Today’s NYT has a lengthy front-page article on legal education suggesting that a major problem with legal education is the failure to teach law students how to practice law. There is something to this complaint — some schools and some legal academics do relatively little to prepare their students for practice and there is much […]
Archive | November, 2011
Adele Tops the Supremes
Why is there so much bad privacy law, and so many privacy victims? Here’s my theory. Privacy advocates exploit that first uncomfortable moment when we realize that technology is changing our world, offering a Luddite illusion that law can prevent uncomfortable change. The result is laws and court rulings on privacy that quickly become quaint. […]
Three Academic Books on International Law and Counterterrorism
Over at Lawfare, I have posted a new review of three books on international law, war, and counterterrorism, with a particular focus on the changing shape of counterterrorism through drone warfare and targeted killing. The three books are all technical and academic, so not everyone’s cup of tea. Sample below the fold.
Court Grants Temporary Restraining Order Against Possible Removal of Occupy Boston Encampment
The decision came in Occupy Boston v. City of Boston (Mass. Super. Ct. Nov. 17, 2011); the hearing on the preliminary injunction is set for Dec. 1. The First Amendment analysis in the decision is quite thin: The court concludes that the plaintiffs have the requisite likelihood of success on their First Amendment claim because […]
Call for Papers on the Law and Cloud Computing
From two of the journals here at UCLA law school: CALL FOR PAPERS: 2012 UCLA ENTERTAINMENT LAW REVIEW and the JOURNAL OF LAW AND TECHNOLOGY SYMPOSIUM The UCLA School of Law’s Entertainment Law Review (ELR) and Journal of Law and Technology (JOLT) are co-hosting their first annual Symposium on March 18, 2012 at the UCLA […]
NPR’s “All Things Considered” on the Scope of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act
I was interviewed for a segment of NPR’s “All Things Considered” today on the Lori Drew case and the scope of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act. You can listen to the segment here.
EU Bans Claim That Water Can Prevent Dehydration
No, it’s not The Onion; it’s a real story.
Why Yankee Doodle called it “macaroni”
The question has bothered me for decades. We sang “Yankee Doodle” plenty of times at school, but nobody seemed to wonder why he would say that “a feather in his cap” was “macaroni.” At last, I found the answer, in Thomas Wright’s book “Caricature History of the Georges” (1860), which examines political and social satire […]
More on the Gay Athletic Group’s First Amendment Right to Limit the Number of Straight Players on a Team
As I noted in June, a district court held that, under Boy Scouts v. Dale, a gay athletic group had a First Amendment right to limit the number of straight players on a team, since that was necessary for it to convey its expressive message. The court has now issued a new opinion (Apilado v. […]
The Safety Sticker of the Beast
Here’s what is alleged in the Complaint in Hyatt v. Berry Plastics Corp. (N.D. Ga. filed Nov. 8, 2011) — recall that these are just the plaintiff’s allegations: 1. Hyatt’s employer kept a safety calendar that marked the number of consecutive days that the workplace was accident-free. Employees were required “to write the number off […]
Finding Fault with the Stop Online Piracy Act
Once again, Congress is being asked to make bad rules that will hurt network security, but this time the blame doesn’t fall on the privacy lobby. This time the booby prize goes to the intellectual property lobby. Below is an op-ed I wrote for Politico this week on the security consequences of the copyright enforcement bills […]
Harvard Law Review Supreme Court Issue
The Harvard Law Review has posted its annual Supreme Court issue, featuring a very interesting Foreword by Dan Kahan. Suzanna Sherry responds to Kahan here, and Mark Tushnet responds as well here.
Finally, A Biography of Judge Henry Friendly
Back in 2008, I wrote the following post: Judicial Biography Needed: Every modern Supreme Court Justice becomes the subject of one or more judicial biographies. It’s a different picture in the court of appeals. Circuit Court Judges occasionally become the subject of a biography, but coverage is spotty. Of course, Gerald Gunther brought us the […]
Fox News and WSJ Columns on the Scope of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act
The scope of the CFAA has been drawing some significant press attention today. Eric Felten takes on the issue in the Wall Street Journal; Judson Berger does so over at Fox News. I’ll be on NPR’s All Things Considered this weekend discussing the same issue.
Larry Lessig and Tyler Cowen on the Future of the “Occupy Wall Street” Movement
An interesting segment of the Diane Rehm show, which you can listen to at this link.