Intellectual Property Law

Transitional moment

By Susan Crawford

Today was gadget day.  I managed to misplace my cellphone on Monday night in my sheer excitement over a visit from a friend, and my ThinkPad is choked-up and crawling.  So today I decided to solve both problems.  And now … I’m in transition.

The phone (a Blackberry Pearl, via Verizon) seems fine, but I haven’t had time to figure out how it works.  I have taken many pictures by accident today.  And it’s almost out of battery (again, no time to charge).  I suppose if you called me it would ring, but I’m not sure I would know how to answer your call.

Then, with the significant help of OneWebDay NYC producer and Apple-expert Laurence Koret, I became the owner of a new Mac.  It looks lovely.  But it doesn’t have any of my email or other files on it yet, and I’m not sure I’ll have time for a while to move all of that over.  If only the PC-Mac transition was simple.  This isn’t Laurence’s fault - he did a great job in all possible ways. (Hint: you should hire him for your NYC technology needs - take a look at his site.)

It’s just the transition time.  These two new objects have come into my life, but it will take a substantial investment of time to make them useful.

(This is why people like devices that are single-purpose appliances with simple interfaces.  Let’s not give in!  That’s the message of Jonathan Zittrain’s The Future of the Internet.  Tonight’s Zittrain book talk at the very classy Tribeca Grand was a great occasion, and I was honored to be a co-host.)

Full post as published by Susan Crawford Blog on April 11, 2008 (boomark / email).