html; check out COPPA at http://www.coppa.org/comply.htm. We hear about Laura’s thoughts on little @ebergus messing around on Facebook.

Love For Our Geeks

@redheadedgirl poses a question about the appropriate response to the question “why are you interested in my firm?” When, you know, you basically just need a job.

As always, thanks to our fantastic listeners, commenters, emailers, twitterers, et al. Keeping in touch with you all is what makes this fun for us.

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US Senators Ask Apple/Android/Blackberry to Remove DUI Checkpoint Apps

Legal Geekery Podcast Episode 24

Laura Bergus — Sat, 26 Mar 2011 14:57:47 +0000

US News Rankings, iPad 2, Twitter trademark, bar review, LG site redesign, picking a case management system, and more.

Do You Love Legal Geekery?

If you like what you hear, please give us a positive review on iTunes, leave your comments and, of course, subscribe to the podcast. Laura’s daughter can give you some guidance on giving us a review.
Send questions, ideas, comments, complaints, and corrections by email to podcast /at/ legalgeekery /dot/ com or via Twitter (@legalgeekery or @lbergus). Many thanks to our listening geeks!

Introduction

Josh haz iPad 2! Spoiler alert: don’t get one if you already have a first generation iPad.
Laura applied for the bar exam. Would it be possible to disclose more personal info that was in that envelope?
Laura selected a non-Barbri review course, thanks in large part to their earlier rather spammy comment on an earlier ‘cast.

In the News

US News Rankings are out and Emory is not too happy with their score.
So apparently there are Vietnamese restaurants in Sioux City? ATL reports Judge Mark Bennett is looking for some, er, hard working clerks.
- See also Judge Bennett’s biography.
Twitter denied trademark in “tweet” yet again.
NYTimes finally gets the long-expected paywall. Not sure how effectively it will be implemented: will clearing cache work, will everyone need a login, or will it be based on IP?
Have you noticed less spam in your inbox lately? That’s because traffic from Rustock, one of the worst spam networks, has ceased.

You’re Doing it Wrong

Josh and Laura discuss their adventures in selecting a case management system, when you have none. Turns out most lawyers fail to consult people who know what they’re talking about or have at least tested out the system.

Love for Our Geeks

We’re on the Supreme Court Haiku Blogroll! ♥ Legal Geekery / Self-proclaimed law student nerds / Tech savvy law blog

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Legal Geekery Podcast Episode 23

Laura Bergus — Sun, 20 Feb 2011 15:35:34 +0000

Fed Ct Website Updates, Racial Bias and the Death Penalty, Privatizing Access to Justice, Supreme Ct Haikus and More.

Introduction

Scott Kuhagen joins us once again for this episode.
Josh reminds us of the importance of civility in the practice of law.
Laura mocks law prom. Scott points out Barristers’ Ball is actually a pretty good time

In the News

The many very ugly websites of the federal district courts will soon, hopefully, improve, according to a memo from the Committee on the Judicial Branch to all the chief judges.
In tech-but-not-law news: The New York Times now has e-book-only bestseller lists.
North Carolina is letting death row inmates challenge their sentences on claims of racial bias, thanks to a controversial law. Laura’s 1L crim law prof, David Baldus, challenged death sentences all the way to the Supreme Court back in McCleskey v. Kemp.

You’re Doing it Wrong

How realistic is it to expect jurors to stay off of the Internet? A Pennsylvania juror could face criminal contempt charges for extensive online research about the victim’s injuries in capital murder case.
A Texas court rejects lawsuit when plaintiff failed to file through Lexis’ proprietary filing system. Nothing like a big step backwards in freer access to justice.

People Smarter Than Us

Scott gives props to the WeJudicate project, a kickstarter-funded enterprise of “citizen coders serving justice.”
Josh, Scott and Laura
Like the Supreme Court haikus
Online at this site

Keep Listening

If you like what you hear, please give us a positive review on iTunes, leave your comments and, of course, subscribe to the podcast.
- Send questions, ideas, comments, complaints, and corrections by email to podcast /at/ legalgeekery /dot/ com or via Twitter (@legalgeekery, @lbergus, or @skuhagen). Many thanks to our listening geeks!
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22. BarBri is Up for Sale and Kaplan Can Smell Law Student Fear

Laura Bergus — Wed, 02 Feb 2011 09:16:49 +0000

Internet Data Retention, The Body Takes on TSA, Barbri v. Kaplan, and more.

Introduction

Wow, there’ve been over 24 hours of Legal Geekery podcasts!
It’s snowy. All over the place.

In the News

The Justice Department is looking at some really scary internet data retention rules.
Dennis Kuscinich is suing the House cafeteria over an olive pit in his food.
Jesse “The Body” takes on the TSA and Homeland Security for their groping, due to his titanium hip.
Iowa’s looking to refill it’s Supreme Court, maybe with an Iowa Law prof.

You’re Doing It Wrong

Laura shakes her head at a Barbri email targeting Kaplan’s tactless marketing.

Love for Our Geeks

@ouij asked us to check out Judge Posner’s latest Yale Law Journal piece, The Bluebook Blues.
@runagaterampant suggested we talk about old school detective novels, or legal tv shows.
@benbalter sought job-hunting tips for geeky lawyer types.

Keep Listening!

If you like what you hear, please give us a positive review on iTunes, leave your comments and, of course, subscribe to the podcast.
Send questions, ideas, comments, complaints, and corrections by email to podcast /at/ legalgeekery /dot/ com or via Twitter (@legalgeekery or @lbergus). Many thanks to our listening geeks!

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