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Covers Constitutional and Intellectual Property (copyrights, patents, trademarks) Law, Information Technology, Telecommunications, Internet and New Media, and business-related legal issues from a American and European perspective. Sports (especially college football), Lifestyle (especially the wine business), and Ancient History (especially Legal History)-- all from a broadly defined legal and evidentiary point of view-- round out the picture.
Post Frequency: 19.8/day Last Entry: February 07, 2010 at 23:20:05 Recent Entries: 752
By Andis Kaulins
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Snow? Global Warming? Natural Laws & Climate Change: Sun Enters New Solar Cycle: Sunspot Activity Forecasts : NCAR, NASA, Tidal Planets, Solar Dynamo
Posted on February 07, 2010Global warming or snow? Whatever you may think of the climate now - it may change. What is current evidence for forecasting solar activity and climate in the next decade?There are laws and then again there are LAWS - natural laws. Let us look at those natural laws...
U.S. Supreme Court Justice Anthony M. Kennedy Criticizes California Prisons and Attacks U.S. Criminal Sentencing (8 Times Longer than Europe)
Posted on February 07, 2010The Los Angeles Times in a report by Carol J. Williams headlines that U.S. Justice [Anthony M.] Kennedy laments the state of prisons in California, writing:"U.S. Supreme Court Justice Anthony M. Kennedy criticized California sentencing policies and crowded prisons Wednesday night, calling the influence that unionized prison guards had in passing the three-strikes law "sick...
The Premier Supreme Court Fantasy League : Playing Like the 10th Justice
Posted on February 07, 2010Unfortunately, we missed the start of "The Premier Supreme Court Fantasy League" this Supreme Court term, and it looks like great fun and a learning experience to boot, but our question is - who has sufficient time for this sort of thing? We are going to try it now, even though a bit late - if only as an additional instrument to hone our knowledge of Constitutional Law:FantasySCOTUS...
Maryland Highway Chief: Watch the Super Bowl - Stay Out of Your Cars
Posted on February 07, 2010Getting There: Drivers getting back to normal -- too fast (updated) - From roads to rails to runways, Michael Dresser tracks transportation - baltimoresun.com"In a noon briefing, Gov. Martin O'Malley warned that road conditions remain dangerous despite progress in clearing the snow...
Digging Out of the Blizzard: Trendsmap.com Shows the Twitter Real-Time Word of the Day in Snow-Affected Areas of the Eastern USA is SHOVEL
Posted on February 07, 2010Trendsmap - which shows local real-time trends on a map of the world (the larger the word the more important) - currently shows that the real-time Twitter "Word of the Day" in snow areas of the Eastern USA is SHOVEL.Take a look.When push comes to shove, the practical things in life are the most important...
Index to the book, Stars, Stones and Scholars: The Decipherment of the Megaliths as an Ancient Survey of the Earth by Astronomy | by Andis Kaulins
Posted on February 06, 2010INDEX to the book,Stars, Stones and Scholars: The Decipherment of the Megaliths as an Ancient Survey of the Earth by Astronomyby Andis Kaulins, 422 pp., 6x9, ISBN: 9781412013444. The book has a 20-page two-column keyword index which we reproduce unformatted below for search purposes for those who might be interested in the immense scope of the subject matter covered by this book:380 ? The Keyword Index to Stars Stones and Scholars- the numbers refer to the page numbers in the book where the keyword appearsAAaran ? 52 Aberdeen - 42, 43, 63Aborigines ? 10 Aboyne - 44Abruzzo ? 275 Abydos - 34, 115, 308Achernar - 160, 299 Aegean Sea - 22Aeniad ? 30 Aesculapius - 5, 97, 102, 168, 169, 280Africa - 1, 3, 10, 11, 27, 30, 97, 99, 100-102, 167, 169, 226-228, 283, 300, 301, 309African bracelet ? 169 Aghade - 173, 175, 225agriculture - 13, 22, 207 Ahrensburgian Culture - 17Aill Na Mireann - 219, 220, 221 Ain - 12, 17, 19, 23, 345Ain Ghazal - 12, 19, 23 Akita - 356, 358Akkad ? 27 Akkadian - 15Aksum - 226, 228, 300, 301 Albania - 11Albarosa ? 280 Albersdorf - 244Albion ? 31 Aldebaran - 261, 324, 335, 361, 366Aleutian Islands ? 164 Alfriston - 145Algonkians ? 377 Allen, Richard Hinckley ("RHA") - see RHAAllerton ? 155 Alphard - 94, 122, 237, 366Alphonsine Tables ? 203 Alsace - 324, 338, 339Altair - 48, 150, 151, 177 Altamira - 9Altar Rock ? 333 Altitona - 338, 339Amazon ? 164 amber - 20America - 1, 3, 13, 164, 270, 278, 373, 377 Amman - 12, 19, 23Ammerman, Albert ? 13 Amon - 330Amos ? 8 Anatolia - 12, 18, 19, 22Ancient Britain - 1, 2, 6, 27, 30, 41, 42, 44, 97, 103, 106, 113, 133, 170, 364Ancient Ireland - 2, 187, 219 Ancient Near East - 9, 19Andernach - 17, 273 Andisleben - 260Andromeda - 15, 49, 65, 69, 105, 117, 127, 146, 147, 191-193, 225, 235, 258, 260, 275, 278, 305, 313, 323, 324, 333, 360, 363, 366Anglesey - 165, 167 Anglo-Saxon - 88, 130, 139, 216Animal, animals - 20, 68, 194, 224, 265, 284, 291, 305, 323, 339, 340, 376Ankaa - 49, 50, 366, 368 Annaghmare - 177, 225ant - 292, 293 Antarctica - 163, 164, 167Antares ? 52-58, 161, 170, 244, 325, 365 Antlia - 77, 91, 93Antrim - 175, 176, 225 Apennines - 275Apulia ? 275 Apus - 82, 161Aquarius - 15, 17, 66, 141-145, 189, 190, 258, 275, 321, 324, 338, 339, 366Aquila - 31, 38, 45, 48, 79, 85, 95, 107, 108, 150-155, 175, 176, 177, 178, 222, 225, 234, 241, 242, 253, 258, 275, 279, 323, 324, 327, 342, 344, 346, 358, 363, 365, 366Aquitaine ? 324 Ara - 145, 161, 184, 188, 217Arabia, Arabic, Arabs - 1, 10, 11, 39, 44, 45, 47, 57, 71, 100, 167, 173, 174, 203, 255, 260, 261, 271, 291, 299, 327, 339, 344, 354Arbor Low - 5, 150, 151 Archaeogenetic ? 10, 27archaeologists, archaeology ? 10, 13, 18, 21-23, 37, 54, 62, 64, 76, 84, 110, 133, 140, 161, 170, 171, 197, 207, 236, 266, 305, 309, 331, 359archer ? 331 Arcturus - 47, 62, 232, 365Ardeche - 321, 322, 323, 324 Ardenne - 324, 343, 344The Keyword Index to Stars Stones and Scholars - 381Ardmore ? 186 Ardristan - 71, 173, 174, 225Argo - 5, 53, 77, 97, 168, 182, 198, 225, 275, 290, 291, 299, 369Argonauts - 5, 77, 97, 98, 99, 100, 101, 164, 165, 169, 280Argyll - 53, 77, 78, 79 Ariadne - 66, 104, 105Aries - 15, 17, 48, 64, 68, 127, 141, 142, 223, 225, 235, 258, 278, 323, 324, 333, 366arm - 139, 203, 291, 361 Armagh - 177, 225arms - 15, 35 Arran - 51, 52, 73Arras - 324, 342, 344 arrow - 17, 109, 158, 331, 364Artapanus ? 8 Arthur - 19, 97, 98, 105, 171, 194, 325Arthur?s Stone Dorstone ? 105 Arthur?s Stone Maen Ceti - 97, 171, 194Asakusa ? 358 Asia Minor - 30Asian - 11, 366 Askwith Moor - 156astronomers, astronomical, astronomy ? 1-6, 8, 12, 15-18, 24, 28, 30-33, 37, 40, 44, 57, 62, 68, 73, 77, 80-85, 91-94, 97-103, 105-108, 112, 114, 116, 120, 125- 128, 133-137, , 140, 148-153, 163, 164, 170, 172, 176, 186-189, 193-195, 199, 205-208, 222, 224, 242, 250, 259, 260-264, 268, 269, 275, 278, 282, 289, 307-310, 313, 317, 318-324, 328, 330, 332, 336, 340, 341, 355, 360, 361, 362, 363, 369, 372, 374, 377Astronomical Measure - 328, 369, 372Asuka - 354, 355, 356, 357 Atlantic Ocean ? 9Atlas Mountains - 11, 30 Aubrey holes ? 128Aude ? 335 Aughnacliffe - 204, 225Auriga - 15, 18, 48, 69, 70, 201, 202, 225, 252, 257, 275, 278, 303, 323, 324, 333, 358, 363, 364, 366, 377Australia ? 10, 11, 163, 164, 283 Austria - 11Autumn Equinox - 15, 39, 54, 168, 169, 170, 186, 245, 246, 317, 325, 328, 349, 364Auvergne ? 324 Avebury - 119, 139Avieloch ? 46 Aviemore - 46, 60, 62Avize - 343, 344 Awanodake - 356axe - 63, 154, 204, 263, 264, 346 axes - 9, 264, 303Ayr ? 51 Azerbaijan - 11Azimuths ? 40 Aztec - 164BBabylonian - 8, 39, 44 Badnabay - 47Baildon Moor ? 156 Balfarg - 48Ballina ? 207 Ballowall - 82Ballybane - 183, 225 Ballyboher - 224, 225Ballyedmonduff - 191, 192, 193, 194, 225 Ballykeel - 177, 225Ballylowra - 200, 225 Ballymeanoch - 78Ballynacloghy - 197, 225, 247 Ballyvatheen - 201, 225Balnaguie ? 47 Balnuaran - 1, 25, 28-32, 38, 45, 57, 162Baltic - 1, 9, 10, 11, 12, 17, 20, 21, 27, 30, 31, 32, 34, 35, 39, 317, 318Baltic Countries, History of ? 17 Baltic Sea - 31, 34Baltynanima - 223, 225 Banning, E...
The Tech View at the Economist about Patent Nonsense is that the Era of Frivolous Patents May Soon End
Posted on February 06, 2010Tech.view: Patent nonsense | The Economist 5 February 2010"An end to frivolous patents may finally be in sight....America?s Supreme Court is about to issue a ruling which, by all accounts, will make it difficult, if not impossible, to get a patent for a business process...
Genetic Privacy : Genetic Testing in New York : Newborn DNA Samples in Texas : German Genetic Diagnosis Act Went Into Effect on February 1, 2010
Posted on February 05, 2010As reported in numerous German-language sources, the German Genetic Diagnosis Act (Gendiagnostikgesetz, GenDG) - English translation at eurogentest.org - took force on February 1, 2010. This law is of interest for many disciplines, especially in view of the recent "genetic privacy" decision in Texas and the pending passage of Katie's Law in New York...
The Body Snatchers are Alive and Well : In ACLU v. Myriad, the Battle over DNA Patents Rages
Posted on February 03, 2010The Daily Scan at the GenomeWeb headlines In ACLU v. Myriad, It's Scientific Accuracy, 0, and Wild Speculation, 1, writing:"Unless you've been living under a sequencer, you already know that the ACLU v. Myriad gene patent hearings began yesterday. Daily Scan was there for the circus, held in a standing-room-only courtroom in downtown New York...
Ira Glasser - former ACLU Executive Director - at the Huffington Post : Understanding the Citizens United U.S. Supreme Court Ruling
Posted on February 03, 2010At the Huffington Post, Ira Glasser (Executive Director, ACLU, 1978-2001, Retired) sets straight the erroneous and oft emotionally distorted opinions floating around about the Citizens United Ruling, writing inter alia:"The recent decision by the U...
Changes to EUR-Lex, Official Journal of the European Union (EU), Legislative Acts, New Numbering in Treaties : EUR-Lex Newsletter 8/1/2010
Posted on February 03, 2010The EUR-Lex Newsletter 8/1/2010 : Access to European Union Law contains important information about changes to EUR-Lex, to the Official Journal of the European Union, to a distinction introduced between legislative and non-legislative acts, and reference to the new numbering of the 'Treaty on European Union' and the 'Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union' as per the Lisbon Treaty...
EUR-Lex : Free Access to European Union EU Law : Official Journal, Treaties, Legislation, Case Law, Legislative Proposals
Posted on February 03, 2010EUR-Lex"EUR-Lex provides direct free access to European Union law. Here you can consult the Official Journal of the European Union as well as the treaties, legislation, case-law and legislative proposals. You can also use the extensive search facilities available on EUR-Lex...
Web Censorship, Human Rights and the Law : US Senator Dick Durbin to Hold Hearing on Global Internet Freedom
Posted on February 03, 2010AFP: US senator asks companies about China rights practices"US senator on Tuesday asked 30 leading companies, including Amazon, Apple, Facebook, IBM, Nokia and Twitter, for information about their human rights practices in China after Google's threat to leave the country over cyberattacks and Web censorship...
Objectives of the fiveIPoffices : EPO, JPO, KIPO, SIPO, USPTO
Posted on February 03, 2010For the Objectives of the "five IP offices" - EPO, JPO, KIPO, SIPO, USPTO - see here.
European Patent Office (EPO) Official Journal January 2010 is Now Online
Posted on February 03, 2010The Official Journal of January 2010 of the European Patent Office (EPO) is now online here.
Doing Business in Europe ? the legal pitfalls | Enterprise Europe
Posted on February 03, 2010Doing Business in Europe ? the legal pitfalls | Enterprise Europe"Considering doing business with Europe? Come along to this new seminar to find out how to avoid some of the legal pitfalls when you sell your goods....Thursday 4th February 2010, Holiday Inn Rochester [UK]8...
The Gene Patent Debate at Genomics Law Report
Posted on February 03, 2010Up Next in Gene Patents: Waiting for a Ruling (Again) and SACGHS Meets (Again)
Why Are There No Arab Democracies? asks Larry Diamond at the Journal of Democracy
Posted on February 02, 2010Why Are There No Arab Democracies? asks Larry Diamond in the "Twentieth Anniversary Issue" of the Journal of Democracy (January 2010, Volume 21, Number 1).The Journal of Democracy writes that "Democracy has held its own or gained ground in just about every part of the world except for the Arab Middle East...
BuzzMachine : Davos 2010 : Replace the Old Order?
Posted on February 02, 2010BuzzMachine"The theme of this year?s World Economic Forum meeting at Davos was ?rethink, redesign, rebuild.? When a friend recited that list for me, I responded that given the institutions there, the more appropriate slogan is ?replace....The World Economic Forum actually does an admirable job trying to push its members into [the] future...
U.S. Sentencing Commission Proposes Reduced Criminal Penalties for Corporations having Compliance Programs | WSJ Law Blog
Posted on February 02, 2010In Federal Agency Proposes Reduced Criminal Penalties for Corporations at the WSJ Law Blog, Amir Efrati writes:"What kind of penalties should companies face when their employees commit crimes?[T]he U.S. Sentencing Commission ... last week included a proposal in this 78-page document to reduce exposure by organizations whose employees engage in criminal behavior...
Arianna Huffington: Davos Diary 2010: Snapshots from My Short But Sweet Visit
Posted on February 02, 2010Arianna Huffington: Davos Diary 2010: Snapshots from My Short But Sweet Visit"Things got off to an interesting start before I even arrived. I happened to be on the same flight from D.C. to Zurich as Larry Summers, who was reading Martin Jacques' weighty tome, 'When China Rules the World...
World Economic Forum 2010 Ends
Posted on February 02, 2010World Economic Forum - Home"At the World Economic Forum Annual Meeting 2010 in Davos, participants resolved to rethink, redesign and rebuild the global economy to ensure principled growth and sustainability."
Huckabee on Tax Policy at the New Jersey Estate Planning & Elder Law Blog
Posted on February 02, 2010At the New Jersey Estate Planning & Elder Law Blog Deirdre Wheatley-Liss of Fein Such Kahn & Shepard relates A conversation with Mike Huckabee [former governor of Arkansas] on Tax Policy where she asked Huckabee the following question:"Governor Huckabee, here in New Jersey we are in the most expensive state to live in and the most expensive state to do business in from a tax perspective...
The future of legal education? SIMPLE. SIMulated Professional Learning Environment.
Posted on February 02, 2010Paul Maharg of Zeugma in his draft document at SlideShare titled The permeable web: community, value and ethics in legal education, discusses SIMPLE - SIMulated Professional Learning Environment - in its application to law studies.Maharg writes:"Draft paper...
Future EU Personal Data Protection and Privacy Laws to Target Social Media : Facebook, Twitter, Myspace et al.
Posted on February 01, 2010Leigh Phillips at the EUobserver in New EU laws to target Facebook writes that:"[T]he European Commission ... announced plans for comprehensive new laws that have in their sights the massively popular website [Facebook]....Underscoring its new powers under the Lisbon Treaty and the legal basis given to the Charter of Fundamental Rights, the commission said it wants to create "a clear, modern set of rules" guaranteeing a high level of personal data protection and privacy...
Jewish Law and Constitutional Interpretation : David Friedman cited at Three Jews, Four Opinions
Posted on February 01, 2010We are a bit late on this December 3, 2009 posting at Three Jews, Four Opinions, but we nevertheless wanted to put in a reference to David Friedman on Jewish Law and Constitutional Interpretation:"David Friedman has an interesting set of posts on Jewish Law and Constitutional Interpretation and And For the Real Enthusiasts in Jewish Law, A Story...
WIPO Uniform Domain Resolution Policy (UDRP) : 1500+ Domain Names Transferred to IHG Intercontinental Hotels Group in Single Ruling
Posted on January 29, 2010Over 1,500 domain names handed to hotels group in single ruling | Pinsent Masons LLP Out-Law.com"The single case, heard by the World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO)'s arbitration centre, transferred 1,519 domain names to the InterContinental Hotels Group (IHG)...
Review of Linguatec Personal Translator Professional, Version 14 - Automatic Translation in Seven Different Language Pairs for Home and Office
Posted on January 29, 2010Personal Translator Version 14 from Linguatec is the new product from the market leader for automatic translations. Such technologically advanced personal translation software is a welcome addition to any software library of useful tools, whether this be in the home or at the office...
Obama's First State of the Union Focuses on Domestic Issues : First Year of Presidency Marked by Unprecedented Winning Streak in Washington D.C.
Posted on January 28, 2010Below is the video of US President Obama's 1st State of the Union Address.A transcript is available.In our opinion, the most important personal policy statement in that address is found in these words:"Our most urgent task upon taking office was to shore up the same banks that helped cause this crisis...
Laughing All the Way to the Bank - Dwight Garner reviews I.O.U.: Why Everyone Owes Everyone and No One Can Pay - by John Lanchester
Posted on January 27, 2010Laughing All the Way to the Banka NY Times review ofI.O.U.: Why Everyone Owes Everyone and No One Can Pay: by John LanchesterLet's get this straight, with a hat tip to CaryGEE:In his book "I.O.U", Lanchester writes at p. 55 about the famed late economist John Maynard Keynes:"As Keynes - he who made himself and his college rich by spending half an hour a day in bed playing the stock market - once observed, there is nothing so disastrous as a rational policy in an irrational world...
Banks, Bailouts, Bonuses and Bogusness: "Geithner Stands His Ground on A.I.G. Bailout Role" - NYTimes.com
Posted on January 27, 2010Geithner Stands His Ground on A.I.G. Bailout Role - NYTimes.com"WASHINGTON ? In heated questioning that at times took on the air of a cross-examination, Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner on Wednesday defended his role and the government?s actions in bailing out the American International Group, saying Washington did what was necessary to prevent ?a second Great Depression...
If you Recall - Federal Rules Dictated That Toyota Halt Sale of Recalled Vehicles - Wheels Blog - NYTimes.com
Posted on January 27, 2010If you Recall ...It's a matter of Law....At the New York Times Wheels blog in Federal Rules Dictated That Toyota Halt Sale of Recalled Vehicles - Wheels Blog - NYTimes.com Christopher Jensen writes:"Toyota had no choice but to stop selling eight different models while it works out a way to fix what the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has called ?a dangerous accelerator pedal issue...
Protect Your Rights : Collaboration Reference Guide : Computer Arts - Strike a partnership
Posted on January 26, 2010Protect Your Rights: Collaboration Reference Guide at the Computer Arts - Strike a partnership"Legal expert Nicolette Hamilton has advised the AOI and worked for the Intellectual Property Office. Here's her indispensable collaboration reference guide, packed with invaluable tips and solid, professional advice for anyone about to join creative forces...
Legal Research Tomorrow: New Westlaw, Lexis & Bloomberg Platforms - News - Google-Izing - ABA Journal
Posted on January 26, 2010Exclusive:Inside the New Westlaw, Lexis & Bloomberg Platforms - News - ABA Journalby Jill Schachner Chanen, who writes inter alia:"There?s a battle about to break out on your computer screen....WestlawNext, the new platform will debut February 1....
10 Noteworthy Cyberlaw Developments of 2009
Posted on January 25, 201010 Noteworthy Cyberlaw Developments of 2009by Eric Goldman
European Union - European Commission - Information Society - Latvia : Laws relating to Electronic Documents
Posted on January 25, 2010European Union - EU - European Commission - Information Society: "Legal and Administrative Practices Regarding the Validity and Mutual Recognition of e-Documents - 17 December 2006The study clarifies the present situation concerning the national legal and administrative practices in 32 countries (the 25 Member States, 3 EFTA countries parties to the EEA Agreement (Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway), 2 Acceding Countries (Bulgaria and Romania) and 2 Candidate Countries (Croatia and Turkey); it assesses them comparatively and identifies the remaining legal barriers concerning the validity and mutual recognition of e-documents...
Clorox: Attorney to Oversee Social-Media Programs - Advertising Age - Digital
Posted on January 25, 2010Clorox: Attorney to Oversee Social-Media Programs - Advertising Age - DigitalMarketer's Move Seen as Testament to Importance of Twitter and Facebookby Jack Neff
Quo vadis South Asia ? Himal Southasian presents "Macaulay's Stepchildren" by Anjum Altaf : Indian & Pakistani Education and their Colonial Aspects
Posted on January 25, 2010Quo vadis Southasia? Read:Himal Southasian/Macaulay's stepchildrenby Anjum AltafWe have excerpted a few paragraphs from this extremely interesting piece:"The colonial decision to utilise English in higher education was not one man?s decision ? and its legacy is far more complex than generally understood...
Animals in the News - Advocacy For Animals
Posted on January 24, 2010Animals in the News - Advocacy For Animals
Money is not Speech : The Volokh Conspiracy Calls the Legal & Political Community to Order on US Supreme Court Corporate Free Speech Decision
Posted on January 24, 2010(reposted due to an initial glitch at Blogger)Eugene Volokh at The Volokh Conspiracy writes:"The problem with restrictions on independent spending on campaign speech ? a problem recognized by Justices Brennan and Marshall and not just by today?s conservatives (though Brennan and Marshall would have allowed more such restrictions than today?s conservatives do) ? isn?t that money is speech...
Yeager and Other Letters Re Liberty article "Libertarianism and Intellectual Property" - Stephan Kinsella - Mises Economics Blog
Posted on January 23, 2010Yeager and Other Letters Re Liberty article "Libertarianism and Intellectual Property" - Stephan Kinsella - Mises Economics Blog
The Harvard Law School Forum on Corporate Governance and Financial Regulation » Governance Problems in Closely-Held Corporations
Posted on January 23, 2010The Harvard Law School Forum on Corporate Governance and Financial Regulation » Governance Problems in Closely-Held Corporations
The Harvard Law School Forum on Corporate Governance and Financial Regulation » Compensation in the Financial Industry
Posted on January 23, 2010The Harvard Law School Forum on Corporate Governance and Financial Regulation » Compensation in the Financial Industry
LEGAL IT SHOW 2010 : Europe?s Premier Legal IT Exhibition Focusing on Software and Services For the Legal Profession : London : 10-11 February
Posted on January 22, 2010Legal IT Show 2010LEGAL IT SHOW 2010Europe?s Premier Legal IT ExhibitionFocusing on Software and Services For the Legal Profession"Venue: Business Design Centre52 Upper Street, Islington, London N1 0QHWednesday 10th Feb: 9:30am - 5.00pm | Thursday 11th Feb: 9:30am - 4:30pmWednesday 10th Feb: 9:30am - 5...
The Economy and the USA : Facing the Future and Keeping America's Edge in Economic Innovation : The Realities : Advantages and Costs
Posted on January 22, 2010Jim Manzi has a thought-provoking article at National Affairs titled Keeping America's Edge.He writes:"The United States is in a tough spot....To grasp the difficulty of this moment for America, we must see more clearly the pain involved in economic innovation, the price we would pay for stifling innovation, and the daunting social obstacles that stand in the way of balancing the two...
Europe vs. the USA : A European Economic Model? ? Crooked Timber on Manzi : BloggingHeads : Henry Farrell & Daniel Drezner discuss Cohen & DeLong
Posted on January 22, 2010Is There an European Economic Model? - Crooked Timber comments on Manzi's article - referenced in our previous posting and at Blogging Heads Henry Farrell and Daniel Drezner discuss Stephen Cohen and Brad DeLong's The End of Influence (of the United States) ...
U.S. Supreme Court Prohibits Suppression of Corporate Free Speech : Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, 558 U.S. ___ (2010) :
Posted on January 22, 2010The United States Supreme Court yesterday issued a landmark decision on corporate political speech which we - as political centrists - heartily endorse, ruling that free speech can not be suppressed just because of the corporate identity of the speaker...
Law Firms in the Baltic : Latvia Lithuania and Estonia
Posted on January 21, 2010James Swift at The Lawyer in The Baltic triangle writes about law and pan-Baltic law firms in Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia. He observes, inter alia, that:"Rightly or wrongly, the Baltic States - Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania - are viewed as one. With a combined population of less than seven million it is no surprise; and for investors, entering into one Baltic country is usually a prelude to entry into the others...
The Academic Battle over the Dead Sea Scrolls : A Harvard Ph.D. and NYU Law Grad Stands Criminally Accused : Did he Commit a Crime?
Posted on January 20, 2010Climategate is no exception.Academia can be a cesspool of vanities and distortion.We knew this long ago.Some of the rest of the world is now just finding that out.InAbout New York - Raphael Golb?s Aliases Enlivened Debate Over Dead Sea Scrolls - NYTimes...
These Law Firms Are Diverse. Here?s How They Got That Way. - Law Blog - WSJ
Posted on January 20, 2010Ashby Jones examines diversity in BigLaw atThese Law Firms Are Diverse. Here?s How They Got That Way. - Law Blog - WSJ
Legal Professions That Don't Require a Law Degree | by Richard Hemby
Posted on January 20, 2010Legal Professions That Don't Require a Law Degree This following guest article was written by Richard Hemby who regularly writes about online law degree programs and college related topics for Online College Guru, an online college degree guide. While the best known legal profession is that of attorney, many other career paths are available to those who do not hold a law degree...
The Pick suggests that the Solution to the World's Problems is to Think French (exquisite humor : plus a video - harmless - The French Art of Loving)
Posted on January 20, 2010Think FrenchThose who know us know that we love France but are reserved about the French, but there are some wonderful fashionable exceptions, such as this one.This is an exquisite intellectual piece for non-intellectuals.Take a look and keep reading in spite of the rather horrid beginning...
Religious Expression in American Public Life: A Joint Statement of Current Law
Posted on January 20, 2010Beyond the shouting, what the law really says about religionby Charles C. Haynes, First Amendment Center, January 20, 2010"Because good news is all too rare in our culture wars, Americans should welcome a common-ground agreement released this week titled 'Religious Expression in American Public Life: A Joint Statement of Current Law...
INTERVIEW - Microsoft top lawyer urges law to protect cloud | Technology | Reuters
Posted on January 20, 2010INTERVIEW - Microsoft top lawyer urges law to protect cloud | Technology | Reuters
Bill Gates of Microsoft Uses Twitter Account to Unveil New Gates Notes Website
Posted on January 20, 2010Jennifer Van Grove at Mashable gives us the scoop that:Bill Gates Uses Twitter Account to Unveil New Website"Now it appears that Bill Gates joined Twitter with calculated intentions. After passing 100,000 followers in eight hours (now he has nearly 250,000 fans), the Microsoft visionary used his now-popular account to announce a new web project: The Gates Notes...
Breakthrough in Nanotechnology in the Development of Super-Material Graphene : The Future of Electronics is Nanotech
Posted on January 20, 2010Breakthrough in developing super-material graphene"ScienceDaily (Jan. 19, 2010) ? A collaborative research project has brought the world a step closer to producing a new material on which future nanotechnology could be based. Researchers across Europe, including the UK's National Physical Laboratory (NPL), have demonstrated how an incredible material, graphene, could hold the key to the future of high-speed electronics, such as micro-chips and touchscreen technology...
Google ices Android launches in China ? The Register
Posted on January 19, 2010Google ices Android launches in China ? The RegisterThe Chinese are making a huge mistake in the manner that they are handling Google in China. We originally thought that China would simply ignore the issue via the well-known Oriental inscrutability, but the systematic attacks on Google systems from within China - where nothing like that happens without government sanction - are stupidly poisoning the world technology atmosphere - greatly to China's detriment...
PDFmyURL.com : a BLOCKBUSTER online application to convert and save any website page into a .pdf - for FREE
Posted on January 18, 2010PDFmyURL.com looks like a blockbuster application. You can use it online to convert and save any website page into a .pdf - for FREE. And it works. We ran it on our LawPundit page successfully.They write at their Twitter page:" pdfmyurl 48 hours online and 22,000 people have visited...
Branding, IP, Finance and J.P. Morgan Chase : Return of the Glass-Steagall Act?
Posted on January 18, 2010IP finance ... where money issues meet intellectual property rights:When Branding Comes to the Rescue of J.P. Morgan Chase
Tweet Tweet: Can I Copyright That? : What is Protected? Kyle-Beth Hilfer Discusses the Law of Copyrights On Twitter
Posted on January 18, 2010Tweet Tweet: Can I Copyright That?
German Publishers Complain to Cartel Authorities about Google
Posted on January 18, 2010Ralf Rottmann at TheNextWeb.com headlines his article Oh no, German publishers call cartel authority to go against Google and writes inter alia:"Yesterday, Google Germany confirmed that the German newspaper publishers association (BDZV), Microsoft owned Ciao and online maps service Euro-Cities AG called the German cartel authorities to investigate Google?s business practices, for various different reasons...
Writers Can Prosper Without Intellectual Property - Gennady Stolyarov II - Mises Institute
Posted on January 18, 2010Writers Can Prosper Without Intellectual Property by Gennady Stolyarov II - Mises Institute"It is commonly supposed that, whatever its moral and theoretical standing, intellectual property is necessary for creators of written works to make a living and ? even more importantly ? to continue to create...
Grahnlaw: EP hearing Michel Barnier: Intellectual property rights
Posted on January 18, 2010Grahnlaw: EP hearing Michel Barnier: Intellectual property rights
Art as Economics : Germany turns to Culture to Combat Foreign Competition
Posted on January 18, 2010Germany combats foreign competition with culture - Pittsburgh Tribune-Reviewby Mike Wereschagin of the Pittsburgh Tribune-Reviewhat tip to German-American Relations group at LinkedIn
Alternative Billing Methods in Labor and Employment Law
Posted on January 18, 2010Michael J. Lotito: The Emplyoment Law Revoltuion, headlines at Entrepreneur:"Streamline Your Legal Services: Results-based fees could make your attorney more efficient" and writes:"One area in which alternative billing methods have been successful is labor and employment law...
Royalty and Continuity : Queen Elizabeth in Photographs with 11 USA Presidents : Is Monarchy a Model for Unity of the Baltic States : A Baltic Union
Posted on January 18, 2010We just posted this status report to law_pundit at Twitter:Talk about #continuity ! #Queen #Elizabeth in #Photographs with 11 #Presidents of the #USA http://b2l.me/4j6b #UK #USA #royals #royaltyThese photos show one advantage of monarchies over elected representation: continuity of leadership...
The 21st Century Belongs to Women : Half-Day Schools in Germany being replaced by All-Day Schools so that Women can Work
Posted on January 18, 2010Katrin Beinhold in The Female Factor at the New York Times writes that In Germany, a Tradition Falls, and Women Rise as all-day schooling spreads in a school system traditionally marked by half-day schools:?This is a taboo we just can?t afford anymore; the country needs women to be able to both work and have children,? said Ursula von der Leyen, the German labor minister...
'Invisible' Woman, 78, Jailed 2 Weeks By 'System of So-Called Justice' - News - ABA Journal
Posted on January 18, 2010Martha Neil has an aptly titled piece at the ABA Journal on an 'Invisible' Woman, 78, Jailed 2 Weeks By 'System of So-Called Justice'.Although we are convinced that the ABA has reported the true version of the story, we did want to relate an alternative version that we heard on the grapevine about the events leading to the invisible woman's release...
Supreme Court Word of the Day: Orthogonal - News - ABA Journal
Posted on January 18, 2010Nice article by Debra Cassens Weiss of the ABA Journal on the Supreme Court Word of the Day: Orthogonal, which means "extraneous, at right angles, perpendicular".The Supreme Court Justices indicated in oral argument that they may want to use this word in a coming "opinion" or "dissent"...
Law Practice No Longer a Golden Goose?
Posted on January 18, 2010Alex Williams at the New York Times in No Longer Their Golden Ticket examines the new situation of young lawyers faced with a legal profession enduring its "worst slump in decades".
Put the PCs in Prison? Computer Crime as a Balance of Technology and Behavioral Science
Posted on January 18, 2010Steve Lohr at the New York Times in Google Case in China Highlights Gaps in Computer Security writes that:"?Fighting computer crime is a balance of technology and behavioral science, understanding the human dimension of the threat,? said Mr. Stroz, the former F...
NFL Playoffs - Predictions and NAYPPA - Net Average Yards Per Play Advantage for all National Football League Teams
Posted on January 15, 2010NAYPPA - Net Average Yards Per Play Advantage - Analysis of the National Football League 2009/2010 going into the NFL Playoffs. NAYPPA is important but defense generally wins football games, so good defensive teams with a strong NAYPPA have an advantage in the playoffs...
The Practical Side of Patents : Invention : Is the Golden Age for Inventors at Hand? asks John Blake at CNN.com
Posted on January 15, 2010John Blake for CNN.com writes at Is the Golden Age for Inventors at Hand? :"Andrea Belz, a management consultant who specializes in technology commercialization for companies, says this is a 'fabulous' time for inventors because labor and real estate is cheap...
Patent Infringement News - Kodak sues Apple and RIM over iPhone and Blackberry
Posted on January 15, 2010The BBC News headline tell us thatKodak sues Apple and RIM over iPhone and BlackberryWe just posted this to @law_pundit at Twitter:#Kodak sues #Apple and #RIM over #iPhone and #Blackberry for #patent #infringement http://bit.ly/5MK556 intellectual property #patents #fb
Intellectual Property Quarterly Newsletter - Winter 2010 - inter alia Federal Circuit and Eastern District of Texas Patent Venue Strategies
Posted on January 15, 2010JD Supra: Legal Articles - Intellectual Property Quarterly Newsletter - Winter 2010Contributor: Morrison & Foerster LLP"IN THIS ISSUE:*1 Risks of Agreeing Not to License a Pooled Patent*3 Federal Circuit?s Transfer Decisions Forcing Plaintiffs to Re-evaluate Their Eastern District of Texas Strategy*8 Who Owns Your New Employee?s Patents?*12 Reexam Interrupted: The PTO Cracks Down on Filing Informalities*14 Intellectual Property Practice News"
Court: Mass. law on wine shipping unconstitutional - San Jose Mercury News
Posted on January 15, 2010Court: Mass. law on wine shipping unconstitutional - San Jose Mercury Newsby BOB SALSBERG, Associated Press Writer 01/14/2010"A Massachusetts law that sharply restricts out-of-state winemakers from shipping their products directly to consumers in the state is unconstitutional, a federal appeals court ruled Thursday...
Our intellectual property regime is absurd ? a reminder from The Equity Kicker via TechDirt
Posted on January 14, 2010Our intellectual property regime is absurd ? a reminder |The Equity Kicker writes as follows and gives us six examples:"....I am neither a lawyer nor an expert on this subject but I have seen enough startups undermined by spurious patent claims and innovative young media companies stymied by copyright difficulties to convince me that the current system is wrong, wrong, wrong...
Help for Haiti | The White House Blog | Donate
Posted on January 14, 2010Help for Haiti | The White House Blog"You can also help immediately by donating to the Red Cross to assist the relief effort. Contribute online to the Red Cross, or donate $10 to be charged to your cell phone bill by texting 'HAITI' to '90999.' Find more ways to help through the Center for International Disaster Information...
Employers and Social Media
Posted on January 14, 2010Social media permeate the employment life cycle by Renee M. Jackson, National Law Journal, January 11, 2010."Employers must address their use and misuse before, during and after an employee's tenure.Social media are any type of Internet-based media created through social interaction in which individuals primarily produce, rather than consume, the content...
We need an independent invention defense to minimize the damage of aggressive patent trolls - Union Square Ventures: A New York Venture Capital Fund Focused on Early Stage & Startup Investing
Posted on January 14, 2010We need an independent invention defense to minimize the damage of aggressive patent trollsan article by Union Square Ventures:A New York Venture Capital Fund Focused on Early Stage & Startup Investing.They write:"[T]he patent system has fallen way behind the pace of innovation, especially in information technology...
America vs. Europe - Opinionator Blog - NYTimes.com : The Evolution of Capitalism
Posted on January 14, 2010At the New York Times Opinionator Blog, David Brooks and Gail Collins discuss capitalism from the standpoint of America vs. Europe.One of the great misconceptions about American capitalism vs. capitalism in Europe is the myth that American capitalism takes more risks - and the blog commenters to this dialogue between Brooks and Collins raise the cutting edge question "at whose cost?"Make sure you read those comments on this topic - some are quite brilliant...
President Obama: We Want Our Money Back! « Row 2, Seat 4
Posted on January 14, 2010President Obama: We Want Our Money Back! « Row 2, Seat 4 (January 14, 2010)"... President Obama today proposed a bank fee on major financial firms in order to reimburse American taxpayers who bore the brunt of the Wall Street bailouts...."From the White HouseRead the full article and the text of the President's remarks here...
Entrepreneur Mark Cuban at "blog maverick" asks : Should the FCC Reclaim Broadcast Spectrum ? and tells us that Success is all about "the edge":
Posted on January 12, 2010We just put up two tweets at @law_pundit (@law_pundit) on Twitter referencing two blog postings by entrepreneur Mark Cuban at his blog maverick blog.Want to be #successful? #Success is all about ... "the #edge". Love the game. Mark #Cuban on the #Sport of #Business http://bit...
Entertainment industry calls for EU internet piracy crackdown - Telegraph
Posted on January 11, 2010Entertainment industry calls for EU internet piracy crackdown - Telegraph: "A new coalition group has been formed by representatives from the film, TV and radio industries to lobby the European Union to toughen up its actions against online pirates."
Evolve and Grow or Stagnate and Decay : Learning From Europe - Paul Krugman at the NYTimes.com on Social Democracy, Health and the Economy
Posted on January 11, 2010One of the keys to life is getting smarter as we go along by learning from others. If we do not learn and evolve, we fall behind, and others pass us. This Darwinian wisdom is omnipresent.We are not always a fan of Paul Krugman, but he is a learner .....
Law and Music on Hold - Josipovic Now Heads Croatia - NYTimes.com
Posted on January 11, 2010Law and Music on Hold - Josipovic Now Heads Croatia - NYTimes.com
Robot Law at Stanford : Legal Experts View Challenges
Posted on January 11, 2010Adam Gorlik writes inAs robots become more common, Stanford experts consider legal challenges:"Stanford scholars are among the first in the country to ponder the potential legal questions facing the emerging field of personal robotics. The issues go beyond claims of personal injury and property damage, touching on criminal and civil rights laws as well...
Is a Twitter Tweet from a Courtroom "Broadcasting" forbidden by Federal Court Rules? and other new special problems for courts through new technology
Posted on January 11, 2010Cellphones, modern camera technology, Twitter, Facebook and social media "broadcasting" are keeping the legal system on its toes. Grant Schulte at USA TODAY in 'Special problems' force courts to confront cellphone issues - USATODAY.com writes inter alia that:"Aside from the noisy interruption of musical ringtones, the technology poses new challenges for judges, who must maintain courtroom décor and consider other legal issues in a world where Facebook, Twitter and cameras are now at the fingertips of many cellphone users...
LawPundit at Headlines Around the Web at the New York Times
Posted on January 11, 2010The New York Times in its Headlines Around the Web featured LawPundit twice yesterday (we have clipped the pages and added the red circles)once for our posting about Paul Krugman's article Learning From Europeand a second time for our posting on the AP article Law and Music on Hold - Josipovic Now Heads Croatia - NYTimes...
Could Google Fast Flip constitute Copyright Infringement of some Text or Graphic Content in spite of License Agreements? New York Times v. Tasini
Posted on January 10, 2010Is Google "Fast Flip" from Google Labs the way that some Google Search results will look down the road?It certainly looks possible.We definitely like Fast Flip, already being a fan of Google Books, which features, e.g., one of our own publications.You can try Google's Fast Flip at the Google News home page (available as of January 8, 2010) via the corresponding menu item there at the bottom of the left column...
BIG BAR IS WATCHING : Facebooking Law Bar Applicants : The "Social Side" of Bar Associations
Posted on January 09, 2010BIG BAR IS WATCHING : Facebooking Law Bar Applicants : The "Social Side" of Bar AssociationsLegal Blog Watch writes in Fabulous Facebook Follies of 2009:"For lawyers, Facebook could prove to be a practice area unto itself....... Herewith, my picks of the top five Facebook legal stories of 2009...
The Old Guard Law Firms of New York City and Related Professions in America : Called "White Shoe Firms"
Posted on January 09, 2010There is such a thing as an "old guard" in America's top law firms and related professions. These firms are called "white shoe", a term even today defined by the Princeton WordNetWeb as "denoting a company or law firm owned and run by members of the WASP elite who are generally conservative...
AmLaw 100 Twittering Law Firms and Social Media Use at The AmLaw 100
Posted on January 09, 2010For AmLaw 100 Twittering Law Firms and Social Media Use at The AmLaw 100 see:Empowering the Corporate Community - Twittering Classes: Lessons For and From the AmLaw 100.
Bar Associations and the Practice of Law : Monopoly Power Corrupts : Connecticut Bar Attacks Non-Law Firm Legal Web Sites : Affordable Law : HALT.org
Posted on January 09, 2010A popular wisdom attributed to Lord Acton but perhaps based on a sentiment uttered more than 100 years before by William Pitt, the Elder, is that "power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely."Many examples of the corruption of power in the legal field can surely be found, but the greatest corruption of all is perhaps the very fact that the judges (lawyers all) and the bar associations of attorneys assist the legal profession in maintaining a shameful and societally unnecessary legal monopoly on the provision of legal services, resulting in vastly inflated legal costs to citizens...
Preview Video of Google Nexus One and Google Android 2.1 from the ToyBox at ZDNet.com
Posted on January 05, 2010Google will allegedly unveil its Nexus One phone today (Tuesday, January 5, 2009).Here is a preview video from ZDNet at Google Android 2.1 walkthrough on Nexus One phone | The Toybox | ZDNet.com:Someone has also circulated the alleged boot animation.As usual, it is better to wait for the real thing...
Legal Recruiters Expect 2010 Will Be a Busy Year - News - ABA Journal
Posted on January 04, 2010Debra Cassens Weiss writes that (slow) economic recovery is expected in the legal field and that:Legal Recruiters Expect 2010 Will Be a Busy Year - News - ABA Journal
BigLaw Laid Off More than 12,000 People in 2009, the Worst Year Ever - News - ABA Journal
Posted on January 04, 2010BigLaw Laid Off More than 12,000 People in 2009, the Worst Year Ever - News - ABA JournalBut there is a silver lining of sorts, as Debra Cassens Weiss writes:"Last year was the worst year ever for layoffs at large law firms, but there is one bright spot in the statistics: The pace is slowing...
Recession Far From Over, Says Legal Directory Avvo's Consumer Data - News - ABA Journal
Posted on January 04, 2010Recession Far From Over, Says Legal Directory Avvo's Consumer Data - News - ABA Journal
Law Food? T.K. BURGERS : Voted Best Burgers in L.A. (Los Angeles) and Orange County
Posted on January 04, 2010Law Food?T.K. BURGERS: Voted Best Burgers in L.A. (Los Angeles) and Orange CountyThis is not an ad. We have a private reason for wanting to know what makes these Burgers so good. Drop us a comment at our mirror blog at LawPundit II.
Edward Hugh interviews Paul Krugman in Ten New Year Questions at A Fistful of Euros
Posted on January 04, 2010AtA Fistful of EurosEdward Hugh interviews Paul KrugmaninTen New Year Questions.See:Ten New Year Questions For Paul Krugman
U.S. Supreme Court Oral Argument Calendar starting 3 January 2010 : Legal Information Institute (LII) Cornell University Law School
Posted on January 03, 2010The Legal Information Institute (LII) at Cornell University Law School has a calendar of U.S. Supreme Court oral arguments starting 3 January 2010.
Libel Reform Campaign - Free Speech Is Not For Sale : Libel Law Reform in the United Kingdom (UK)
Posted on January 03, 2010There is a strong ongoing movement in the United Kingdom to reform the libel laws.See Libel Reform Campaign - Free Speech Is Not For Sale
January 1, 2010 : New Laws covering texting, tanning beds, trans fat take effect in 2010 - CNN.com
Posted on January 02, 2010January 1, 2010New Laws covering texting, tanning beds, trans fat take effect in 2010 - CNN.com
2010 Market Could be Greatest Bull of Modern Age -- Seeking Alpha
Posted on January 02, 20102010 Market Could be Greatest Bull of Modern Age -- Seeking Alpha
Law and Music in 2010: All the Rules of the Music Business Have Been Remade - NYTimes.com
Posted on January 02, 2010All the Rules of the Music Business Have Been Remade - NYTimes.com"By now, in 2010, we?re all geeks, conversant with file formats and software players. Our cellphone/camera/music player/Web browser gadgets fit in a pocket, with their little LCD screens beckoning...
Lawmakers tweet their 2010 greetings - The Hill's Twitter Room
Posted on January 02, 2010Lawmakers tweet their 2010 greetings - The Hill's Twitter Room
HAPPY NEW YEAR 2010 and WELCOME TO THE NEW DECADE OF THE 2010s - THE TEENS which follow THE AUGHTS (2000s)
Posted on January 01, 2010HAPPY NEW YEAR 2010!The New Year always begins for us with the televized live New Year's Concert (in German "Neujahrskonzert") of the Vienna Philharmonic (Wiener Philharmoniker) which is broadcast worldwide (ca. 11:15 a.m. European time) and this year reached a record 72 countries...
Paul Krugman at NYTimes.com pinpoints the world's number one economic problem in the Chinese Year of the Tiger : China and Chinese Mercantilism
Posted on January 01, 2010Paul Krugman - Chinese New Year - NYTimes.com:"The bottom line is that Chinese mercantilism is a growing problem, and the victims of that mercantilism have little to lose from a trade confrontation."Hat tip to CaryGEE.
The European Union has taken a few steps in the quicksand of copyright law in the digital age
Posted on December 30, 2009The European Union has taken a few steps in the quicksand of copyright law in the digital age:"For that reason, the year 2010 promises to be richer in legislative initiatives in the field of digital books."
European Union EU approves Microsoft ballot screen for choice of browsers
Posted on December 29, 2009The European Union (EU) has approved a Microsoft ballot screen for choosing web browsers.As Peter Sayer writes at PCAdvisor.co.uk:"The EU has accepted Microsoft's 'ballot screen' offer, which will allow Windows users to choose the web browser they want, ending the commission's antitrust investigation...
Paris court rules against Google in book copyright case | The Industry Standard
Posted on December 29, 2009Paris court rules against Google in book copyright case | The Industry Standard:"Google's book search project suffered a legal setback in Paris on Friday, as a court ordered it to pay ?300,000 (US$432,000) in damages for breach of copyright, and to stop distributing digital copies of French books to French Internet users without the permission of their publishers...
E-Commerce News: IT Management: The Stunning Impact of E-Discovery on IT (via TweetALink.com)
Posted on December 29, 2009E-Commerce News: IT Management: The Stunning Impact of E-Discovery on IT (via TweetALink.com)
Social Media in 2009 : Video
Posted on December 29, 2009Check out this video:Video: 2009 in social media
AIG?s General Counsel Scores Millions In Severance Pay - Law Blog - WSJ
Posted on December 29, 2009AIG?s General Counsel Scores Millions In Severance Pay - Law Blog - WSJ
Ten Predictions for 2010 - Financial Adviser - WSJ
Posted on December 29, 2009Ten Predictions for 2010 - Financial Adviser - WSJ
Facebook and Privacy : FTC complaint says Facebook's privacy changes are deceptive
Posted on December 29, 2009Facebook faces an FTC complaint. As headlined by Jacqui Cheng at ars technica: FTC complaint says Facebook's privacy changes are deceptive. The suit involves EPIC - the Electronic Privacy Information Center.Cheng writes:"The basic premise of the complaint is that most users either don't understand the changes they are being prompted to make, or that the changes are so complex that even experienced users are confused by them...
Copyright Law : Google Books : Google is sued by Chinese author Mian Mian, China's Literary Wild Child : Sex Drugs Rock & Roll
Posted on December 29, 2009Everybody is now getting into the act of suing search engines for including scanned excerpts of their books in search results. See, for example:BBC News - Google is sued by Chinese author Mian MianMy own book, Stars, Stones and Scholars is found at Google Books and I am very pleased about it, since it makes that book much more accessible to millions of potential readers...
Sun Bowl : Oklahoma vs. Stanford : YPPSYS NCAA FBS College Football Bowl Game Predictions 2009 / 2010 Season
Posted on December 28, 2009December 31, 2009, Thursday (New Year's Eve)17. Sun Bowl, El Paso, Texas, Oklahoma vs. Stanford, 2:00 pmAs a law school alumnus of Stanford, my allegiance in this game is of course with the Cardinal team, head coach Jim Harbaugh, Heisman 2nd-placed Toby Gerhart, and rising QB star Andrew Luck, whose recent surgery on his throwing hand makes his start in the Sun Bowl doubtful...
Armed Forces Bowl : Houston vs. Air Force : YPPSYS NCAA FBS College Football Bowl Game Predictions 2009 / 2010 Season
Posted on December 28, 2009December 31, 2009, Thursday (New Year's Eve)16. Armed Forces Bowl, Fort Worth, TX, Houston vs. Air Force, 12:00 pmThe opening line favored Houston by 7 points, which has fallen to a spread of 4 points at the time of this posting, surely because of the strength of the Air Force defense, which ranks 1st in the nation in passing defense, in spite of BYU's Max Hall, who zipped the Falcons for 377 yards and 5 touchdowns in their last regular season game...
Holiday Bowl : Nebraska vs. Arizona : YPPSYS NCAA FBS College Football Bowl Game Predictions 2009 / 2010 Season
Posted on December 28, 2009December 30, 2009, Wednesday15. Holiday Bowl, San Diego, CA, Nebraska vs. Arizona, 8:00 pmThe opening line on the Holiday Bowl game between the Nebraska Cornhuskers and the Arizona Wildcats saw this game as even, and the Arizona Wildcats are now surprisingly seen by the line as 1-point favorites, in spite of the Huskers narrow 13-12 loss in the Big 12 championship game to highly-ranked Texas, a game which Nebraska actually deserved to win...
Humanitarian Bowl : Idaho vs. Bowling Green : YPPSYS NCAA FBS College Football Bowl Game Predictions 2009 / 2010 Season
Posted on December 28, 2009December 30, 2009, Wednesday14. Humanitarian Bowl, Boise, Idaho, Idaho vs. Bowling Green, 4:30 pmBy common opponent comparison this football season, the Idaho Vandals lost to Boise State 63-25 while the Bowling Green Falcons lost to the Broncos 49-14, but comparative scores can be deceiving, as Boise State outgained Bowling Green 529 yards to 282 yards, whereas the Vandals actually put up MORE yards total offense than the Broncos, outgaining them 514 yards to 458 yards...
Music City Bowl Game Result 2009 : Clemson over Kentucky 21-13
Posted on December 28, 2009Clemson beat Kentucky 21-13 in the Music City Bowl. The Tigers' C.J. Spiller had 67 yards rushing and 1 TD on 15 attempts and 58 yards on three pass receptions. Clemson averaged 6.8 yards per play to 4.1 yards per play for Kentucky and should have thus won more handily than the they did...
Leading-Edge Law: Congress made patent situation worse | Richmond Times-Dispatch
Posted on December 28, 2009Leading-Edge Law: Congress made patent situation worse | Richmond Times-Dispatch:JOHN FARMER, TIMES-DISPATCH GUEST COLUMNIST, December 28, 2009"
Inventing a New Economy: What patent applications can tell us about America's economic prospects. - By Eliot Spitzer - Slate Magazine
Posted on December 28, 2009Inventing a New Economy: What patent applications can tell us about America's economic prospects. - By Eliot Spitzer - Slate Magazine:"Eliot Spitzer is the former governor of the state of New York."
BCS Championship Game : Alabama vs. Texas : YPPSYS NCAA FBS College Football Bowl Game Predictions 2009 / 2010 Season
Posted on December 28, 2009January 7, 2010, Thursday34. BCS Championship Game, Pasadena, CA, Alabama vs. Texas, 8:00 pmAlabama was favored in the opening line by 4 points and that has dropped at the time of this posting to 3.5 points.YPPSYS I ranks Alabama 2nd with a ranking of 2...
GMAC Bowl : Troy vs. Central Michigan : YPPSYS NCAA FBS College Football Bowl Game Predictions 2009 / 2010 Season
Posted on December 28, 2009January 6, 2010, Wednesday 33. GMAC Bowl, Mobile, Alabama, Troy vs. Central Michigan, 7:00 pmCentral Michigan was favored in the opening line by 4.5 points and that has dropped at the time of this posting to 3 points. YPPSYS ranks the Chippewas 36th with a rating of -0...
Orange Bowl : Iowa vs. Georgia Tech : YPPSYS NCAA FBS College Football Bowl Game Predictions 2009 / 2010 Season
Posted on December 28, 2009January 5, 2010, Tuesday32. Orange Bowl, Miami FL, Iowa vs. Georgia Tech, 8:00 pmGeorgia Tech is favored by 3.5 points. YPPSYS I ranks Iowa 22nd with a rating of -0.1 and the Yellow Jackets 31st with a rating of -0.5, a difference of 0.4 x 9 = 3.6 points...
Fiesta Bowl : Boise State vs. TCU : YPPSYS NCAA FBS College Football Bowl Game Predictions 2009 / 2010 Season
Posted on December 28, 2009January 4, 2010, Monday 31. Fiesta Bowl, Glendale, AZ, Boise State vs. TCU, 8:00 p.m.To the disgrace of the BCS, this game is a battle between two unbeaten teams who should be playing BCS Big 6 conference teams. As it is, the game is now merely a rematch between last season's Poinsettia Bowl opponents, a game which TCU won 17-16...
Alamo Bowl : Michigan State vs. Texas Tech : YPPSYS NCAA FBS College Football Bowl Game Predictions 2009 / 2010 Season
Posted on December 28, 2009January 2, 2010, Saturday30. Alamo Bowl, San Antonio, Texas, Michigan State vs. Texas Tech, 9:00 pmThe "Battle at the Alamo" this year has started much earlier than normally. Can we call this the "Suspension Bowl"?Michigan State head coach Mark Dantonio recently suspended numerous players, including 3 starters, for a brawl which has thus far resulted in 9 misdemeanor charges by authorities against Spartan football players and some player dismissals...
Liberty Bowl : East Carolina vs. Arkansas : YPPSYS NCAA FBS College Football Bowl Game Predictions 2009 / 2010 Season
Posted on December 28, 2009January 2, 2010, Saturday 29. Liberty Bowl, Memphis, TN, East Carolina vs. Arkansas, 5:30 pm Arkansas was favored in the opening line by 10 points and that has dropped at the time of this posting to 7 points. YPPSYS ranks the Razorbacks 25th with a rating of -0...
Cotton Bowl : Oklahoma State vs. Mississippi : YPPSYS NCAA FBS College Football Bowl Game Predictions 2009 / 2010 Season
Posted on December 28, 2009January 2, 2010, Saturday28. Cotton Bowl, Dallas, Texas, Oklahoma State vs. Ole Miss, 2:00 pmMississippi was favored in the opening line by 2.5 points and that has risen at the time of this posting to 3 points. YPPSYS ranks the Cowboys 27th with a rating of -0...
PapaJohns.com Bowl : Connecticut vs. South Carolina : YPPSYS NCAA FBS College Football Bowl Game Predictions 2009 / 2010 Season
Posted on December 28, 2009January 2, 2010, Saturday 27. PapaJohns.com Bowl, Birmingham, Alabama, Connecticut vs. South Carolina, 2:00 pm South Carolina was favored in the opening line by 3 points and that has risen at the time of this posting to 3.5 points. YPPSYS ranks the Gamecocks 37th with a rating of -0...
International Bowl : South Florida vs. Northern Illinois : YPPSYS NCAA FBS College Football Bowl Game Predictions 2009 / 2010 Season
Posted on December 28, 2009January 2, 2010, Saturday26. International Bowl, Toronto, Canada, South Florida vs. Northern Illinois, 12:00 pmSouth Florida was favored in the opening line by 4.5 points and that has risen at the time of this posting to 7 points. YPPSYS ranks the Bulls 43rd with a rating of -0...
Sugar Bowl : Florida vs. Cincinnati : YPPSYS NCAA FBS College Football Bowl Game Predictions 2009 / 2010 Season
Posted on December 28, 2009HAPPY NEW YEAR!January 1, 2010, Friday (New Year's Day) 25. Sugar Bowl, New Orleans, Florida vs. Cincinnati, 8:30 pmFlorida is favored by 10.5 points. YPPSYS I ranks Florida 3rd with a rating of 2.3 and Cincinnati 4th with a rating of 2.0, an advantage of 0...
Rose Bowl : Ohio State vs. Oregon : YPPSYS NCAA FBS College Football Bowl Game Predictions 2009 / 2010 Season
Posted on December 28, 2009HAPPY NEW YEAR!January 1, 2010, Friday (New Year's Day) 24. Rose Bowl, Pasadena, California, Ohio State vs. Oregon, 4:30 pmThe opening line favored Oregon by 2 points and that spread has risen to 3.5 points at the time of this posting. YPPSYS ranks Oregon 7th with a rating of 1...
Gator Bowl : Florida State vs. West Virginia : YPPSYS NCAA FBS College Football Bowl Game Predictions 2009 / 2010 Season
Posted on December 28, 2009HAPPY NEW YEAR!January 1, 2010, Friday (New Year's Day) 23. Gator Bowl, Jacksonville, FL, Florida State vs. West Virginia, 1:00 pmIncredibly, the opening line favored Florida State by 1 point but that spread has changed to 3 points in favor of West Virginia...
Capital One Bowl : Penn State vs. LSU : YPPSYS NCAA FBS College Football Bowl Game Predictions 2009 / 2010 Season
Posted on December 28, 2009HAPPY NEW YEAR!January 1, 2010, Friday (New Year's Day)22. Capital One Bowl, Orlando, FL, Penn State vs. LSU, 1:00 pmThe opening line favored Penn State by 3 points and that spread has dropped to 2.5 points at the time of this posting. YPPSYS ranks Penn State 9th with a rating of 0...
Outback Bowl : Northwestern vs. Auburn : YPPSYS NCAA FBS College Football Bowl Game Predictions 2009 / 2010 Season
Posted on December 28, 2009HAPPY NEW YEAR!January 1, 2010, Friday (New Year's Day) 21. Outback Bowl, Tampa, FL, Northwestern vs. Auburn, 11:00 amThe opening line favored Auburn by 4 points and that spread has risen to 7.5 points at the time of this posting. YPPSYS I ranks Auburn 18th with a rating of -0...
Chick-Fil-A Bowl : Virginia Tech vs. Tennessee : YPPSYS NCAA FBS College Football Bowl Game Predictions 2009 / 2010 Season
Posted on December 28, 2009December 31, 2009, Thursday (New Year's Eve)20. Chick-Fil-A Bowl, Atlanta, Georgia, Virginia Tech vs. Tennessee, 7:30 pmTennessee has improved this year but the Virginia Tech offense and defense are both statistically a bit better this year than the comparable teams of the Volunteers...
Insight Bowl : Minnesota vs. Iowa State : YPPSYS NCAA FBS College Football Bowl Game Predictions 2009 / 2010 Season
Posted on December 28, 2009December 31, 2009, Thursday (New Year's Eve)19. Insight Bowl, Tempe, Arizona, Minnesota vs. Iowa State, 6:00 pmYPPSYS ranks Minnesota 76th with a rating of - 2.2 and Iowa State 85th with a rating of -2.5, giving the Golden Gophers an advantage of 0.3 x 9 = 2...
Texas Bowl : Navy vs Missouri : YPPSYS NCAA FBS College Football Bowl Game Predictions 2009 / 2010 Season
Posted on December 28, 2009December 31, 2009, Thursday (New Year's Eve)18. Texas Bowl, Houston, Texas, Navy vs. Missouri, 3:30 pmYPPSYS ranks Missouri 32nd with a rating of -0.5 and Navy 61st with a rating of -1.8, a difference of 1.3 x 9 = 11.7 points. That separation is smaller however when the schedule-adjusted margin of victory is considered...
College Football Bowl Game Results : Marshall vs. Ohio, Pittsburgh vs. North Carolina, USC vs. Boston College
Posted on December 27, 2009Marshall upset Ohio 21-17 as the Bobcats managed a mere 123 yards total offense against the Thundering Herd, as Ohio averaged a paltry 2.4 yards per play, which is beyond anything acceptable in college football. Give the coaching staff a failing grade in that one...
Champs Sports Bowl : Miami of Florida vs. Wisconsin : YPPSYS NCAA FBS College Football Bowl Game Predictions 2009 / 2010 Season
Posted on December 26, 2009December 29, 2009, Tuesday13. Champs Sports Bowl, Orlando, FL, Miami of Florida vs. Wisconsin, 8:00 pmThe offenses and the defenses of Miami of Florida and Wisconsin are virtually even, except that the Hurricanes gain more yards through the air and Wisconsin more on the ground...
Eaglebank Bowl : Temple vs. UCLA : YPPSYS NCAA FBS College Football Bowl Game Predictions 2009 / 2010 Season
Posted on December 26, 2009December 29, 2009, Tuesday12. Eaglebank Bowl, Washington, D.C., Temple vs. UCLA, 4:30 pmIn spite of its 35-17 loss to the Ohio Bobcats in its last regular season game, the Temple Owls had a Cinderella season, forging a nine-game winning streak up to the final game and finishing 9-3...
Independence Bowl : Texas A&M vs. Georgia : YPPSYS NCAA FBS College Football Bowl Game Predictions 2009 / 2010 Season
Posted on December 26, 2009December 28, 2009, Monday11. Independence Bowl, Shreveport, Louisiana, Texas A&M vs. Georgia, 5:00 pmYPPSYS ranks Georgia 24th with a rating of -0.2 and Texas A&M 69th with a rating of -2.0, a difference of 1.8 x 9 = 16 points. Both teams have equally strong offenses but the Bulldogs have a bit better than average defense while the Aggies have a a very weak defense, so that A&M did well this season only against teams with weak defenses, while other teams blew them off the field...
President Barack Obama : A Historic Moment : Senate Passes Health Care Overhaul on Party-Line Vote - NYTimes.com
Posted on December 25, 2009Senate Passes Health Care Overhaul on Party-Line Vote - NYTimes.comPresident Barack Obama sent out the following email:"Andis --Although it's Christmas Eve, I wanted to share some exciting news: The Senate just passed a historic health reform bill.In all the back and forth, it's easy to lose sight of what this incredible breakthrough really means...
Music City Bowl : Clemson vs. Kentucky : YPPSYS NCAA FBS College Football Bowl Game Predictions 2009 / 2010 Season
Posted on December 25, 2009December 27, 2009, Sunday10. Music City Bowl, Nashville, TN, Clemson vs. Kentucky, 8:30 pmYPPSYS I ranks Clemson 21st with a rating of -0.1 and Kentucky 64th with a rating of -1.9, a difference of 1.8 x 9 = 16.2 points. YPPSYS II by schedule-adjusted margin of victory rates Clemson at 8...
College Football Bowl & Championship Game Predictions & Results (updated as scores come in) - NCAA I ( FBS, FCS), II, & III & NAIA - 2009/2010 Season
Posted on December 25, 2009NCAA Division I FBS (the old Division I-A)The 2009/2010 NCAA Division I FBS bowl season started off with surprises and we would not be surprised if this continues throughout the remaining bowl games. The BCS looks bad.Fresno State and Wyoming opened the bowl season in style in the New Mexico Bowl, as underdog Wyoming won in two overtimes 35-28...
Health Care Bill Could Face String of Legal Challenges according to FoxNews.com
Posted on December 23, 2009FoxNews.com reports that the "Health Care Bill Could Face String of Legal Challenges"FOXNews.com - Health Care Bill Could Face String of Legal ChallengesThe U.S. Republican Party in their handling of national health care reform has shown itself to be about 64 years behind the times...
HEALTH LAW : National Health Bill Clears 3 Steps in Senate - Final Vote reportedly forthcoming on Thursday, Christmas Eve, to the Ire of the Scrooges
Posted on December 23, 2009David M. Herszenhorn and Robert Pear report at the New York Times that Parties Stay United as Health Bill Clears Steps in Senate, writing that:"The Senate voted 60 to 39 early Tuesday on three steps leading up to a final vote Thursday morning on sweeping health care legislation...
As Going Gets Tough, Nokia Brings Out Legal Guns - NYTimes.com
Posted on December 20, 2009As Going Gets Tough, Nokia Brings Out Legal Guns - NYTimes.com:"The mobile industry, since its inception, has been a legal battleground."
Op-Ed Columnist Frank Rich - Tiger Woods, Person of the Year - NYTimes.com
Posted on December 20, 2009Op-Ed Columnist Frank Rich - Tiger Woods, Person of the Year - NYTimes.com:"As we say goodbye to the year of Tiger Woods, it is the country, sad to say, that is left mired in a sand trap with no obvious way out."
Emerald Bowl : Boston College vs. USC : YPPSYS NCAA FBS College Football Bowl Game Predictions 2009 / 2010 Season
Posted on December 20, 2009We make no warranties as to the truth or accuracy of our information. As always, we do this in good fun only - do not rely on our predictions for anything - and we disclaim any and all liability for any reliance upon our prognostications. Football is sport...
Little Caesars Pizza Bowl : Marshall vs. Ohio : YPPSYS NCAA FBS College Football Bowl Game Predictions 2009 / 2010 Season
Posted on December 18, 2009We make no warranties as to the truth or accuracy of our information. As always, we do this in good fun only - do not rely on our predictions for anything - and we disclaim any and all liability for any reliance upon our prognostications. Football is sport...
Hawaii Bowl : SMU vs. Nevada : YPPSYS NCAA FBS College Football Bowl Game Predictions 2009 / 2010 Season
Posted on December 18, 2009We make no warranties as to the truth or accuracy of our information. As always, we do this in good fun only - do not rely on our predictions for anything - and we disclaim any and all liability for any reliance upon our prognostications. Football is sport...
Meineke Car Care Bowl : North Carolina vs. Pittsburgh : YPPSYS NCAA FBS College Football Bowl Game Predictions 2009 / 2010 Season
Posted on December 18, 2009We make no warranties as to the truth or accuracy of our information. As always, we do this in good fun only - do not rely on our predictions for anything - and we disclaim any and all liability for any reliance upon our prognostications. Football is sport...
Poinsettia Bowl : Utah vs. California : YPPSYS NCAA FBS College Football Bowl Game Predictions 2009 / 2010 Season
Posted on December 17, 2009This college football bowl season we are publishing our game predictions to LawPundit game by game. These postings are traditionally among our most popular posts and utilize our unique YPPSYS system - based on yards per play advantage and schedule difficulty, this year combined with a schedule-adjusted margin of victory variable...
Las Vegas Bowl : BYU vs. Oregon State : YPPSYS NCAA FBS College Football Bowl Game Predictions 2009 / 2010 Season
Posted on December 17, 2009We make no warranties as to the truth or accuracy of our information. As always, we do this in good fun only - do not rely on our predictions for anything - and we disclaim any and all liability for any reliance upon our prognostications. Football is sport...
New Orleans Bowl : Southern Miss vs. Middle Tennessee : YPPSYS NCAA FBS College Football Bowl Game Predictions 2009 / 2010 Season
Posted on December 17, 2009This college football bowl season we are publishing our game predictions to LawPundit game by game. These postings are traditionally among our most popular posts and utilize our unique YPPSYS system - based on yards per play advantage and schedule difficulty, this year combined with a schedule-adjusted margin of victory variable...
St. Petersburg Bowl, Rutgers vs. UCF : YPPSYS NCAA FBS College Football Bowl Game Predictions 2009 / 2010 Season
Posted on December 17, 2009This college football bowl season we are publishing our game predictions to LawPundit game by game. These postings are traditionally among our most popular posts and utilize our unique YPPSYS system - based on yards per play advantage and schedule difficulty, this year combined with a schedule-adjusted margin of victory variable...
YPPSYS NCAA FBS College Football Bowl Game Predictions 2009 / 2010 Season : New Mexico Bowl : Fresno State vs. Wyoming
Posted on December 17, 2009This college football bowl season we are publishing our game predictions to LawPundit game by game. These postings are traditionally among our most popular posts and utilize our unique YPPSYS system - based on yards per play advantage and schedule difficulty, this year combined with a schedule-adjusted margin of victory variable...
Supreme Court Rejects Early Appeals of Attorney-Client Privilege Determinations
Posted on December 10, 2009At law.com Marcia Coyle, National Law Journal, reports that the U.S. Supreme Court Rejects Early Appeals of Attorney-Client Privilege Determinations.
Christmas in the Spirit of Business : 'Twas the Night before Earnings
Posted on December 10, 2009'Twas the Night before Earnings from Jim Buckley at Sharon Merrill Associates- with apologies to Clement C. Moore -should warm every Christmas heart in the upper echelons of business everywhere in the world.Hat tip to TigerHawk.
Income Equality Best in Europe : USA Lags Behind : Robert Paterson's Weblog: EconomPic: Income - Destruction of the Middle Class
Posted on December 10, 2009Income inequality is one of the major problems of the third world and also of the United States. The world leader in income equality is Europe - and it is no coincidence that Europe is also the most civilized area of the world.For the figures, see Robert Paterson's Weblog: EconomPic: Income - Destruction of the Middle Class
Law and Golf : Illinois pair charged in Titleist golf ball scam | SouthCoastToday.com
Posted on December 04, 2009Illinois pair charged in Titleist golf ball scam | SouthCoastToday.com
Razorlight "Wire to Wire" Is a Blockbuster Song
Posted on December 04, 2009Razorlight "Wire to Wire" Is a Blockbuster Song
Privacy Controls Changed at Facebook | An Open Letter from Facebook Founder Mark Zuckerberg
Posted on December 03, 2009Facebook is changing its privacy controls in an update that will require all Facebook users to update their privacy settings. Mark Zuckerberg announced the changes at his Facebook blog:Facebook | An Open Letter from Facebook Founder Mark Zuckerberg.
Legal Implications of Cloud Computing -- Part Four (E-Discovery and Digital Evidence) : Info Law Group
Posted on December 02, 2009Legal Implications of Cloud Computing -- Part Four (E-Discovery and Digital Evidence) : Info Law Group
Cornell Law Library - InSITE - Annotation on LawPundit
Posted on December 02, 2009The Cornell Law Library - InSITE has the following annotation about the LawPundit blog:"Contents: LawPundit is an English-language legal blog produced by Andis Kaulins, of the University of Trier, Germany. Kaulins? posts are weekly, if not daily, but usually contain meaty commentary and voluminous links...
Powering the Dubai Overshoot | Gregor.us
Posted on December 01, 2009Powering the Dubai Overshoot | Gregor.us
LawPundit at New York Times Topics Organizations : Headlines Around the Web on December 1, 2009 : Punitive Damages and U.S. Supreme Court Standards
Posted on December 01, 2009The New York Times picked up our previous LawPundit parody posting on the U.S. Supreme Court's standard on punitive damages and its application to a concrete case by the California Supreme Court - a link to that posting currently appears on the NYTimes U...
Don't Go to Work and Make Millions by Staying at Home : The Caliphonia Supreme Court Shows the Way : Panic Disorder and Punitive Damages
Posted on December 01, 2009Just as a matter of law, I think that this is an airy parody....In a whiffy opinion written by Justice Canard (sic), the Caliphonia (sic) Supreme Court has issued a decision in which punitive damages were awarded in the same amount as the already greatly inflated compensatory damages, relying on the standards set out in State Farm Mut...
News Research : Most Searched New York Times Words and Phrases - The New York Times : Last 24 Hours : Last 7 Days : Last 30 Days
Posted on December 01, 2009The New York Times has a page which references the most popular search terms at the NYTimes in the last 24 hours, the last 7 days and the last 30 days - updated hourly at Most Searched New York Times Words and Phrases - The New York Times.At the time of this posting, for the last 24 hours, the search for Tiger Woods leads the search for health care, which is otherwise the top search term the last 30 days, followed by Obama and China...
European Union Developments : Javier Solana to Step Down as Lisbon Treaty Enters Force : British Catherine Ashton to Become EU Foreign Minister
Posted on November 30, 2009Javier Solana is going into retirement on the day, December 1, 2009, that the Lisbon Treaty is to go into forcee and the British Catherine Ashton will become the "first" EU Foreign Minister.See the article by Andrew Rettman:EUobserver / EU's quiet diplomat steps aside after 10 years
The European Union EU Lisbon Treaty enters into force December 1, 2009
Posted on November 30, 2009The European Union EU Lisbon Treaty enters into force December 1, 2009.See e.g.Grahnlaw.
Privacy Law and Social Networking : Mind Your Tweets: The CIA Social Networking Surveillance System
Posted on November 29, 2009Mind Your Tweets: The CIA Social Networking Surveillance System:"a ubiquitous surveillance infrastructure"
Why Big Media's Anti-Google Counter-Revolution Will Fail - Umair Haque - HarvardBusiness.org
Posted on November 29, 2009Why Big Media's Anti-Google Counter-Revolution Will Fail - Umair Haque - HarvardBusiness.org
TOP 30 TEAMS : COLLEGE FOOTBALL TEAM IMPROVEMENT from the 2008 to the 2009 football season as based on NAYPPA calculations : NCAA FBS Division I-A
Posted on November 28, 2009Which NCAA Division I-A FBS college football coaching staffs have done a great job this year and which have not? Which head coaches, or offensive and defensive coordinators are rightly on the hot seat and who has done a good job even if it is not reflected in the won-loss record?The won-loss record of a team does not always reflect whether a team is improving or declining and it sometimes takes a couple of years for improvement to become visible in the won-loss column...
Seth's Blog: How to lose an argument online
Posted on November 27, 2009Seth's Blog: How to lose an argument online
Law and Robots : Personal Robotics : Stanford University Experts Consider the Legal Challenges to Torts and Criminal and Civil Rights
Posted on November 26, 2009Adam Gorlick has a Stanford University News report dated November 23, 2009 and titledAs robots become more common, Stanford experts consider the legal challengesin which the abstract writes:"Stanford scholars are among the first in the country to ponder the potential legal questions facing the emerging field of personal robotics...
Betting that Brizzly will be huge, ex-Googlers are working on things | Technology | Los Angeles Times
Posted on November 26, 2009Betting that Brizzly will be huge, ex-Googlers are working on things | Technology | Los Angeles Times: "After gaining some viral interest through its invitation-only sign-up system -- a strategy that has worked exceedingly well for Gmail and now Google Wave -- Brizzly is unlocking its doors today...
Court Libraries are Closing : Law Technology News
Posted on November 25, 2009Court libraries are closing.See Law Technology News
Rulings Address Defamation on Interactive Sites, in E-Mail
Posted on November 25, 2009Rulings Address Defamation on Interactive Sites, in E-Mail
The ALM Law Technology News Launches Upgrade
Posted on November 25, 2009The ALM Law Technology News Launches Upgrade:"NEW YORK--(BUSINESS WIRE)--ALM?s Law Technology News today introduced its new Web site at www.lawtechnologynews.com. The comprehensive site now offers expanded coverage of the legal technology industry, including news, reviews and analysis of the products, services, and vendors who serve the legal profession, as well as video, white papers, downloadable software and links to blogs, Web sites, surveys and other resources...
Official Google Blog: Finding the laws that govern us
Posted on November 24, 2009Official Google Blog: Finding the laws that govern us:11/17/2009 09:05:00 AM"Starting today [November 17], we're enabling people everywhere to find and read full text legal opinions from U.S. federal and state district, appellate and supreme courts using Google Scholar...
Tech Tidbits: Copyright Matters - The Hill's Hillicon Valley
Posted on November 24, 2009Tech Tidbits: Copyright Matters - The Hill's Hillicon Valley by Kim Hart currently notes the Google settlement with Authors Guild and the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement.
Global Warming and the Real Truth : Did Scientists Doctor the Data and Silence and Discredit Critics?
Posted on November 24, 2009We have posted at length previously about the slipshod manner in which evidence is handled in the mainstream arts and sciences. See also Man's History is a question of EVIDENCE: Where was Troy? Where did Paris take Helen of Troy? Greece & the Origins of Writing in Western CivilizationWe now have a scandal in climate research...
The Criminal Justice Leviathan : Who Should be in Jails and Prisons and Why? Right and Left Join to Take On U.S. Over Criminal Justice - NYTimes.com
Posted on November 24, 2009The United States has the largest population of imprisoned citizens among the civilized nations of the world.But for what reason?As my first mentor at Stanford Law School, Herbert Packer, cogently explained in his book The Limits of the Criminal Sanction, there are many undesirable things in society which are simply not rightly subjects for the criminal justice system, and yet, as Adam Liptak observes in his November 23, 2009 New York Times article,Right and Left Join to Take On U...
The Wall Street Journal Has The Richest Readership Among Print Publications
Posted on November 24, 2009CHART OF THE DAY:"The Wall Street Journal has the wealthiest readership among print readers according to a new survey from Mediamark Research & Intelligence, by way of BtoB Online."See how others rank, here.
We Hold These Truths To Be Awesome: The Founding Fathers Give Google Wave A Try
Posted on November 24, 2009We Hold These Truths To Be Awesome: The Founding Fathers Give Google Wave A Try
Tom Osborne, Beyond The Final Score: There's More to Life Than the Game ? Family, Mentoring, Leadership, Serving (a book review by Andis Kaulins)
Posted on September 30, 2009The legendary Nebraska Cornhuskers football head coach Tom Osborne was a three-time representative in Congress from Nebraska's 3rd congressional district. We guarantee you a smile if you look at this map of that district. Well, OK, it is not ALL of the state...
Results of the German National Elections, Sunday, September 27, 2009
Posted on September 28, 2009The German national elections, held every four years, were held yesterday, Sunday, September 27, 2009.There were some changes, but in stable Germany, such changes are seldom earth-shaking, even if the currently ruling grand coalition of the left and the right was deposed...
Statement by President Barack Obama on the G-20 Summit in Pittsburgh
Posted on September 24, 2009Statement by President Barack Obama on the G-20 Summit in Pittsburgh:"Michelle and I look forward to welcoming world leaders to the wonderful city of Pittsburgh on September 24th and 25th and we thank the people of Pittsburgh and Pennsylvania for opening their city as a showcase to the world...
Pittsburgh G-20 Summit Takes Place Today and Tomorrow (September 24 & 25, 2009)
Posted on September 24, 2009The Pittsburgh G-20 Summit of the world's leading economies takes place today and tomorrow (September 24 & 25, 2009) in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania (the G-20 - chaired in 2009 by the UK - consists of 19 nations and the European Union - i.e. Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Italy, Japan, Mexico, Russia, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, South Korea, Turkey, United Kingdom, United States of America, and the EU)...
Nonprofits including New York Law School Scramble for Cash : The Endowments of the Top-Ranked United States Universities Plummet in Financial Crisis
Posted on September 24, 2009Stephanie Strom at the New York Times has an incisive piece titled Nonprofits Paying Price for Gamble on Finances (September 23, 2009). Go there for the full nonprofit scoop and then return here for some stats on university endowments.We have always thought that the term "non-profit" was a misnomer because it implicitly conveys the vision of eleemosynary people and institutions working for the common good, oblivious to the greedy mammon of money and to the serendipity temptations of the omnipresent evil that accompanies financial motivation...
BlogWorld & New Media Expo in Las Vegas at the Las Vegas Convention Center, October 15-17, 2009
Posted on September 21, 2009The BlogWorld & New Media Expo takes place October 15-17, 2009, in Las Vegas Nevada at the Las Vegas Convention Center:"The 2009 BlogWorld & New Media Expo will take place at the Las Vegas Convention Center, beginning with the exclusive "Social Media Business Summit"(TM) conference on October 15th and continuing with the BlogWorld & New Media Expo and Conference October 16th-17th...
Cloud Computing at the ASIDIC Association of Information and Dissemination Centers Fall Meeting October 13-15 at the Westin in Arlington, Virginia
Posted on September 21, 2009We note at Newstex that its President, Larry Schwartz, is to lead a session on cloud computing at the (ASIDIC) Fall 2009 Meeting of ASIDIC (Association of Information and Dissemination Centers) to be held October 13-15 at the Westin Arlington Gateway Hotel in Arlington, Virginia, to be joined on the panel by Michele Kimpton, Chief Business Officer of DuraSpace (repository platforms to manage, preserve, and provide access to digital content), Steve O?Keeffe, Founder and President of Meritalk - the Government IT Network (view their IT Dashboard (beta))- and George Landau, President of NewsEngin (engine for digital and print publishing)...
Gallup-Healthways Well-Being Index (TM) Shows Well-Being in America On the Increase during Obama Administration : Who is Happiest & Healthiest ?
Posted on September 19, 2009If you think that the Obama Administration is having a negative impact on the well-being of Americans, think again.The Gallup-Healthways Well-Being Index (TM) shows that American well-being - with small dips in February and July - has been going steadily upward in the year 2009 since an absolute low in December of 2008:graph scanned from http://www...
The Mighty Who ? Hu ! Texas Law School Prof to Head New SEC Office of Economic Analysis and Office of Risk Assessment
Posted on September 17, 2009Hu Gadarn, the first king of the Britons, during whose time a series of great floods occurred (probably the formation of the English Channel) was "also known as Hu the Mighty ... was said to have brought the Welsh to Britain from Deffrobani (the Summer Country) ...
LawPundit Referred to at the Wall Street Journal Online in the Case of the Mighty Hu, the SEC and its New Division of Risk, Strategy and Finance
Posted on September 17, 2009The Wall Street Journal online referred to the LawPundit posting on the case of the Mighty Hu at the SEC in its new division of risk, strategy and finance. We have scanned a portion of the page here and added the red circles and red line:
Germany's Top PC Mag Computer Bild Tests the Browsers : Mozilla Firefox Wins, Google Chrome 2nd, Opera 3rd, Apple Safari 4th, Internet Explorer 5th
Posted on September 16, 2009Computer Bild, Germany's most popular PC magazine with a biweekly circulation of close to 750,000, in its latest issue (20/2009, 14 September 2009) put the five top Internet browsers (Mozilla Firefox, Google Chrome, Opera, Apple Safari and Microsoft Internet Explorer) through 30 hours of performance tests and examined the programs from other parameters as well, coming up with the following test ratings, based upon a system in which 1 is the best score and 6 is the worst:Mozilla Firefox Version 3...
Incompetents in Congress : A Man Who Can Not Maintain Decorum as a Congressman is Unfit to Make Laws for Ordinary Citizens : South Carolina Wake Up
Posted on September 16, 2009A lawmaker who does not abide by the rules himself is the worst sort of example for the citizens of any country, and the United States is no exception.One of America's problems is that many of the people elected to the U.S. Congress and other high political offices are more-or-less populist-elected candidates, who are often very popular with the simple folk who elect them, but who do not seem to have the integrity and character required to properly exercise their Congressional or other political offices...
LawPundit College Football Predictions Now at Sport Pundit
Posted on September 10, 2009In the future our sports prognostications and results are posted at Sport Pundit.
College Football Results, Friday, September 4, 2009
Posted on September 05, 2009Our call: Tulsa over Tulane 45-9. Result: Tulsa won 37-13 as G.J. Kinne, a transfer from Texas who sat out the last season, passed for 211 yards and ran for 77, while Damaris Johnson added 252 all-purpose yards (60 yards receiving, 31 yards rushing, 85 yards returning punts, and 76 kickoff return yards) that were the significant difference between the two teams, as Tulsa outgained Tulane only 412 to 364 yards in total offense (rushing+passing), averaging 6...
College Football Results, Thursday, September 3, 2009
Posted on September 04, 2009THURSDAY, September 3, 2009Our call: Troy over Bowling Green 30-24. Result: In a surprise, Bowling Green stunned Troy 31-14, as Clawson and Ruggiero celebrated a successful coaching debut with the Falcons, with Tyler Sheehan throwing for 339 yards on 32 of 44 pass completions and Freddie Barnes catching 15 (!) passes for 157 yards and 2 touchdowns...
Alternative Billing Arrangements for Law Firms in the Current Economic Downturn : Attacking the Billable Hour
Posted on September 04, 2009In their Wall Street Journal article, 'Billable Hour' Under Attack: In Recession, Companies Push Law Firms for Flat-Fee Contracts, Nathan Koppel and Ashby Jones write that: "With the recession crimping legal budgets, some big companies are fighting back against law firms' longstanding practice of billing them by the hour...
Education and Politics in the United States : The Obama Motivational Speech to American Students and the International Ranking of American Schools
Posted on September 04, 2009Education is the most important undertaking of any country and so it is admirable of President Obama to offer a motivational speech to American students across the nation. If I were a student today - I would be honored to have the U.S. President want to talk to ME...
Best Little Towns in the USA : Outside Magazine Online Picks Ten : How About Boone, North Carolina : Plus Top 10 Most Popular Postings
Posted on September 04, 2009While researching the Appalachian State college football team for this football season, we ran across a reference tothe outstanding Outside Magazine Online, which picked Boone, North Carolina, the home of the Mountaineers, as one of the top 10 Best Small Towns in America 2009, writing:"When Lance Armstrong launched his comeback to pro cycling in 1999, he was holed up in a spartan cabin in this sleepy (pop...
College Football Game Predictions Week 1 2009 Season
Posted on September 02, 2009The college football season opens with some fantastic matchups that will set the tone for 2009. We have seldom seen the opening betting lines so greatly changed down the road as for this season-opening day, suggesting that it will be an exciting football season...
THE 2009 YPPSYS (TM) PRE-SEASON DIVISION I-A (FBS) COLLEGE FOOTBALL RATINGS and RANKINGS PREDICT A USC NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP
Posted on September 01, 2009We predict a USC national championship in 2009, based on the YPPSYS Ratings and Rankings.THE YPPSYS (TM) DIVISION I-A FBS 2009 PRE-SEASON COLLEGE FOOTBALL RATINGS and RANKINGS are based on performance ratings and rankings from the preceding season. Yppsys ratings and rankings are a YPP SYStem (yards per play system) primarily determined by four variables: 1) the net average yards per play gained vs...
OK, Bubba, Where did You go to Law School? Best Quality vs. Best Value is a Hot Topic : How About a Quality of Football Team Correlation?
Posted on August 29, 2009Jennifer Pohlman at the September 2009 National Jurist has an article on their list of the top 65 "best value" law schools, reporting under the title "Best Bang! for your buck".Hat tip here to Debra Cassens Weiss at the ABA Journal Law News Now and her article, North Carolina Central Tops List of Best Value Law Schools, citing to Paul L...
Top 100 Law Firms in the United States by Prestige According to the 2010 Vault (Vault.com) Rankings
Posted on August 25, 2009Vault.com has published its2010 Vault (Vault.com) Law Firm Prestige Rankingswith its familiar line-up of "big law".Interesting - with few exceptions - is that the current recession and the substantial effect of the financial crisis on law firm hiring - and firing - practices has had as good as no effect on individual law firm prestige...
ABA Journal launches Legal Rebels Project providing Profiles, Videos and Audio Slideshows about the Leading Innovators in the Profession of Law
Posted on August 25, 2009We just received this announcement from the ABA Journal:"We thought you and your blawg's readers would be interested in the ABA Journal's Legal Rebels project, which launches today.Over the course of the next three months, we'll be profiling 50 of the profession's leading innovators at http://www...
The Natural Born Requirement of the Presidential Eligibility Clause : Preempted by the 5th and 14th Amendments to the U.S. Constitution ?
Posted on August 18, 2009In connection with our previous posting we have been following - with bemused legal interest - the uninformed and in part duped "Birthers" false campaign against President Obama's legitimate birth as a U.S. citizen, a "natural birth" amply demonstrated by his birth certificate:The U...
Socio-Economic Data and Demographics in the USA by Country, State, County and Neighborhood : Education : Occupation : Income : Housing : Religion
Posted on August 18, 2009The United States has always been a nation of immigrants and their progeny, and this is particularly true in the current era, although the current recession may be slowing immigration for the time being. People go where opportunity knocks.In better days, before the current recession and the discussion about "natural born" citizens, one used to talk about 1st-Generation Americans as opposed to e...
World Bank Group issues Business Rankings relating to the Ease of Doing Business in Any Country : Startups, Taxes, Property, Contracts
Posted on August 14, 2009How conducive in any country is the regulatory environment for starting a business and for doing business? How about taxes, property, and contracts?The World Bank Group gives us a guide to answer such questions through their newly released Doing Business Economy Rankings, where, for example, the United States ranks 3rd overall in the world and Germany 25th...
NCAA College Football Soon Begins : Husker Football and Nebraskans in New York : Follow the Big Red Cornhuskers at the Irish Rogue in New York City
Posted on August 14, 2009The upcoming 2009 college football season is nearly upon us ....A discussion comment by Marsha Lee of The Official University of Nebraska-Lincoln Alumni Association Group at LinkedIn points to the Irish Rogue (see Shecky's NYC Nightlife Review) as the Husker meeting place in New York City to watch Husker football games this year :"Nebraskans in New York...
The United States Lags Far Behind Many World Countries in Medical Care : It is a Disgrace : A National Health Care System Should Be Inevitable
Posted on August 13, 2009We posted previously about this topic at LawPundit but add a bit more here, as we just received an email from David Axelrod, Senior Adviser to the President of the United States, about the new White House Reality Check on Health Insurance Reform. Check it out...
Google Books and Copyright Law : New Feature Creates Word Clouds for Published Materials : The Example of Stars Stones and Scholars by Andis Kaulins
Posted on August 11, 2009Words. Words. Words.Google Books has a special page for Legal Analysis relating to Google Books and copyright law.Our photo shows the sculpture "The Word" at Groote Markt, the marketplace in Sint-Niklaas, capital of Waasland, Flanders, Belgium,the largest such marketplace in the country:Google Books is a wonderful information resource which can assist greatly in determining whether to buy a book or not...
Standardize Electric Car Batteries so that Drivers can quickly exchange Battery Units at Charging Stations rather than charge a Car's Own Batteries
Posted on August 10, 2009Are we missing something?The main problem with electric cars is the rather ridiculous state of affairs that each car has its "own" set of batteries which have to be recharged at charging stations over a considerable period of time, which greatly limits the mobility of electric cars - and greatly impedes their sale...
Day Pitney Unwisely Launches the Dysphemism "Summer Apprentice" for On-The-Job Legal Training to Replace the Euphemistic "Summer Associate"
Posted on August 10, 2009The road to hell is paved with good intentions and that proverb might be applied in principle to a well-meaning press release issued by the law firm Day Pitney announcing their launch of a "summer apprentice program" to replace the firm's previous "summer associate program" (hat tip to Debra Cassens Weiss at the ABA Journal)...
Law Firms as "Attractive" Investments under the UK 2007 Legal Services Act : Private Equity Funds Consider Investing in BigLaw Starting 2011
Posted on August 05, 2009The mass of law firm layoffs in the current recession, putting profits before principles, indicates that the practice of law as a profession in the modern era has become more and more a typical "business" and is less and less a noble legal profession conforming to the faulty image of professionally ethical attorneys nostalgically portrayed by the monopolistic bar associations...
Undergoing MyBlogLog Blog Ownership Verification Procedure
Posted on August 04, 2009Undergoing MyBlogLog Verification
The Potential Economic Impact of Weather and Climate on the Example of El Niño which is Back in Force for 2009 and 2010
Posted on August 04, 2009Global warming is one thing but the cyclical El Niño is another.Michael McCarthy, environment editor at the Independent - via Reddit - informs us that a new El Niño is developing - the second strongest El Niño on record, which means global economic impacts for the world based on weather implications in the coming 2009-2010 period...
Auto Clunker Plan Update : Car Allowance Rebate System to be Extended by $2 Billion as House Passes Emergency Funding : Senate Approval Pending
Posted on July 31, 2009Matthew L. Wald reports at the New York Times that House Votes for $2 Billion Fund to Extend 'Clunker' Plan.
What Goes on Here? Cash for Clunkers Auto Rebate Program Runs Out of Money While Bankdog Millionaires Stuff their Pockets with Bailout Money
Posted on July 31, 2009Slumdog Millionaire - the rags to riches story of a Mumbai slum child - won eight Oscars at the 81st Annual Academy Awards in 2009, including best film of the year.Based on recent reports about billions of dollars in bailout money paid out as "bonuses" by banks to their employees in spite of the financial crisis which many of the bonus recipients surely helped to create, we suggest a "rich to richer" U...
Is Skype to be Joltid by Kazaa Developers? Was the $2.6 Billion eBay Purchase of Internet Telephony made without the underlying P2P Software ?
Posted on July 31, 2009Loz Blain at Gizmag.com covers the strange dispute between Skype and Joltid under the headline: Licensing issues threaten to shut Skype down for good:"When eBay bought Skype from Joltid in 2005, the whopping US$2.6 billion price tag didn't include the Global Index peer-to-peer software that the world's biggest Internet Telephony system is based on...
Willful Unauthorized File Sharing (Downloading & Distribution) of Music is Copyright Infringement : Fair Use is NOT a Defense for Online Piracy
Posted on July 30, 2009In the landmark Tenenbaum file sharing case, liberal U.S. Federal Judge Nancy Gertner of the U.S. District Court for Massachusetts, a Clinton appointee who is certainly one of the more modern of today's judges as a blogging federal judge - see also Slate and Sentencing Law and Policy) - whose legal career is marked by devotion to women, minorities, and the poor - has nevertheless ruled in favor of intellectual property rights that unauthorized music file downloading and distribution is NOT a "fair use" exception under the copyright laws...
Associated Press (AP, A.P.) to Require Licensing Agreements for News and Headlines : Thomson Reuters & OpenCalais New Content Economy
Posted on July 24, 2009We posted previously at LawPundit about the Commercial Use of Newspaper Headlines Without Permission [as] Copyright Infringement in Japan. There is little doubt under the world's copyright laws that the same standard applies in other countries as well...
Judge Posner Stands Corrected at LawPundit for Using Faulty Reasoning Regarding the Consumer Financial Protection Agency Act of 2009
Posted on July 23, 2009Via Debra Cassens Weiss at the ABA Journal in Posner Questions Behavioral Economists and Proposed Credit Regulator we go to federal appeals judge Richard Posner and his WSJ editorial Treating Financial Consumers as Consenting Adults in which he criticizes a "paternalistic" Consumer Financial Protection Agency Act of 2009 asking:"Is the choice among such alternatives really beyond the cognitive competence of the average home buyer? Is three minutes the limit of his attention span?"As you should know, Judge Posner, and as the 140 character limitation on messages at the popular Twitter microblogger amply prove, the answer to your question is "yes"...
For All Golfers - THIS IS A TIP - NOT A PAID AD : The Easily Affordable Digital Pro High Speed Golf Swing Analysis System
Posted on July 19, 2009This is not a paid ad and we do not generally post email that we get as advertising but we got this in the mail today from Digital Pro Golf and looked at the specs and video samples online.What we liked was the ability to download the software and try it out for free, which we did, and we were able to use the program to evaluate an ...
Twitter and the Matter of Twitter-User Hijacked Names : What about the Names of Law Firms ?
Posted on July 19, 2009Martha Neil at the ABA Journal Legal Technology Law News Now in her July 17, 2009 article asks"Did BigLaw Snag Twitter Usernames, or Were They ?Twitterjacked??"citing to a Law.com Legal Blog Watch posting by guest blogger Bruce Carton, "editor of Securities Docket, an online publication that tracks securities litigation and enforcement developments on a global basis...
New Podcast Series by Chorey, Taylor & Feil -- Common Legal Mistakes International Companies Make in Doing Business in the U.S. and How to Avoid Them
Posted on July 18, 2009Via a posting at the German American ExecuNet group at Linkedin.com, attorney John Watkins of the law firm Chorey, Taylor & Feil in Atlanta (Buckhead), 3399 Peachtree Road, N.E., Suite 1700, The Lenox Building, Atlanta, Georgia 30326 alerts us to a podcast by John L...
The Guitars Have It : Customers Have Power : Is YouTube replacing the U.S. Supreme Court as the Last Resort for Customer Complaints?
Posted on July 18, 2009It happened on the way to Nebraska....Power on this planet is sometimes misunderstood, especially in the legal field. The power of the U.S. Supreme Court, for example, is undisputed, but is generally visible only over longer periods of time and for a very small selection of legal issues and cases...
Twitter and Trademark Infringement : LawPundit Trademark Stolen at Twitter : LawPundit Responds by Registering Name EvanEvWilliams : Tit for Tat
Posted on July 15, 2009We posted previously at LawPundit about the fact that the trademarked lawpundit name has been stolen at Twitter and that the management there is not responding to our complaints to have that name turned over to us - and this is part of established Twitter policy...
U.S. President Barack Obama on Supreme Court nominee Judge Sonia Sotomayor : Judge Sotomayor as a Former Summer Associate at Paul Weiss et al.
Posted on July 14, 2009We subscribe to the email messages of U.S. President Barack Obama at the White House. President Obama's most recent mailing concerns his nomination of Judge Sonia Sotomayor to the U.S. Supreme Court.Judge Sotomayor was a summer associate in her younger days at the Law Pundit's former law firm, Paul, Weiss et al...
The Top 10 Most Frequently Accessed United States Supreme Court Decisions at LexisNexis : Significance and Case Commentaries
Posted on July 05, 2009What United States Supreme Court decisions actually get the most action in legal circles?TechnoLawyer in its July 1, 2009 TechnoRelease® features the LexisNexis top 10 most frequently accessed United States Supreme Court decisions.The case citations below are from LexisOne, but the commentary is by LawPundit, linking to selected other websites which discuss these cases...
Genetic Patent Battle in the Biotech Sector Intensifies : The ABA Law Journal Magazine Features Law and Technology in "Wrangling Genes"
Posted on July 05, 2009Brendan L. Smith at the ABA Journal online Law News Now in the section on Science & Technology Law has a posting titled Law Trails Behind as Disputes Over Genetic Patents Intensify.Read his full feature article in the ABA Journal magazine July 2009 issue at Wrangling Genes: As the law changes and new medical frontiers open, the dispute over genetic patents intensifies...
Andis Kaulins from the USA in Germany (LawPundit) is no near relation to Andis Kaulins from Canada in Wuxi China or to Andis Kaulins in Talsi Latvia
Posted on July 03, 2009Most people think because of the rarity of the name Andis Kaulins that there can be only one person on Earth with that name - and this mistaken assumption has already led several times online to very unfortunate cases of mistaken identity and other difficulties...
The Trademarked LawPundit Name has been Stolen at Twitter which is Criminally Abetting Identity Theft : Here is our Complaint to Twitter
Posted on July 02, 2009The legal community must begin coming down harder on identity theft and the online companies who abet identity theft and make their fortunes by knowingly abetting criminal behaviour, in the instant case, the website Twitter.com.Let us take a current real-world example involving the trademarked name of our own syndicated blog, LawPundit, whereby someone - not I, the trademark owner - has unlawfully taken the name lawpundit at Twitter...
2009 Am Law A-List of Top United States Law Firms Published : Compare to the 2009 Legal 500, the NLJ Survey and Other Rankings
Posted on June 30, 2009American Lawyer magazine has published its 2009 Am Law A-List, which annually picks the top 20 law firms in the United States out of the Am Law top 200 list based on the factors of Revenue per Lawyer (RPL), Pro Bono Work, Associate Satisfaction and Diversity...
USA Environmental Legislation : American Clean Energy and Security Act of 2009 Passes U.S. House of Representatives and Heads to the U.S. Senate
Posted on June 28, 2009The United States - which is far behind Europe in environmental legislation, and which is learning hard energy lessons in the automotive industry - is moving forward on clean energy, as the U.S. House of Representatives on June 26, 2009 passed Barack Obama's "Clean Energy Bill", (H...
Cybercrime and Cybersecurity : Cyberspace and Cyberwar : Russia for International Treaty : USA for Law Enforcement Cooperation : European Convention
Posted on June 28, 2009Arms control for cyberspace?In a "futuristic" June 27, 2009 article at the New York Times titled U.S. and Russia Differ on a Treaty for Cyberspace, John Markoff and Andrew E. Kramer point to the growing threat of cyberwar:"Officials around the world recognize the need to deal with the growing threat of cyberwar...
Google Voice Phone Management System Arrives : Can also be Combined with Google's GOOG 411 to Find and Connect with Local Businesses by Phone for Free
Posted on June 28, 2009Some readers are no doubt familiar with Google's free Goog 411 "find and connect to a business by phone service" - dial from any phone 1-800-GOOG-411 (1-800-466-4411):So how about the new Google Voice?Jeff Bertolucci at PC World in his June 26, 2009 article Hands On With Google Voice -This Is Really Cool reviews "Google's long-awaited Google Voice phone management service that finally became available this week to a lucky few" writing:"Google Voice provides a single phone number, such as 415-555-1212, for all your cell, home, and work numbers, and lets you manage your voice services online...
European Commission Puts Economies of Struggling Britain and Ireland in the Same Category as Latvia : German Economy may be on the Upswing
Posted on June 24, 2009We remain worried about the national finances of Latvia and see the threat of devaluation as a strong concern, but now breathe a sigh of relief to see that the Latvian government is in good company.(See Financial Times Alphaville and Latvia Economy Watch on the economic situation in Latvia)...
The Witness Problem : Human Memory is Fallible and Vulnerable : Which Sense Organ Gives the Most Reliable Testimony? The Eye or the Ear?
Posted on June 23, 2009Human memory is fallible and vulnerable, which has special consequences for the law.The Stanford Journal of Legal Studies has a review by Laura Engelhardt of The Problem with Eyewitness Testimony, a talk by Barbara Tversky, Professor of Psychology and George Fisher, Professor of Law, writing:"In a presentation sponsored by the Stanford Journal of Legal Studies, George Fisher placed Barbara Tversky?s research on memory fallibility into the context of police investigations and jury verdicts, discussing the relevance of such research to our system of justice...
Happy Father's Day - on the Third Sunday in June, but not Everywhere, as it is Celebrated on Different Days in Different Countries
Posted on June 21, 2009Today is Happy Father's Day in many countries of the globe, but not everywhere. Take a look at the Wikipedia article on Father's Day for a history and a world view.
Motorists and Cyclists : Bicycles and Law : Law Enforcement : Radfahren und das Recht : Know Your Laws : Die gesetzlichen Bestimmungen kennen
Posted on June 17, 2009Lawyer On a Bike writes about bicycles and the USA:"The bicycle is a two wheeled, human powered vehicle that offers no crash protection. Cyclists are at the mercy of cars. Between 1932, when bicycle crash fatality statistics were first kept, until 2002, there have been 47,000 deaths of cyclists from bicycle related injuries...
Foxconn & Hon Hai Precision Industry : China's Largest Exporter Opening Dell Assembly Plant in Mexico on the Border of the United States and Mexico
Posted on June 14, 2009The future is always in the making and it behooves us to look carefully at international economic developments, especially when they take place on our own borders.What company known to you is the manufacturer of, among other things, iPods, iPhones, Macbooks, Playstations, Wii's, Xbox 360s, Nokia and Motorola cell phones, Kindles, and motherboards for Intel, Dell and HP?You've heard of them, right? Foxconn is China's biggest exporter, where it employs about a half a million people, and it is one of the world's largest OEM manufacturers of electronics and computers...
What is a Maquila or a Maquiladora? Mexican Border Factories Employ Thousands and Account for a Great Share of Mexican Exports but At What Cost?
Posted on June 14, 2009A quote in the previous LawPundit posting uses the term maquila (short for maquiladora).Map of the maquiladora plants in Mexico from The Cutting EdgeThe Wikipedia under maquiladora tell us that:"A maquiladora or maquila is a factory that imports materials and equipment on a duty-free and tariff-free basis for assembly or manufacturing and then re-exports the assembled product, usually back to the originating country...
EU Election Results for the European Union Parliament : 27 Countries : 736 Members of Parliament (MEPs) : Representing 492 Million Citizens of Europe
Posted on June 13, 2009Few in Europe know the name of their European Parliament MEP (Member of Parliament)? Those who do not know can view this EU directory, which at the time of this posting does not yet reflect the elections just held for the European Parliament.The Germany Missions in the United States at Germany...
The TouchTable : Like a Giant iPhone : A Very Serious High Tech Toy for Military and Law Enforcement : Also Useful for Firms & Private Households
Posted on June 12, 2009Have you seen this? Fantastic.The TouchTable®.If you want an incredible modern high tech coffee table - a touch table is it. The cost is still quite high, but we definitely want one of these for Christmas. Just imagine keeping track of your client legal cases or your sales force or your cash flow or your product chain or your investments by use of one of these things...
Deadline Alert : USA Importer Security Filing & Additional Carrier Requirements Interim Final Rule (ISF 10+2) to require Advance Cargo Info
Posted on June 11, 2009Michael Laden writes at gtnews.com about the impending deadline for implementation of the Importer Security Filing Rule of US Customs & Border Protection (CBP):"We are nearing the half way mark of a one-year non-enforced phase-in of this rule and, unless otherwise delayed, on 26 January 2010 the CBP will begin full enforcement of this new requirement...
France Strikes Out on its Three Strikes Law Against Digital Piracy as the French Constitutional Council Affirms Individual Right to Internet Access
Posted on June 11, 2009The Constitutional Council of France - a uniquely French legal body which is neither a court nor composed of judges - struck down the French Three Strikes Law against digital piracy as contrary to "French constitutional principles". As Peter Sayer of IDG News Service notes:"France's highest legal authority has ruled as unconstitutional a government plan to cut off, without trial, Internet users accused of copyright infringement...
LawPundit Posting "Who Killed the Electric Car" at the New York Times Headlines Around the Web
Posted on June 09, 2009The June 8, 2009 LawPundit posting "Who Killed the Electric Car" was featured at the New York Times Headlines Around the Web in connection with the Wikipedia as follows:
Who Killed the Electric Car?
Posted on June 08, 2009This posting is a logical sequel to our LawPundit posting on Unnecessary Patent Encumbrance of Large Automotive NiMH Batteries : What is Required are Draconian Penalties for the Greedy Patent Holders.As written at the Wikipedia:Who Killed the Electric Car? is a 2006 documentary film that explores the creation, limited commercialization, and subsequent destruction of the battery electric vehicle in the United States, specifically the General Motors EV1 of the 1990s...
Unnecessary Patent Encumbrance of Large Automotive NiMH Batteries : What is Required are Draconian Penalties for the Greedy Patent Holders
Posted on June 08, 2009One of the areas of environmental protection and improved energy development which are being unnecessarily held back by overly broad patent protection is the development and sale of large automotive NiMH Batteries.We have been researching the puzzling snail's pace of production of hybrid and electrical vehicles and ran across the Wikipedia article Patent encumbrance of large automotive NiMH batteries...
Real Estate Prices and Home Values : Housing Prices in Relation to Income : The Zillow.com ZIndex and the Maximum Affordability Ratio of Ben Engebreth
Posted on June 05, 2009Is real estate still vastly overpriced? It most certainly is at the high end of things, but that will probably never change. Buyers often pay a substantial premium for exclusivity (location, location, location) which often far exceeds the strict objective value of the actual property...
Update to CarTrawler Posting
Posted on June 04, 2009Please note that I have made the following update to my previous posting about CarTrawler.UPDATE (June 4, 2009)I received a full apology by phone today from CarTrawler for the car rental booking circumstances previously described in this blog posting, together with sincere assurance that the matter would be righted...
US State & Local Tax Burdens for 2008 Fiscal Year via The Tax Foundation : You Get What You Pay For : The California FailOut
Posted on June 04, 2009Everybody talks about taxes, but who is really doing anything about them?The Tax Foundation, a "nonpartisan educational organization" whose mission "is to educate taxpayers about sound tax policy and the size of the tax burden borne by Americans at all levels of government", has some interesting figures in its Special Report No...
U.S. BEA Commerce Department GDP Economic Report Shows only a ca. 5.7 % drop in the USA in the 1st Quarter of 2009 : BETTER than previous estimates
Posted on June 02, 2009The Commerce Department GDP Economic Report just released (May 29, 2009) by the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) shows an expected drop in U.S. GDP, but the data are better than previous estimates. You can read the Report below or go to the full screen link at Docstoc...
CarTrawler : An Alleged Car Rental Service to AVOID : CarTrawler is NOT a Full Car Rental Company and Potentially a Scam Costing YOUR money
Posted on June 02, 2009I made the great mistake recently of following a CarTrawler.com (Dublin) online link at the RyanAir (Dublin) website after booking a flight and hotel through the reputable and otherwise excellent cheap flyer RyanAir. I also booked a hotel through a RyanAir link - with very good success at a reduced price - and then tried to rent a car at a flight destination airport, thinking that it would also be a good deal and not questioning its reliability since the link appeared on the RyanAir website...
The World of New York Wines : Is Winemaking "Agriculture" as a Matter of Law? What is Legal Zoning with respect to the Wine Industry?
Posted on May 26, 2009Uncork New York! is the website of the New York Wine & Grape Foundation, headquartered in Canandaigua, New York State, USA. If you think you know the wine world, but are not familiar with New York State wines or wineries, you are in for a surprise...
LawPundit Mentioned in the New York Times Topics : Yuan News
Posted on May 25, 2009Our previous LawPundit posting, How Much is the Dollar Worth? Past U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt's (FDR) First Inaugural Address Shows why Greed Kills : Also in $$-Rich China, was mentioned in the New York Times Topics, the Yuan News of May 25, 2009, under the rubric "Headlines Around the Web" (we have added the red circle around the LawPundit link)...
What are the Best Blogs for Law Librarians? Online University Lowdown Focuses on the Importance of the Law Librarian in its Selection of the Best 50
Posted on May 25, 2009We taught legal research in the Trier Law School FFA program for a number of years and remain convinced that research is the bread and butter of the legal profession. You have to know or be able to find the law. Often it is the latter.Understandably, law libraries and law librarians remain as indispensable as ever...
Where to Invest One Million Dollars? Technology Company Executives Reveal Their Favorites : How about Cheap Kindles?
Posted on May 24, 2009At the Reuters blog MediaFile, Tiffany Wu has a May 22, 2009 posting titled Tech execs, where would you put a million dollars?Selected tech execs were asked at the Reuters Technology Summit: "If we gave you $1 million to invest anywhere ? but not in your own company ? where would you spend it?"The tech exec answers given provide some nice insights into today's technology as well as the state of the world economy...
Do it Like the Norwegians : Prudence, Stability and Sovereign Wealth Fund Legislation in Thriving Norway are an Example for the Rest of the World
Posted on May 23, 2009Norway is doing something right that many of the countries in our world are doing wrong, namely running the national economy wisely.Is Norway a model for a healthy and prudent national economics?Landon Thomas Jr. in his May 13, 2009 New York Times article Thriving Norway Provides an Economics Lesson gives us a nice summary of the economic policies followed by a "wealthy" but "relatively frugal" country...
How Much is the Dollar Worth? Past U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt's (FDR) First Inaugural Address Shows why Greed Kills : Also in $$-Rich China
Posted on May 23, 2009"As Dollars Pile Up, Uneasy Traders Lower the Currency?s Value" - that is the title of Jack Healy's May 22, 2009 piece at the New York Times.How Much is the Dollar Worth and What is it Likely to be Worth Tomorrow?The opinions differ. Some have uncertainty and fear, but all that we really have to fear ...
LawPundit Posting on the Economy of Norway Mentioned in the New York Times World Topics : Headlines Around the Web :
Posted on May 23, 2009The New York Times apparently liked our previous posting about the NY Times article by Landon Thomas Jr. on Thriving Norway Provides an Economics Lesson, yesterday, May 23, including a mention of LawPundit and a link to our commentary on Thomas's article which we titled Do it Like the Norwegians : Prudence, Stability and Sovereign Wealth Fund Legislation in Thriving Norway are an Example for the Rest of the World (we have appended the two red circles and the blue double-headed arrow to this partial scan and miniaturization of the respective New York Times World Topics page):
Linex Legal : Forget it : This Allegedly Free Service Is Not Free For Everyone : Possibly Illegal Discrimination on the Basis of the Email Provider
Posted on May 22, 2009As someone who is retired from teaching law at the university level, I nevertheless keep up on legal developments worldwide, inter alia, also co-authoring the world's leading (Langenscheidt-Routledge) German-English dictionary on business, commerce and finance and also doing legal work for the European Commission...
Change in the Pharmaceutical Industry : USA, UK & Europe, especially Germany : Working Paper by Harvard's Daemmrich Summarized by Rob Houck
Posted on May 19, 2009LawPundit: The following summary by Rob Houck (here published with the author's consent) of a working paper by Arthur Daemmrich of the Harvard Business School came to our attention indirectly via assistance from Janine Labusch. Thank you. Materials in [brackets] have been added viz...
What is Democracy? : PUBLIC Online YouTube Voting in the Worldwide Democracy Video Challenge Final Begins May 15 and Runs to June 15
Posted on May 15, 2009America.gov staff writer Tanya Brothen has an article on the Democracy Video Challenge, an online video contest which was launched at the United Nations on September 15, 2008 and for which online voting beings on May 15, running to June 15, 2009, i.e...
X-Life : Using Mobile Cellphone Technology as Cultural e-Diplomacy : Can Game-Playing be Useful as a Form of Education in the International Sphere?
Posted on May 15, 20094 BILLION cellphone subscribers worldwide. Incredible. About 4 times as many as Internet users. Now, that is an eye-opening statistic for this posting.Having taught at a law school for a number of years, the LawPundit has a cutting edge interest in teaching, learning and education...
What is Democracy? Democracy is ... Voting has Begun : Cast Your Vote at YouTube in the Worldwide Democracy Video Challenge : 6 Geographic Regions
Posted on May 15, 2009What is Democracy? Democracy is ...VOTE NOWAs written at America.gov:"Vote for the Video that Defines Democracy BestThe Democracy Video Challenge is an online video contest in which contestants submitted videos that explore the nature of democracy. People worldwide can select a winner by voting between May 15 and June 15 for the video that best captures the nature of democracy...
Update of the Paul, Weiss Reference Guide to U.S., European (EU) & Global Legislative and Regulatory Measures to Deal with the Financial Credit Crisis
Posted on May 14, 2009Paul, Weiss has just issued a comprehensive updated edition (May 6, 2009) of A Reference Guide to the Financial Crisis Rescue Efforts, such as are being taken via legislative and regulatory measures in the United States, Europe (European Union, United Kingdom, Germany, France, Italy, Ireland, The Netherlands, & Other European Countries) and also on a Coordinated Global basis...
France Defies European Union and Passes Controversial Anti-Piracy Three Strikes and You're Out Creation and Internet Law Against Illegal File-Sharing
Posted on May 12, 2009The French National Assembly of the Fifth French Republic, the lower legislative chamber in the bicameral Parliament of France, has passed the "three strikes and you're out" anti-piracy "Creation and Internet Law", also called the "Three-Strikes Law" against illegal file-sharing and it is expected that the upper house, the French Senate, will also pass the law tomorrow...
Nanotechnology Patent Landscape in the UK 2009 : Nanotech Patents May be Declining
Posted on May 12, 2009The Nanotechnology e-News Bulletin of April 30, 2009 in FREE REPORT: IPO produce UK Innovation Nanotechnology Patent Landscape Analysis 2009 refers to a free report (80 pdf pages) just issued on the nanotechnology patent landscape in the United Kingdom 2009:"The UK Intellectual Property Office has compiled a nanotechnology patent landscape for the UK...
Nanotechnology Growth and Nanotech Patents
Posted on May 12, 2009At IPFrontline.com in Nanotechnology Patents and Challenges Raj Bawa, PhD writes to open his article that:"The time for nanotechnology has come and a classic technological revolution is unfolding. According to the National Science Foundation, by 2015 the annual global market for nano-related goods and services will top $1 trillion, making it one of the fastest growing industries in history...
Andis Kaulins Hitting a 300-yard Drive : Golf-Club Cochem/Mosel Driving Range
Posted on May 12, 2009Andis Kaulins Hitting a 300-yard Drive from Andis Kaulins on Vimeo.Andis Kaulins Hitting a 300-yard DriveWell, I nearly fell on my head on that one. I by no means have a perfect swing. But I won my club's men's championship in 2008 at age 61. It is the speed of the swing that makes for distance, determined mostly by a quick body turn at impact...
Montblanc Trademark for Stationery Goods Not Protected against Mont Blanc Tobacco Products in Latvia : Latvian Supreme Court Senate Decision : EU
Posted on May 11, 2009Class 46 summarizes a note written at the World Trademark Review by Valentina Sergeyeva of Strahlberg & Partners in Riga, Latvia, relating to a decision of the Senate of the Latvian Supreme Court concerning a "Mont Blanc" tobacco and cigarette trademark registration application by the Polish company Zaklady Tytoniowe w Lubline SA, which was opposed by Montblanc-Simplo GmbH, now owned by the luxury goods conglomerate Richemont, as holders of the famous MontBlanc pen and stationery trademark...
Brandz Top 100 Most Valuable Global Brands : Consumers are Angry with Governments, Institutions, and Economic Sectors but not Brands
Posted on May 11, 2009The brandz.com BrandZ Top 100 ranking of brands by brand value was created by Millward Brown Optimor to identify the world's most valuable brands by dollar value. Their 2009 Press Release regarding this year's ranking is found below:"BRANDZ? TOP 100 MOST VALUABLE GLOBAL BRANDS NOW WORTH $2 TRILLIONGoogle is the world?s first $100 billion brand, number one for the third year runningNew York, New York, 29th April 2009 ? the fourth annual BrandZ? Top 100 Most Valuable Global Brands ranking published today by Millward Brown Optimor reveals that brands sustain their value, despite the tough economic environment...
The OFNetwork Update : An Interesting Site for People In or Retired From the U.S. Military Services
Posted on May 11, 2009We have been alerted to a blog, The OFNetwork Update, which is especially suited for readers in or retired from the U.S. military services.The most recent posting, for example, relates to the news that the Obama Administration will not be increasing the fees for Tricare, which is "the health care program serving active duty service members, National Guard and Reserve members, retirees, their families, survivors and certain former spouses worldwide...
Happy Mother's Day with a Maywood Medley and Mother How Are You Today?
Posted on May 09, 2009Mother How Are You Today? Medley by Maywood. Happy Mother's Day!See more of MayWood.
OECD Snapshot Country Statistical Profiles for 2009 are NOW Available for its 30 Member Countries plus Six Large Non-Member Economies
Posted on May 08, 2009Do NOT believe everything you read in the media. To fully understand this world, it pays to look at hard facts available online.In this vein, one should now look at the Country Statistical Profiles for 2009 which have just become available from the Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Development (OECD)...
"The Legal Workshop" Aggregates and Digests Seven Law Reviews in a Unique New Collaboration to Reach Readers who are Shifting to Digital Media
Posted on May 07, 2009(hat tip to Law@Stanford, May 2009 for bringing this topic to our attention)The digital era is slowly but surely eroding the importance of print-only law review tomes, so that it is probably inevitable to see that projects such as The Legal Workshop, newly conceived as a collaboration of seven law reviews (Cornell Law Review, Duke Law Journal, Georgetown Law Journal, New York University Law Review, Northwestern University Law Review, Stanford Law Review and University of Chicago Law Review), are now trying to reach readers by presenting digest versions of the often lengthy articles published in those seven law reviews...
A Visiting Card from Latvia : An Exceptional Video from the Latvian Institute : Via the Baltic Online Media Store (BOMS)
Posted on April 30, 2009Seen originally at the Baltic Online Media Store (BOMS) - Make sure to turn on your sound.Latvijas viz?tkarte - Sounds Like LATVIA (2009) - Latvijas Instit?ts
Full Text of April 23, 2009 Press Release of the European Commission regarding Germany's Dodging of its CAP Disclosure Duty
Posted on April 29, 2009Here is the full text - in English, French and German - of the April 23, 2009 Press Release of the European Commission regarding Germany's dodging of its disclosure duty to publish a list of all recipients of all forms of EU agricultural and rural development funds for each financial year...
European Union EU Common Agricultural Policy CAP Susbsidies also include Egregious Non-Farm Aid to Multinational Corporations
Posted on April 28, 2009With reference to our previous posting on EU farm subsidies, we should point out that CAP payments made by the EU are not limited to farms and that European Union Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) susbsidies also include Non-Farm Aid to multinational corporations, for example, in the form of notorious so-called export refunds, which involve the transfer of billions of euros to the bank accounts of large food-related companies...
European Union Farm Subsidies of $55 Billion are 43% of EU Budget : Germany Refuses to Name Aid Recipients on Data Protection Grounds
Posted on April 28, 2009Feudalism is alive and well in Europe. It just has a very modern form of expression.The really big money in the European Union financial scheme of things changes hands feudally between the lowly taxpayers and vested agricultural interests, mostly big agribusiness and large landowners...
USA Drug Policy Flawed : 2.3 Million in Jail or Prison : Limits of the Criminal Sanction : Portugal Leads Way to Legal Reform & Drug Decriminalization
Posted on April 27, 2009According to Eric E. Sterling, President of the non-profit Criminal Justice Policy Foundation and former counsel on anti-drug legislation to the U.S. House Judiciary Committee, there are currently 2.3 million Americans in jails or prisons, many of them due to drug infractions:"We certainly need to imprison dangerous offenders - to protect us and to punish them...
U.S. Federal Reserve Bank Earned $32 Billion in 2008 : Bankruptcy Law and Policy : Law Prof Todd Zywicki on the Housing Crisis : Real Estate Sales
Posted on April 26, 2009One must always recall that whenever money is being lost somewhere, it is being made elsewhere. The world's financial markets are in a constant seesaw battle for supremacy.It is thus no surprise to us that the U.S. Federal Reserve Bank, in spite of having absorbed the assets - including the so-called "toxic assets" - of the "bankrupted" Bear Stearns and AIG companies, posted a $32 billion profit for the year 2008...
World Digital Library (WDL) Launched to Share Content of World's Libraries and Cultural Institutions
Posted on April 24, 2009The World Digital Library (WDL) was launched on April 21, 2009.Staff writer Louise Fenner at America.gov provides the essential details of "a vast multilingual collection of manuscripts, maps, rare books, sound recordings, films, prints, photographs and other cultural and historical materials [which] can be viewed with the click of a computer mouse ? and this is only the beginning of an ambitious project to share the contents of the world?s libraries and cultural institutions...
Patent Baristas Comments Extensively on In Re Kubin : The Use of Conventional Techniques to Arrive at an Obvious Result Does Not Make an Invention
Posted on April 17, 2009Stephen Albainy-Jenei at the blog Patent Baristas has an extensive posting on In re Kubin at Court: It?s Not An Invention If You Use Conventional Techniques To Make It, writing:"In In re Kubin (08-1184), the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit held that the US Patent and Trademark Office's Board of Patent Appeals and Interferences was correct to hold claims as unpatentably obvious when applicants use "conventional techniques" to make an invention...
Comparing Pharmaceutical and Biotechnology Innovation in the United States and Europe : The Key Player is Venture Capital Financing and not Patents
Posted on April 17, 2009It is often claimed that the liberal granting of patents is essential for the development of the pharmaceutical industry, especially modern biotechnology. The facts do not support that view.NGP's Mind the gap? writes:"Fast factsFor most of the past century, Europe has been leading the world in pharmaceutical innovation...
Federal Circuit affirms In re Kubin and puts sensible limits on Biotechnology Patents pursuant to the KSR obviousness standard, thus negating Deuel
Posted on April 07, 2009We posted previously, extensively and definitey about the need to limit biotechnology patents at In re Kubin : Hitting the NAIL on the Head : Sequencing Poor Federal Circuit Court Decisions out of the Biotechnology Patent Genome via KSR and/or Bilski Reasoning...
The Odd Couple : President Nicolas Sarkozy of France and Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany : A Partnership for European Unity ? The G20 Summit
Posted on April 02, 2009Steven Erlanger and Nicholas Kulish have a very perspicacious March 30, 2009 article in the New York Times on the European economic situation at Sarkozy and Merkel Try to Shape European Unity, in which they refer to the "odd couple" of President Nicolas Sarkozy of France and Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany, who are currently leading a world in which we are surely seeing the inglorious end of what Erlanger and Kulish call "unbridled capitalism"...
Rethinking the Legal Profession at the New York Times : Adam Cohen Ponders the Logical Consequences of the Downturn
Posted on April 02, 2009At the New York Times, Adam Cohen ponders the logical consequences of the financial crisis in big law in his article, With the Downturn, It?s Time to Rethink the Legal Profession:"The employment pains of the legal elite may not elicit a lot of sympathy in the broader context of the recession, but a lot of hard-working lawyers have been blindsided, including young associates who are suddenly finding themselves with six-figure student-loan debts and no source of income...
European Union (EU) Political Blog Aggregator at BloggingPortal.eu
Posted on April 02, 2009The BloggingPortal.eu has instituted an interesting concept as it provides a website that aggregates European Union political blogs, 334 in number as of the date of this posting.Hat tip to GrahnLaw.
Building a Better Legal Profession (BBLP) : April 3-4 National Student Conference on Large Law Firm Reform : Layoffs, Recession : New Book on BigLaw
Posted on April 01, 2009PRESS RELEASENATIONALLY RECOGNIZED STUDENT-RUN NONPROFIT RELEASES FIRST BOOK; ORGANIZES NATIONAL CONFERENCE ON REFORMING LARGE LAW FIRMS DURING ECONOMIC DOWNTURNStanford, CA, April 3, 2009 ? Building a Better Legal Profession (?BBLP?) ? the national student group whose efforts to reform large law firms ?shook up the legal world,? according to the New York Times ? has intensified its efforts in the wake of the economic downturn...
GM Chrysler and Obama : Automaker Debacle "a failure of leadership - from Washington to Detroit" : No More Bailouts without Restructuring
Posted on March 31, 2009As reported by the BBC, no more bailouts for US carmakers GM and Chrysler if they do not restructure swiftly.President Obama has correctly called the American automaker debacle of GM and Chrysler "a failure of leadership from Washington to Detroit that led our auto companies to this point...
Scribd Copyrights Ken Follett and the Law Pundit, plus J.K. Rowling Nick Hornby and John Grisham, author of The Associate, a NY TIMES Bestseller
Posted on March 31, 2009Scribd is becoming a force to be reckoned with on the Internet.At ScribdBlog in their posting What ever happened to Fact Checking?, the Scribd Team goes one on one with the Times of London on copyright issues relating to Scribd, involving such famous novelists as J...
AIG and Obama : "I like to know what I'm talking about before I speak."
Posted on March 29, 2009Say what you want, but Obama is sharp. To the rather aggressive question by someone in the news media who is clearly not on Obama's side as to why it took Obama so long to express outrage at the AIG bonuses, Obama replied: "It took us a couple of days because I like to know what I'm talking about before I speak"...
Wealth in America : Who Has the Money? : Wealth Income and Power in U.S. Society : Owners and Top-Level Managers Dominate : The Average American Loses
Posted on March 26, 2009Who holds America's riches?Professor G. William Domhoff of the University of California at Santa Cruz is the author of Who Rules America?, a book which he describes online as follows:"My book, Who Rules America?, presents detailed original information on how power and politics operate in the United States...
Hedge Fund Managers Fleece the Country and the World of Yet More Billions
Posted on March 25, 2009Svea Herbst-Bayliss at Reuters reports in Top hedge fund earners take home billions that the country's top 25 hedge fund managers had their 3rd best year ever in 2008, gambling with other people's money, and collected a total of $11.6 billion for their services, which averages out to $464 million per manager per year...
Does Your Average American Know He or She is Being Stolen Blind by the Upper Echelons ?
Posted on March 25, 2009The Great Debate, a blog by Bernd Debusmann at Reuters, has some interesting statistics on the ever-widening gap between salaries at the American business top as compared to those of normal American workers. Debusmann writes in In American Crisis, Anger and Guns:"There?s less wealth to spread around now as trillions of dollars has evaporated with increasing speed in the deepening crisis...
Major Causes of the Financial Credit Crisis : Stanford Magazine Tells the TRUE Story of Brooksley Born : The Rejected Attempt to Regulate Derivatives
Posted on March 25, 2009Paul Krugman, who in 2008 was the sole winner of the Nobel Prize for Economic Science, in his book, The Great Unraveling: Losing our Way in the New Century, chronicles the optimistic 1990s which dissipated into gloom in the 2000s because of "incredibly bad leadership, in the private sector and in the corridors of power...
AIG Financial Products Corp. : Financial Crisis CBS Video re AIG : 2008 Employee Retention Plan posted at Scribd
Posted on March 25, 2009The monies paid out by A.I.G. to members of its financial products group - who are most answerable for the financial collapse of AIG prior to the bailout - were clearly the result of irregularities even prior to the current bailout. The members of this group plundered AIG by gigantic amounts for a small circle of recipients...
Europeana Relaunched Again : The European Union Digital Cultural Resource Project Appears in Improved From with over 4 Million Digital Items
Posted on March 24, 2009We were informed by email today that Europeana, the digital cultural resource project of the European Union, currently presenting access to over 4 million digital items at museums and libraries throughout the EU, has relaunched again after a problematic start in November...
4th European Forum for In-House Counsel : 23-24 April 2009 Brussels : Academy of European Law : European Company Lawyers Association (ECLA/AEJE)
Posted on March 24, 2009The 4th EUROPEAN FORUM FOR IN-HOUSE COUNSEL, sponsored by the Academy of European Law (ERA, Europäische Rechtsakademie, Académie de Droit Européen, Accademia di Diritto Europeo) and by the European Company Lawyers Association (ECLA/AEJE) will take place in Brussels, Belgium on Thursday and Friday, 23-24 April 2009...
Cinderalla is Alive in March Madness NCAA Basketball 2009 : Cleveland State and Roburt Sallie of Memphis Trumph : Big 12 Administrators Look Bad
Posted on March 21, 2009We predicted previously at LawPundit that the tenacious Cleveland State Vikings were the most likely Cinderella team in this year's NCAA men's basketball championships, and they came through with a convincing 84-69 victory over a Wake Forest team that started the season with 16 straight wins, including a win over North Carolina, and was ranked No...
Master of Laws (LL.M.) at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University : Only Non-Law School in the USA to Offer This Program
Posted on March 20, 2009The Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University in Medford, Massachusetts offers a Master of Laws (LL.M.) for legal professionals tracking for or expanding their credentials to Public International Law, International Business Law or International Economic Law...
Langenscheidt Dictionary of Business, Commerce and Finance English-German German-English published by licence agreement with Routledge Ltd, London
Posted on March 20, 2009The definitive two-way Langenscheidt Dictionary of Business, Commerce and Finance (German-English English-German), now in its 3rd edition and published by license agreement with Routledge Ltd, London ("licence" in the UK) , and of which I am one of four co-authors, has a new link in English here, and I have changed the corresponding links on the LawPundit website which previously led only to the German-language page at Langenscheidt...
Conference May 21, 2009 at Stanford University : Advancing Socially and Environmentally Responsible Supply Chains: Innovation, Integration, Incentives
Posted on March 19, 2009The Global Supply Chain Management Forum and the Center for Social Innovation at the Stanford Graduate School of Business are presenting a conference, Thursday, May 21, 2009 on Advancing Socially and Environmentally Responsible Supply Chains: Innovation, Integration, Incentives...
Maureen Dowd at the New York Times Gives a Modern Twist to the Gaelic Saying : Never Bolt the Door with a Boiled Carrot : AIG Forces Obama "Change"
Posted on March 18, 2009When a Presidential candidate runs on the slogan of "change", the first person who is going to have to prove that "change" has arrived is that same candidate when he gets elected.The A.I.G. bonus scandal is proving to be the first precedent-setting playing field for determining whether Obama and his team mean serious business in diverting the country from the ruinous economic path taken by the Bush administration and the financial mercenaries it supported...
Dmitry Medvedev : President of Russia : Video Blog at the Kremlin
Posted on March 18, 2009We found it educational that the current President of Russia, Dmitry Medvedev, has a video blog, with English subtitles. For someone who grew up during the "Cold War" era, the idea there there is now a domain Kremlin.ru is really quite remarkable, and shows how very far forward Russia and much of Eastern Europe have developed...
The Intellectual Property Colloquium on Patents Copyrights and Technology : Free CLE Podcast on IP : Professor Doug Lichtman : UCLA Law School
Posted on March 18, 2009We are very impressed by the digital legal innovation that is apparent at UCLA Law School. They seem to have a law faculty at the cutting edge.One of their new online innovations is by Professor Doug Lichtman, who has "started a free CLE podcast on intellectual property topics"...
Grigory Sokolov : Prokofiev Piano Sonata No. 7 : Medici.tv
Posted on March 18, 2009This is Grigory Sokolov playing Prokofiev Piano Sonata No. 7 from Medici.tv. Sokolov plays the piano so that you hear every note clearly, no matter how fast he is playing, and he is playing very fast. Watch his hands. Incredible art.Hat tip to CaryGEE...
Toward the Rule of Law in Russia and Eastern Europe : Dietrich André Loeber : Augusts Lebers : Latvian Supreme Court : Mentzendorff House : Riga
Posted on March 18, 2009This posting follows thematically in the footsteps of the previous LawPundit posting.In the year 1974, I left my position as an associate with Paul, Weiss in the United States to come to Europe, heeding the call to work together with the late Professor Dietrich André Loeber at the University of Kiel Law School in Germany, where Loeber, later Dean of the Law School, was the Director of what was then called the "Institut für Recht, Politik und Gesellschaft der sozialistischen Staaten" (Institute for the Study of Law, Politics and Society of the Socialist States) , in short, "Institut für Ostrecht" (literally, Institute for "East Law"), which is now the "Institut für Osteuropäisches Recht (Institute of East European Law)...
CBS & ESPN Sports Widgets Added to LawPundit
Posted on March 17, 2009March Madness in American college basketball is here and the golf season is under way so we have put up CBS & ESPN Sports Widgets in the right column. All law and no sports, naw.
LawPundit Posting on RSS and Atom Feed Formats Cited in MIT Masters Thesis by Anand Rajagopal: A Knowledge Services Roadmap for Online Learning
Posted on March 16, 2009In his MIT Masters Thesis, A Knowledge Services Roadmap for Online Learning, SM, 2005 (Feb 2005), Anand Rajagopal cites to the LawPundit posting ATOM vs. RSS - Advantages of ATOM - The Monopolists Lose.The Thesis was certified by John R. Williams and accepted by Dava J...
Mickelson wins WGC as a rusty Tiger Woods putter is not up to Birdie : CNN Reports Classic Comment by Nick Watney
Posted on March 16, 2009As reported at CNN, Phil Mickelson beat Nick Watney by one stroke to take to the WGC-CA Championship on the Blue Monster Course at Doral, where this author once played nearly 40 years ago. (I recall shooting a 74, but golf "memory" gets better as we move along in age...
Quantcast Audience Profile for LawPundit
Posted on March 16, 2009We recently installed Quantcast on LawPundit pages and here are the currently running results:Gender: 59% of LawPundit readers are male, 41% are female. This is to be expected in the legal field.Age Groups: 30% of our readers are over 50 years of age, 45% are between 35 and 49 years of age, 22% are between 18 and 34 and 3% are between 12 and 17...
LawPundit RSS & Atom Feeds Working Again
Posted on March 15, 2009We yelled LOUD at Google Feedburner and Blogger and the RSS & Atom feeds were up and running again in a few hours, but we have no idea whether our yelling had anything to do with it.
A.I.G. to get $165 Million of Government Bailout Money for Executive Bonuses Earned While Running the Company and the Economy Into the Ground
Posted on March 15, 2009The A.I.G. is to get $165 million of U.S. government bailout money for executive bonuses earned while running the company and the economy into the ground. (This adds to our previous posting at LawPundit).Just how much is $165 million in REAL terms?WHO is paying their bonuses?YOU are, stupid...
March Madness NCAA Basketball Playoffs : We Favor Memphis Mizzou Gonzaga Louisville UConn UCLA & Cleveland State Vikings as likely Cinderella Team
Posted on March 15, 2009Our pick this year in March Madness is Memphis because of their convincing win over Gonzaga in the regular season and their current 25-game winning streak, combined with the nation's number one team for defensive efficiency.If there is a potential Cinderalla team it might be the defensively tenacious Cleveland State Vikings, who under Coach Gary Waters went from 21 losses in 2006-07 to 21 wins in 2007-08 and this year stand 25-10, including a win over Syracuse and an NCAA tournament ticket win over Butler...
Economic Recovery & Executive Earnings Salaries Bonuses and Compensation: Establishing Sensible Legal Guidlelines for the Distribution of Remuneration
Posted on March 15, 2009One of the false arguments raised for paying the outrageous A.I.G. (American International Group) bailout executives millions in bonuses is the absurd claim that such payments are necessary to retain top executive talent. How much talent does it take to lose $100 billion over the space of the last five quarterly reports? which is the claim to fame of A...
$165 Million in Bonuses to Go To A.I.G. Executives in Government Bailout : Theft by the Haves of Taxpayer Monies paid by the Have Nots
Posted on March 14, 2009One of the major reasons for the present world economic disorder is the flawed and economically idiotic policy that the Bush administration followed from its very first days in cutting taxes for the rich and redistributing the nation's money from the middle classes and the poor to the wealthy...
Notice to LawPundit RSS and E-Mail Subscribers regarding LawPundit RSS & Atom Feeds
Posted on March 14, 2009At the moment, the normal RSS & Atom feeds for LawPundit are not working because Google's Blogger is writing 0 bytes to our server for the atom.xml and rss.xml files. We think that the cause may be glitches in the porting of Feedburner feeds to Google, which were supposed to be concluded by the end of February, but difficulties were reported by Google about this during the week...
The Financial Crisis in the World Economy : Origins Causes Players and Solutions : Soros Outlook for 2009
Posted on March 11, 2009To predict the outcome of a game, you should know the players. A handicapper who fixes the odds on flats or trotters in horse racing has to know the race track, the conditions, the horses, the jockeys, the length of the race and their post positions in order to have an informed idea of how the race will end...
Subscription Newsletters for Professionals at PinHawk : Corporate Financial Economic Political Federal Law Firms NYC Real Estate Blawgs Media Courts
Posted on March 06, 2009Beth A. Wilkinson becomes a Member of Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison LLP in the Litigation Department of the Washington D.C. Office
Posted on March 06, 2009We just received an alumni announcement in the mail that Beth A. Wilkinson has "join[ed] Paul, Weiss as a partner in the firm's Litigation Department in the Washington, D.C. office. She will practice general litigation."Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton and Garrison, known in the trade as Paul | Weiss, is in our mind the best litigation firm in the United States - it certainly was when I was an associate at that firm in the 1970's and, indeed, it was recently selected, nearly 40 years later, as the Litigation Department of the Year by the American Lawyer...
JustAnswer.com Legal Questions Answered Online : A Portent of Law Practice in the Future at the Simplest Level? or is it the Illegal Practice of Law?
Posted on March 06, 2009We have learned never to sneeze at new developments until we have examined them carefully. It is so easy to make judgments based on preconceptions, which often turn out to be wrong.One area about which have been very skeptical is the use of the Internet as an online service for user questions to be answered by "experts", who are paid for their efforts by the questioner...
TALF is Launched with Revised Terms as part of the U.S. Financial Stability Plan for Economic Recovery : Paul Weiss Financial Crisis Resource Alert
Posted on March 06, 2009Washington?s Financial Stability Plan (FSP), according to James Cooper at Business Week:"[R]ecognizes that a sustainable recovery depends on three things: removing the fear of bank insolvency, rejuvinating the securitization process in the credit markets, and stabilizing housing activity and home prices...
The History of Ancient Egypt : Revision Forthcoming : More Fragments of the Turin Canon of Kings (Kinglist, Papyrus) are Discovered in Italy
Posted on March 06, 2009Evidence, evidence, evidence.THIS IS SENSATIONAL NEWS for everyone who has an interest in the history of civilization, Ancient Egypt and the chronology of the Ancient Near East, which is based to a large degree on Egyptian chronology, and that in turn is based on a papyrus known as the Turin Canon of Kings...
Top Ten Spas in the World : The Telegraph includes Traben-Trarbach's Five-Star Parkschloesschen in their Elite List
Posted on March 05, 2009Law Firms You Do not Want to Work For : The AmLaw Daily Presents its List of Top Ten Firms in Terms of Associate and Staff Layoffs
Posted on March 05, 2009The Six Pillars of Russian Strength in the Current Economic Crisis as Analyzed at Stratfor.com
Posted on March 05, 2009Managing Mortgage Market Malaise : Cringely to the Rescue : Recent Cisco Certified Internetwork Expert (CCIE) Increase Suggests a Market Upturn
Posted on March 05, 2009German Constitutional & Election Law : Electronic Vote Computers Rejected by Germany's Federal Constitutional Court for Lack of Proper Public Scrutiny
Posted on March 05, 2009How to Effectively Bail Out the Automobile Industry in the United States : The Carrot for New Car Purchases : The Stick for Polluting Old Car Drivers
Posted on March 04, 2009Understanding the Global Recession : Banks and Money : A Primer for Governments, Economists and Laymen : MV = PQ : German Car Buying Model Incentive
Posted on March 04, 2009Russian Law Online : Top News : Legal Newsletter : Encyclopedia of Russian Law
Posted on March 03, 2009American Art and Culture : How about a U.S. Secretary of Culture ? : Life in the USA : Is the American Way of Life Sustainable?
Posted on March 01, 2009Economic Recovery : Are You a Part of the Solution, or Are You a Part of the Problem? Latham & Watkins as a Negative Example of Recovery Policy
Posted on February 28, 2009Oil & Gas Cartels and American Inertia on Energy Issues : Major Culprits for the Current Economic Situation in the World?
Posted on February 28, 2009Lulin the Green Comet Passes Earth Not to Return for a Million Years if at all : View the Green Goddess : Now or Never : See it Via a Dipity Timeline
Posted on February 26, 2009See it now or never. The Green Goddess, comet Lulin, or simply Comet C/2007 N3, whose green color comes from a cyanide-type gas that envelops the comet, has already passed Earth and is leaving quickly. Here is Lulin in the presentation format of Dipity, a timeline-based lifestreaming aggregator of Internet content that apparently anyone can use to make their own personal timeline widgets (we have not tried this out yet fully and we disclaim any and all liability for other news articles on any topic that may show up alongside Lulin on Dipity, and from what we have seen, be prepared to see some things you do not want to see - this is not our timeline):Comet Lulin on Dipity...
World Economic Situation Emphasizes Unique Leadership Role of the United States of America : Friedman at the New York Times Pages Uncle Sam
Posted on February 25, 2009Thomas L. Friedman has it right in quoting a "senior" South Korean official concerning the current world situation:"?No other country can substitute for the U.S.,? a senior Korean official remarked to me. ?The U.S. is still No. 1 in military, No. 1 in economy, No...
SlideShare is a Nifty Website for Uploading and Sharing Presentations such as Power Point or Photographs, with Audio & Video Integration Offered
Posted on February 23, 2009We tried our Phaistos Disk and Elamite PPT on SlideShare.net and got excellent results. SlideShare also provided a transcript of the text without graphics or other slide formatting, which is in fact extremely useful for many purposes (see all that below)...
LawPundit Graphic Interface Updated and Modernized including a Veritable Widget Panoply and Special Features Installed
Posted on February 21, 2009In the course of updating and modernizing the LawPundit blog,we now have the following widgets, gadgets and special features installed. We are not sure we will keep all of these new installations, but most of them for sure:ABA Journal Widget - Latest Legal News - right columnClipmarks special feature - the ClipCast is in the left columnLingospot In-Text Content Discovery - certain selected words or phrases can be featured as lingolinks, e...
The LawPundit Traben-Trarbach Header
Posted on February 21, 2009As of February 21, 2009, the LawPundit graphic interface has been updated and modernized for the reader, also adding some brand new state-of -the-art bells and whistles to make a reading of this web journal (viz. blog, blawg, weblog) more enjoyable. Here we explain the header...
London by Night, From the Air : Fantastic Aerial Photography by Jason Hawkes
Posted on February 20, 2009Jason Hawkes was the photographer for the memorable publication Prehistoric Britain from the Air, by Janet & Colin Bord, one of the most prized books in my personal library, which was instrumental in my writing of Stars Stones and Scholars, the cover of which is found in the right column of this LawPundit blog...
World Best Cities in terms of Quality of Life : Business Week presents Mercer Consulting list of Best Places to Live : The Top Ten
Posted on February 19, 2009Globally seen, what are the best places in the world to live? And if it is good to live there, these places might well be worth a visit when you are planning your next vacation. We show the top 10 here.Business Week carries an article by Carl Winfield at The World's Best Places to Live 2008, presenting the annual Mercer Consulting list of global cities having the best quality of life (see the Mercer Quality of Living Reports)...
Plaxo Pulse as a Coming Blockbuster Social Networking Appplication plus Career Opportunity and Job Search Connector
Posted on February 19, 2009Looking to connect with people you know, knew or would like to know? At a grownup and/or professional level? Or how about alerting everyone in your firm or company or organizational community, committee or team, etc. - immediately - where you will be, e...
Königstein im Taunus ca. 1895 : Photograph of the Detroit Photographic Company via the Library of Congress : Rendering 1646 AD : Modern Video of Town
Posted on February 17, 2009Since the LawPundit was born in Königstein im Taunus, I have added some more information for family and friends and for anyone else interested in this part of Germany.Königstein im Taunus in the late 19th Century (1890 to 1900) : Photograph at the Library of Congress, also found at the Wikipedia from the Wikimedia Commons:The Evangelical Immanuel Church is seen just below the castle to the left
Königstein im Taunus : Clovis I : The Rothschilds : Frankfurt : Deutsche Bank : Financial Center of the European Union
Posted on February 17, 2009Königstein has an interesting history which reaches back into ancient legend. As noted at the Wikipedia:"Shrouded in legend, the town's founding date is unknown. The best known legend says that it was the Merovingian King Chlodwig (466-511) [Clovis I], who had a castle built on a mountain and a chapel in a neighbouring dale, who also founded the town in thanks for a prophecy that came his way
Yana Fedoruk and Vladimir Popolzin in Königstein im Taunus at the Evangelische Immanuelkirche : Coincidence or Destiny?
Posted on February 17, 2009Are there coincidences or is there an invisible web in which everything is meshed?I had cause to think about this as regards my previous posting about Yana Fedoruk and Vladimir Popolzin at the Parkschlösschen in Traben-Trarbach.After making that posting I ran across a link online the next day which indicated that Fedoruk and Popolzin had played in Königstein im Taunus at the Evangelische
Cartographia: Mapping Civilisations by Vincent Virga and the Library of Congress is a "Must Have Book" for Library Shelves
Posted on February 17, 2009We are a bit late on this, but Cartographia: Mapping Civilisations by Vincent Virga and the Library of Congress is a "Must Have Book" for your library shelves. For example, it features the Waldseemüller Map, the first map to ever use the term "America":"Waldseemüller map is the first map to include the name "America" and the first to depict the Americas as separate from Asia...
The Origin of the Cult of Horus in Predynastic Egypt : The Falcon was the Symbol of the Pharaohs on Earth & in Heaven - As Above, So Below
Posted on February 17, 2009The so-called "Followers of Horus" were the people who first occupied Egypt and who created Pharaonic Civilization, starting in the predynastic era. Horus, the Pharaonic falcon, was not only their "God of the Heavens" but also served as the symbol of the first Pharaonic kings, the Pharaohs, and their predecessors...
Yana Fedoruk on the Accordion : A New Talent in a Pleasing Performance
Posted on February 16, 2009We had the pleasure of seeing and hearing the new accordian talent Yana Fedoruk live on the accordion yesterday at the Parkschlösschen in Traben-Trarbach at one of its cultural evenings. She was accompanied by teacher, composer, arranger and concert accordionist Vladimir Popolzin who introduced the program, which Fedoruk played from memory of course: Blue Moon - Richard Rodgers/Lorenz Hart, Love
Scribd Embed of Phaistos Disc: An Ancient Enigma Solved : Two corroborative Old Elamite scripts deciphered using Phaistos Disc Greek Syllabic Values
Posted on February 14, 2009This posting is self-explanatory and is part of a series of postings that will appear periodically on LawPundit relating to critical questions of evidence in fields of academic research other than law. Historical questions are too important to be left solely in the decision-making ambit of scholars who have no training in evidence and whose treatment of available facts can be quite
Archaeology and Evidence : The Norse Pharaohs : Astronomical Decipherments Relating to Tanum Hierakonpolis Nazca Sahara Mesopotamia Middle East
Posted on February 14, 2009The Norse Pharaohs is a book that I wrote ten years ago as part of my series of publications on Origins: Studies in the History of Mankind and its Languages. There was also an accompanying CD-ROM.In The Norse Pharaohs I present decipherments for various megalithic, rock art and other ancient locations where there is generally evidence of the influx or influence of ancient seafarers: Tanum (Sweden
Lingospot In-Text Content Discovery and Clipmarks ClipCast Widget added to LawPundit : New Cutting Edge Technologies for Blogs and Websites
Posted on February 13, 2009You want to post clips to your blog immediately? You want to alert the world to what you have written, published or created - writing, art, photography, video, etc.? Permanently? In a portable anywhere-embeddable ClipCast widget? We explain the technology here...
Me Morality: Why Are Law Firms and Corporations Not Cutting Salaries by 25% or more Across the Board and Saving ALL Jobs Rather than Firing People?
Posted on February 12, 2009We remain continuously mystified about what appears to us to be the boundless greed of our fellow human beings. It is in our opinion this endless selfishness which is now driving the recession. In a kind of mad panic, people and organizations are busy looking after their OWN skin only, rather than taking the course of action which everyone should be taking - and ultimately must take - to get the
Lessig Blog Online Again
Posted on February 12, 2009Lessig Blog was not accessible for a while but is online again.
The Queen of England has a New Website as the British Monarchy rolls out its Newest Face to the World
Posted on February 12, 2009It is high time that the media stop posting its sensationalistic doom and gloom, which only serves to depress private and public sectors, thus making the recession much worse than it would otherwise be. If people just went on living normally things would be much better...
Economic Recovery and the Lessons of History : Joseph's Bailout in Egypt in the Bible : Parshat Vayigash
Posted on February 11, 2009Ups and downs in the economy are a matter of history generally. One example that comes to mind here is the Bible - storing up in fat years for lean years, as Joseph did in ancient Egypt, which was not sufficient, as famine still swept the land and everyone came to Joseph for deliverance...
Evidence and the History of Western Civilization and Christianity : Moses and Exodus and the Kings of Egypt and Judah : Errors in Current Chronology
Posted on February 11, 2009Quizzes by Quibblo.com
The LawPundit Recession Survey : Who is Responsible for the Recession? Who will Turn it Around? What Needs to be Done for Economic Recovery?
Posted on February 10, 2009Want to voice your opinion about the state of the economy? Here is your chance. Take this survey of only three questions. MULTIPLE ANSWERS are permitted: you can pick more than one answer for each question. (Please note that the other quizzes listed at "More" on this Widget - should they appear - are NOT selections by LawPundit but are inserted by Quibblo...
Supreme Court of the United Kingdom Having Trouble Being Supreme : Post Office Refuses UK Parliament Square Address : Website Address Unsuitable
Posted on February 09, 2009There are several new controversies about the new Supreme Court of the United Kingdom (established by the Constitutional Reform Act 2005 and detailed here) which "will take over the Law Lords' judicial functions in the House of Lords and some functions in the Judicial committee of the Privy Council...
Sally Hartley of Lincolnshire in England sings "Make you feel my love" and "All that Jazz" : A Singer at Events, Functions and Weddings in the UK
Posted on February 08, 2009Looking for a singer with a nice voice to sing at an event, function or wedding in the UK? In the following two videos Sally Hartley sings "Make you feel my love" and "All that Jazz". She is based in Lincolnshire, England. For enquiries or booking info contact sallyhartley@dsl...
New York Times on Tiger Woods includes LawPundit Posting on Woods at the Obama Inauguration in its Headlines on the Web : plus Why Tiger wins Majors
Posted on February 08, 2009Today's February 8, 2009 edition of the New York Times in Times Topics features an article on Tiger Woods and includes a LawPundit posting on Tiger Woods at the Inauguration of new U.S. President Barack Obama in that NYT page's Headlines on the Web. As written there: "Blogrunner automatically monitors news articles and blog posts and tracks news events as they develop across the Web...
Evidence and the History of Writing : The Phaistos Disc and Old Elamite Scripts
Posted on February 08, 2009This is the power point presentation that I gave on 31 October 2008 at the INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON THE PHAISTOS DISK on the 100th anniversary of its discovery in 1908 by the Italian archaeologist Luigi Pernier. Conference location: Society of Antiquaries, London, Burlington House, Piccadilly...
Bad Rap for Failout Bankers at Bank Lawyer's Blog : The Bailout Rap as A Stockbroker's Rapumentary
Posted on February 06, 2009The younger generations - especially rap fans - are going to love the YouTube video below by stockbroker performer, Gregg Somerville, as produced by Christopher Conti Video, taken by Mowgli Frere Video, music by Chris Conti. We ourselves tend toward electronic dance music of the type you find at the Love Parade, currently the world's biggest annual music festival, but we found this rap
In Case of Economic Emergency : Push the Button
Posted on February 06, 2009One of the most interesting blogs online is Dane Carlson's Business Opportunities Weblog. He has a cheer-up posting at When The Economy Has You Down, which cites to the source of the emergency button below, which can be bought as a product at Archie McPhee...
To a Visitor from Beijing China : Our Nebra Sky Disk .pdf Link has been Updated
Posted on February 05, 2009A visitor from Beijing China today tried to access my Nebra Sky Disk article at the respective .pdf file at The Sky Disk of Nebra : A Question of Evidence but the link was outdated. We have updated that link at that LawPundit posting and also inform that reader - identity otherwise unknown to us of course - that the correct link is now the link Nebra Sky Disk ...
Guzzle or Unguzzle? Winding Road Magazine and NextAutos.com : The Finest Cars and Motors Past Present Future : Recession or RaceSession?
Posted on February 05, 2009Guzzle or Unguzzle? That is the question. The future is definitely Unguzzle, so enjoy the Guzzlers while they last. President Obama has directed the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to reconsider auto emission policies. It is high time that America cut back its gluttonous use of natural resources - for the sake of the environment and for the sake of the future...
Tiger Woods at the Inauguration of new U.S. President Barack Obama
Posted on February 04, 2009You can subscribe to the Tiger Woods Newsletter at his website. Being a golfer myself, I do. Tiger's most recent posting contains the following notable paragraph: "President Obama recently asked me to speak at the inauguration opening ceremony at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D...
President Obama on Economic Recovery : Plus a Tip on Using the Search Function in YouTube
Posted on February 04, 2009Take a look at this short video (2 minutes) of President Obama on economic recovery: P.S. If you are not accustomed to using YouTube, run your mouse across the top of the video box and a YouTube search box will drop down, where you can look for other videos on political, legal, economic or other topics of interest...
The Frequent Traveler Freddie Awards : Vote for Your Favorite Airline and Hotel Programs
Posted on January 29, 2009Are you a frequent traveler? Have you voted yet for your favorite airline and hotel programs in the frequent traveler Freddie Awards which now are in their 21st edition? Do so now, as voting started January 15 and ends February 28, 2009. The award ceremony takes place in Fort Lauderdale on April 23, 2009...
LinkedIn Online Networking Platform for Professionals Growing Fast and Becoming a Business Relationship Powerhouse
Posted on January 29, 2009We first posted at LawPundit about the advantages of LinkedIn two years ago. LinkedIn is a serious networking platform (serving also as a kind of high level visiting card) for professionals. LinkedIn growth in 2008 outpaced Facebook and MySpace and their membership is definitely leaping forward in the current economic climate as people become even more aware than previously of how important
Startup Advice from Dick Costolo, Co-Founder of FeedBurner : Problems with FeedBurner at Google in Migrating and Merging the Technology
Posted on January 29, 2009Dick Costolo, co-founder and then CEO of FeedBruner, which was acquired by Google for an estimated $100 million in 2007, closed his Burning Door blog in 2008 with some interesting advice for startups in his posting Ask the Wizard. We had cause to look at his posting again since Google in 2009 is now in the process of migrating and merging FeedBurner feeds into the general Google technology...
The German-American Connection as an Important Factor to the Solution of Key Problems in Modern World Affairs : Europe, Economy, Iran, Afghanistan
Posted on January 27, 2009Roger Cohen has a perspicacious January 25, 2009 article at the New York Times on Remembering Germany, in which he first emphasizes the miracle of German reconstruction after World War II: "That miracle, of course, was in large measure a German-American achievement, from Marshall Plan reconstruction, through West Germany?s insertion into NATO, culminating with the astute U...
In re Kubin : Hitting the NAIL on the Head : Sequencing Poor Federal Circuit Court Decisions out of the Biotechnology Patent Genome via KSR and/or Bilski Reasoning
Posted on January 27, 2009The Human Genome is OURS not theirs: Gene Patents Should be Void on their Face Let us say, prior to our comments about In re Kubin, that we think that gene patents should be void and voided by legislation as a matter of public policy, including all gene patents thus far granted...
The First U.S. Patent of Samuel Hopkins and the Legal Standard in In re Bilski : A Return to the Roots?
Posted on January 27, 2009In the previous post we noted that In re Bilski, 545 F. 3d 843 (Fed. Cir. 2008)(en banc) held that patent protection does not extend to business methods which are not tied to a machine process or a physical transformation, thus supporting our longstanding criticism of business method patents...
The Apple iPhone Patent and the Voice of the People at Slashdot : The Patenting of Human Gestures is a Colossal USPTO Error
Posted on January 27, 2009OK. So the clueless USPTO has now approved Apple's 358-page iPhone patent application. Methods for entering data with your fingers (at the snap of a finger?) have been patented as "touch gestures", and similar nonsense. Did someone say something about human Language and Gesture? How about the Apple Multi-Touch Gesture Language? The patenting of a language? Surely you jest...
The Google Glob : What is Wrong at Google? The Last Two Changes of the Google Favicon Are Terrible, both in Color as well as Design
Posted on January 27, 2009Goo for Google? We call the new Google favicon "the Google Glob". Something is not right at Google and you may have noticed yourself that the Google favicon has changed over the past 12 months from the familiar large blue "G" to a weak ugly lower case "g" and then recently to an ugly shape marked by a more or less hideous color combination...
Cosmopolitan Citizenship & World Legal Order : Germ. Law J. (1, 2009) on Kant, Habermas, Divided West & International Law Constitutionalization
Posted on January 26, 2009IN a special edition, 10 German Law Journal No. 1 (1 January 2009) presents The Kantian Project of International Law: Engagements with J. Habermas' The Divided West (in English). Achilles Skordas & Peer Zumbansen write in the introductory article: "After Habermas' Der gespaltene Westen was published in Germany [by Suhrkamp] in 2004 to wide acclaim, Polity Press published an English language
Barack Obama & Hadrian, A New Emperor, presented by 2008 Briton of the Year Neil MacGregor, British Museum Director : Hadrian, Obama and Iraq
Posted on January 26, 2009Does history repeat itself? You decide. The parallels between the ancient Roman Emperor Hadrian (famed for Hadrian's Wall) and the new US President Barack Obama are remarkable. Watch the video below about Hadrian from the British Museum, narrated by Neil MacGregor, voted Briton of the Year 2008 by the Times in his capacity as Director of the British Museum (and someone Obama might want to
The Americans photographed by Robert Frank and introduced by Jack Kerouac has been published in a new version in English, German and Chinese editions
Posted on January 25, 2009The Americans in German, "Die Amerikaner" and in Chinese "???". I got this book for my birthday this past December. If you are down about the American economy and the prospects for 2009 and beyond, don't be. Take a look at this book - and at this first link about that book - to see how greatly much of America has changed in the 50+ years since the mid-1950's...
NFL National Football League Super Bowl XLIII (43): Pittsburgh Steelers vs. Arizona Cardinals : Who Will Win?
Posted on January 19, 2009Notice: Our predictions are always made in good fun. We disclaim any and all liability for any consequences of any reliance (directly or indirectly) upon our prognostications. May the best team win. NFL Super Bowl XLIII (No. 43) : Pittsburgh Steelers vs...
Overflow Legal : A digg approach to the sheer Volume of Information available in the Law in the Digital Age
Posted on January 19, 2009OverFlow Legal is trying the digg method of dealing with news information overflow and is offering a similar system of information evaluation with regard to legal news in the modern age. It is a nice idea which, however, pits two conflicting forces against each other: 1) the need of legal professionals to manage information overflow more effectively; and, 2) the resistance of the skeptical
Obama "Yes We Can" Fever Hits Germany
Posted on January 18, 2009As an American expatriate in Germany, we find that people in the United States have little conception of their IMPACT on other world countries. Most people in the United States think that America is IMPORTANT to the rest of the world - actually, that is not the case, as the rest of the world does not really think much about America in their day-to-day living, but what America has is a worldwide
LawPundit Optical Graphic Interface Change to Coincide with the Inauguration of the 44th President of the United States of America Barack Obama
Posted on January 18, 2009In anticipation of the direction of "change" to be ushered in by the inauguration of Barack Obama as the 44th President of the United States on Tuesday, January 20, 2009, we have also "changed" the graphic interface of LawPundit, something which we may now do periodically over the coming months and years, to coincide with seasons, events and trends...
Lexmachina at Stanford Law School : Online IP Clearinghouse for Patents, Copyrights, Trademarks, Trade Secrets, Antitrust, free for non-commercial use
Posted on January 14, 2009Lexmachina anyone? Law@Stanford in the January 2009 issue links to a Sheri Qualters article about the fact that Stanford Law School [has launched an] Online IP Clearinghouse writing: "Stanford Law School has launched the Stanford Intellectual Property Litigation Clearinghouse [IPLC], a searchable online database of intellectual property cases filed since 2000...
The American Car Industry and the Stupidity of the US Automobile Manufacturers : What would Apple's Steve Jobs make of this mess?
Posted on January 14, 2009Speaking of cabbages and kings, as in the previous LawPundit posting, while doing a Mad Hatter through the Internet, we ran across Cabbages & Kings, Limited - "Quickly. A blog for slow readers by Joel Shurkin.", where there is discussion of an idea by Robert X...
SLAW is LAW : Do Something for Your Health and Start Eating Healthy Foods : Eleven Tips from Jonny Bowden via the Well at the New York Times
Posted on January 14, 2009Slaw (with apologies to the blawg) is law. Cole slaw that is. Lewis Carroll wrote: "The time has come," the Walrus said, "To talk of many things: Of shoes--and ships--and sealing-wax-- Of cabbages--and kings--"There was poetry in a posting last year at the Well, a New York Times blog on health by Tara Parker-Pope, which gave some superb nutritional advice from nutritionist and author Jonny
Interactive Collaborative Student-Centered Learning is Best : Universities such as MIT are Getting Smarter
Posted on January 14, 2009According to Sara Rimer at the New York Times, they are getting smarter at MIT, at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, at North Carolina State University, at the University of Maryland, at the University of Colorado at Boulder and at Harvard. They are finally catching on that interactive and collaborative student-centered learning in smaller groups is far more effective than one-directional
Kristy Kay has a New Song : I Will Wait
Posted on January 14, 2009Kristy Kay has a new upbeat song at her website and at MySpace I Will Wait
Man's History is a question of EVIDENCE: Where was Troy? Where did Paris take Helen of Troy? Greece & the Origins of Writing in Western Civilization
Posted on January 12, 2009Not all disciplines understand evidence the way that the law does. John F. Hughes, Professor of Computer Science at Brown University, provides us with the following anecdote about the way in which archaeologists treat evidence: "In 2001, archaeologists discovered a ship sunk in the middle of the Mediterranean, surrounded by amphorae...
Sustainable Development Now : The ENERGY CRISIS and the continued POPULATION EXPLOSION : 2009 and Beyond : Quo Vadis Malthus?
Posted on January 09, 2009Herve at the Blogactiv.eu blog Un peu de bon sens (A Bit of Good Sense) made the following posting on January 5, 2009. For some reason, neither Herve nor the blog are now accessible, but we found the text in Google cache. Herve's posting sets out the major problems facing humanity in the year 2009 and beyond : the energy crisis and the population crisis...
International Year of Astronomy 2009 (IYA2009) initiated by UNESCO and the IAU to be Launched on January 15 and 16, 2009
Posted on January 09, 2009As you can read at NASA, 2009 is the International Year of Astronomy, which will be officially launched on January 15 and 16 at UNESCO. This is the official logo. UNESCO writes: "The International Year of Astronomy will be launched at UNESCO on 15 and 16 January...
Europeana Online Again : European Union Relaunches its Multimillion-Euro Digital Library Experiment : Example : Oldest Illustration of Stonehenge
Posted on January 09, 2009We posted previously about Europeana, the EU's digital library project that went online in November, 2008, only to crash the first day of operations. Today, we received news that Europeana is back online again. Here is a screen capture: It is accompanied by the following message: "Europeana is back online Thanks for registering with Europeana...
Fixed Vote at the 2nd Annual ABA Journal Blawg 100 Reader Poll to determine the favorite Reader Blawgs in 10 Categories
Posted on January 08, 2009How about blawg popularity voting? The ABA Journal online has a thought-provoking article by Edward A. Adams titled "Some People Love the Blawg 100 a Little Too Much". Language is a funny thing - and the law uses this fact to its advantage. We intentionally selected the word "fix" in our title because it possesses a double entendre in the case of a "fixed" vote at the 2nd Annual ABA Journal
I-tah! U-tah! We-tah! but Nobody-tah Utahns! Yuttahih! Football Polls are Exposed as a Popularity Contest Based on Opinion not Viewed Performance
Posted on January 05, 2009There are two theories about the origin of the State name Utah: "[1] . . .named after the Ute Indian tribe, it means "people of the mountains" [2] . . . from the word "Yuttahih" [Apache term for the Navajo] meaning "one that is higher up"". Sportswriter Dan Wetzel has a nice piece at Yahoo! Sports about the Utah University Utes and the current college football BCS bowl and poll fiasco, which
NFL Playoffs 2009 : National Football League Divisional Round Predictions January 10 and 11, 2009
Posted on January 05, 2009NFL National Football League Divisional Round YPPSYS Predictions January 10 and 11, 2009 [These predictions are made just for fun. We disclaim any liability for any reliance upon them.] Baltimore Ravens (11-5, 1-0 in playoffs) at the Tennessee Titans (13-3) Our stats favor the Titans by 4...
THE YPPSYS DIVISION I-A FBS FINAL COLLEGE FOOTBALL RATINGS and RANKINGS for the 2008 / 2009 SEASON - USC is the NATIONAL CHAMPION according to YPPSYS
Posted on January 05, 2009FINAL YPPSYS DIVISION I-A FBS COLLEGE FOOTBALL RATINGS 2008 /2009 (after the bowl games)... and the national champion is ... Southern Cal (USC). Compare these rankings to last year's rankings. NAYPPA (net average yards per play advantage) as a rating is calculated using data obtained at CFBSTATS...
ESPN Sports Blogs : Golf Blog : NFL Nation
Posted on January 04, 2009ESPN has a number of sports blogs. Take a look at that link for a linked list. We are, for example, following the newly founded ESPN Golf Blog which is a statistical treasure chest on golf thus far, and in view of the now ongoing NFL playoffs, we are following NFL Nation...
LawPundit Football Championship Head Coaches of the Year 2008/2009 Season
Posted on January 04, 2009The LawPundit Football Championship Head Coaches of the Year for the 2008/2009 Season (all photos enlarged on this website) are: NCAA Division I-A (FBS) Kyle Whittingham of Utah (13-0, Only undefeated Division I-A FBS Team in the 2008/2009 Football Season) Photo linked from Continuum, the Magazine of the University of Utah Utah took over as holders of the nation's longest bowl win streak this
2009 Husker Recruits are Top : University of Nebraska Cornhusker Football Recruitment Commits are the Kind of Players that Make Winning Football Teams
Posted on January 02, 2009In spite of the Nebraska Cornhuskers 9-4 record in the 2008 / 2009 football season, the SI.com team of 2008 College Football All-Americans does not include a single Husker, not even in the honorable mentions, which go up to 15-deep at each position, including the 1st two teams...
YPPSYS NFL Pro Football Pre-Playoff Rankings and Playoff Predictions (2008/2009 Season) based on NAYPPA Statistics
Posted on January 02, 2009YPPSYS NFL Pro Football Pre-Playoff Rankings and Predictions (2008/2009 Season) based on NAYPPA Statistics (Net Average Yards Per Play Advantage) YPPSYS POST-SEASON PRE-PLAYOFF NFL PRO FOOTBALL RATINGS and RANKINGS (* = Division Champion. The Rating is determined by taking the NAYPPA - net average yards per play advantage, subtracting ...
Happy New Year 2009 from LawPundit : Onward with Our Moleskine
Posted on January 01, 2009We wish all readers and subscribers of LawPundit a Happy New Year 2009. Starting 2009, our Google PageRank has improved from a 5 to a 6, which is pretty good for a blog. Google's own Official Google Blog has a ranking of 8 and the first blog to appear on Google Search for the keyword "blog" is Seth Godin's Blog which has a ranking of 7...
German Chancellor Angela Merkel in a Guest Column at ADAC Magazine (Germany's leading automobile club) identifies Measures for the 2009 Economy
Posted on December 29, 2008ADAC Motorwelt is the club magazine of the ADAC, Germany's and Europe's leading automobile club with over 16 million members. The January 1, 2009 print issue (accessible digitally online only to members) of ADAC Motorwelt contains a guest column by Angela Merkel, the German Chancellor (the Chancellor is the CEO of the government), in which Merkel talks about the measures taken by the German
New Head Football Coach Gene Chizik of Auburn Hires Gus Malzahn of Tulsa (and formerly of Arkansas) as Offensive Coordinator
Posted on December 28, 2008Fans of Auburn. Your fortunes are looking up. Definitely. As just reported by the AP via Rivals.com at Yahoo Sports, new head football coach Gene Chizik of Auburn has hired Gus Malzahn of Tulsa (and formerly of Arkansas) as the new Offensive Coordinator and Quarterbacks Coach at Auburn...
Music and Culture : Elina Garanca - A New Mezzo-Soprano Star on the Opera, Symphony and Classical Music Recording Scene
Posted on December 27, 2008Elina Garanca is a new mezzo-soprano star on the opera, symphony and classical music recording scene. NEW RELEASE, JANUARY, 2009 To be released in January 2009 by Deutsche Grammophon ("Deutsche Grammophon is Classical Music") is Elina Garanca Bel Canto: Already available are, for example, the following recordings: Elina Garanca - Mozart Opera & Concert Arias: Elina Garanca - Arie
The Financial Credit Crisis : Rescue in USA UK Germany : Paul Weiss publishes Reference Guide to Emergency Economic Stabilization Act (Bailout) & More
Posted on December 23, 2008Our alma mater law firm, Paul | Weiss (Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison LLP), headquartered in New York City, one of the top law firms in the world, has just issued its December 22, 2008 Reference Guide to U.S. Rescue Efforts in the current financial credit crisis...
Key Secrets of Good Coaching Leadership II : Winning 151 Football Games in a Row can be Taught Learned :: Prepare Your Team : Recognize Priorities
Posted on December 22, 2008This posting is Nr. II of a series about The Key Secrets of Good Coaching Leadership : Winning can be Taught Learned : Personnel : Recruiting : Mentoring : Preparedness. How is it possible that Bob Ladouceur, the head football coach at De La Salle High School in Concord, California, won 151 straight football games from 1992 to 2003 and keeps winning at an incredibly high percentage rate? pa href="http://feeds...
Mount Union Purple Raiders Win NCAA Division III National Football Championship as Nate Kmic First to Cross 8000 Yard Career Rushing Mark
Posted on December 20, 2008Nate Kmic of the Larry Kehres coached Mount Union Purple Raiders ran for 88 yards in the NCAA Division III National Football Championship Final to raise his career rushing total to 8074 yards and become the first player ever to cross the 8000 yard career rushing mark in NCAA competition, as the Purple Raiders - returning just six starters from the previous season - regained their Division 3 pa href="http://feeds...
LawPundit Subscribers Please Note Format Change of RSS and Atom Feed due to FeedBurner Inability to Handle Large Feeds
Posted on December 18, 2008This is a special message to LawPundit Subscribers. Up to now, our RSS and Atom feeds have fed your aggregators with the entire text of all LawPundit postings. However, since some LawPundit postings are quite long, we have, for the second time this year, been faced with the inability of FeedBurner to handle our FeedBurner LawPundit feeds, as FeedBurner shuts off any feed - not just LawPundit's pa href="http://feeds...
Khan of Khans Kagan recaptures cyberlawyer Lawrence Lessig who is leaving Stanford Law School to return to Harvard : HLS Leads Trend, but Quo Vadis?
Posted on December 16, 2008Kagan (viz. khaghan or khakhan) in Mongolian means "khan of the khans" or "emperor" and Elena Kagan of Harvard Law School is befitting that approximate appellation well in her capacity as Dean of HLS (Harvard Law School). HLS has now stocked up its professorial assets for the 20th time under Kagan's reign by hiring a tenured professor from another law school, in this case Stanford Law School's ( pa href="http://feeds...
College Football Results the Weekend of Saturday, December 13, 2008 : Nate Kmic of Division III Mount Union Sets NCAA All-Time Career Rushing Record
Posted on December 14, 2008There were no Division I-A FBS football games this weekend as the Bowl games kick off next weekend, but we report the following results in the playoff games in the other football divisions. Division I-AA FCS In semifinal playoff games James Madison almost came back from a 35-17 deficit, but Montana held on to win 35-27 and make it to the national championship FCS game whereas Richmond came back pa href="http://feeds...
Auburn Selection of Gene Chizik from Iowa State as Head Football Coach viewed from the standpoint of YPPSYS Rankings and Statistics
Posted on December 14, 2008It appears to us in college football that defensive coordinators may sometimes make better head coaches than offensive coordinators, so that the selection of Gene Chizik, head coach at Iowa State as the new head football coach at Auburn could be viewed as understandable, as Chizik made a name for himself as a stellar defensive coordinator at Texas and Auburn before being named head coach at Iowa pa href="http://feeds...
Marriott on the Move : The Blog of CEO J.W. Marriott, Jr. Talks about the Economy and Marriott Hotels in 2009
Posted on December 12, 2008Did you ever stay at a Marriott hotel? J.W. Marriott, Jr., Chairman and CEO of Marriott International, Inc., has a blog at Marriott on the Move in which Arne Sorensen, chief financial officer, presents Reflections on the Economy and Marriott's Prospects for 2009 and talks about RevPAR (revenue per available room), a key performance measuring stick in the hotel industry...
Law and Romanettes : Blondes, Brunettes or Redheads? US Supreme Court Chief Justice Roberts Learns a New Word
Posted on December 11, 2008You mean you are in law and do not know what a romanette is? OK, neither did we. Here is the answer from Wikipedia: 2008, United States Supreme Court oral argument, United States v. Hayes, Case no. 07-608, page 9, MS. SAHARSKY: . . . not looking at this Romanette (i) and (ii), but just looking at that sentence...
Hiring a Good Coach is Half the Battle: Buffalo Head Football Coach Turner Gill is on the Radar of Auburn and Syracuse
Posted on December 11, 2008Here is the AP headline at ESPN: "Buffalo's Gill on wish list for Syracuse, Auburn after unlikely MAC title BUFFALO, N.Y. -- Buffalo coach Turner Gill, fresh off an improbable Mid-American Conference title, is a candidate for coaching vacancies at Syracuse and Auburn...
YPPSYS NCAA Division I-A FBS College Football Bowl Game Predictions and Ratings for the 2008 / 2009 Season
Posted on December 10, 2008COLLEGE FOOTBALL BOWL GAME PREDICTIONS 2008/2009Our prediction record for the college football season is 653-212 in calling the game winners and 307-288-11 against the point spread. See our pre-bowl ratings and rankings. NCAA Division I-A FBS College Football 34-Game Bowl Schedule, Matchups and Predictions...
Underwater Megaliths at Atlit-Yam Israel Deciphered as Ancient Astronomy
Posted on December 10, 2008I received an email recently alerting me to the fascinating megalithic underwater site of Atlit-Yam in Israel. The Israel Antiquities Authority writes: "The site of Atlit-Yam is situated some 200-400 m offshore, at a depth of 8-12 m and extends over an area of ca...
THE YPPSYS DIVISION I-A FBS PRE-BOWL COLLEGE FOOTBALL RATINGS and RANKINGS for the 2008 SEASON on December 9, 2008: After 15th WEEK
Posted on December 08, 2008THE YPPSYS DIVISION I-A FBS PRE-BOWL COLLEGE FOOTBALL RATINGS and RANKINGS for the 2008 SEASON on December 9, 2008 ________ THE YPPSYS DIVISION I-A FBS COLLEGE FOOTBALL RATINGS after Week 15 of play. NAYPPA (net average yards per play advantage) is calculated according to CFBSTATS...
YPPSYS College Football Game Predictions and Results - 2008 Season - Week 15 - Week of Saturday, December 6, 2008
Posted on December 07, 2008Update: Our record this week in Division I-A FBS football was 11-4 in calling the winner and 7-8 against the betting line. In the other divisions our record in calling the winner was 6-4. Our record for the season is therefore 653-212 in calling game winners and 307-288-11 against the spread...
EU Job Posting for Director General of OLAF in English, French and German Languages only Found to be Discriminatory by the Court of First Instance
Posted on December 04, 2008The translators in Europe will be happy about a decision of the Court of First Instance of the European Union, just handed down in case in which the suit was brought by Italy, as joined by Spain and Latvia. The court decision nullified a European Commission policy, adopted in the year 2004, to publish job vacancy notices for senior positions in English, French and German languages only...
Which is the Best Team in the Land? It all Depends on Who Plays Whom : Offensive and Defensive Strengths and Weaknesses Result in Paradox Outcomes
Posted on December 04, 2008Who is the best college football team in the land? and how can it be that team A beats team B, team B beats team C, and then team C beats team A? Maybe there is often no true national champion but simply a mix of top teams. A good example here is the triumvirate of games in the 2008 college football season between Texas, Oklahoma and Texas Tech, where Texas beat Oklahoma, Oklahoma beat Texas pa href="http://feeds...
College Football Teams Compared by 2008 Statistics taken from CFBSTATS.com
Posted on December 03, 2008If we assign a ranking to various parameters for college football teams according to CFBSTATS.com, what do the accumulated rankings look like? The following analysis of the most important statistics in football shows that Florida and USC should be ranked 1st and 2nd and that Boise State is really getting the shaft if it is not selected to a BCS Bowl, since it ranks higher than Utah and Ohio State pa href="http://feeds...
Leaders Unite! A Worldwide Online Community for Leadership Research : SSRN (Social Science Research Network) announces MRN Leadership Research Network
Posted on December 02, 2008In case you did not know it, the leading download at SSRN, referenced below, is 'I've Got Nothing to Hide' and Other Misunderstandings of Privacy, by Daniel J. Solove, George Washington University Law School. Join SSRN (for free) to download it. __________ We just received the announcement below from MRN, the Management Research Network at SSRN, the Social Science Research Network, concerning pa href="http://feeds...
College Football Teams 2008 Statistically Compared using cfbstats.com: Florida vs. Texas Tech
Posted on December 01, 2008The current college football rating system by popular polls should be scrapped. A review of football statistics this season shows this clearly. Too much emphasis is being placed upon a team going undefeated against weak opposition, rather than on hard football facts...
College Football Teams 2008 Statistically Compared using cfbstats.com: Oklahoma vs. Texas
Posted on December 01, 2008The current college football rating system by popular polls should be scrapped. A review of football statistics this season shows this clearly. Too much emphasis is being placed upon a team going undefeated against weak opposition, rather than on hard football facts...
College Football Teams 2008 Statistically Compared using cfbstats.com: Alabama vs. USC
Posted on December 01, 2008The current college football rating system by popular polls should be scrapped. A review of football statistics this season shows this clearly. Too much emphasis is being placed upon a team going undefeated against weak opposition, rather than on hard football facts...
THE YPPSYS DIVISION I-A FBS COLLEGE FOOTBALL RATINGS and RANKINGS for the 2008 SEASON on December 1, 2008: After the 14th WEEK of Play
Posted on December 01, 2008THE YPPSYS DIVISION I-A FBS COLLEGE FOOTBALL RATINGS and RANKINGS for the 2008 SEASON on December 1, 2008: After the 14th WEEK of PlayTHE YPPSYS DIVISION I-A FBS COLLEGE FOOTBALL RATINGS after Week 14 of play.NAYPPA (net average yards per play advantage) is calculated according to CFBSTATS...
BCS Standings of December 1 Biased Ignoring Actual Football Performance : Oklahoma victor over 4 BCS ranks, Texas 3, Alabama & Florida only 1 each
Posted on December 01, 2008The new BCS standings as of December 1, 2008(The BCS rating score is a calculation based on a formula relying on the Harris Interactive poll, the USA Today coaches poll and selected computer polls.)Take a look at that poll below anc consider the following stats:Oklahoma has beaten the teams ranked 7, 11, 13, and 14 and has lost to the team ranked 3rd...
College Football Teams 2008 Statistically Compared using cfbstats.com: Penn State vs. USC
Posted on December 01, 2008The current college football rating system by popular polls should be scrapped. A review of football statistics this season shows this clearly. Too much emphasis is being placed upon a team going undefeated against weak opposition, rather than on hard football facts...
College Football Teams 2008 Statistically Compared using cfbstats.com: Utah vs. Boise State
Posted on December 01, 2008The current college football rating system by popular polls should be scrapped. A review of football statistics this season shows this clearly. Too much emphasis is being placed upon a team going undefeated against weak opposition, rather than on hard football facts...
College Football Teams 2008 Statistically Compared using cfbstats.com: Florida vs. USC
Posted on December 01, 2008The current college football rating system by popular polls should be scrapped. A review of football statistics this season shows this clearly. Too much emphasis is being placed upon a team going undefeated against weak opposition, rather than on hard football facts...
BCS Bowl Matchups and the BCS Eligibility Provisions in the College Football Bowl Selection Procedure
Posted on November 30, 2008Even in sports, also in college football, it all comes down to the legal paragraphs.TEN BCS TEAMS ARE SELECTED for the BCS Bowls by the eligibility provisions of the BCS Selection Procedures.The Eligibility Provisions of the BCS Selection Procedures read as follows (LawPundit has added emphasis where required and has also added the material in brackets in orange script to help in the explanation of the provisions):"Automatic Qualification, At-Large Eligibility and Selection Procedures, 2007-2010 GamesAutomatic Qualification1...
President-Elect Obama and the Battle for His BlackBerry : Keeping in Touch with People Outside of the Inner Circle at the White House
Posted on November 29, 2008Obama is negotiating to have his BlackBerry returned, according to Molly McDonough at the ABA Journal Law News Now of Novebmer 26, 2008, citing to an ABC News interview with the Obamas by Barbara Walters.It seems that his BlackBerry had to be given up for security reasons, but that Obama finds he needs to be connected to the world outside of the "10 or 12 people who surround my office in the White House"...
Mirror mirror on the Wall, Who's the Best Team of them All? Not Alabama. Substantial Changes Need to be Made in the College Football Rating Systems
Posted on November 29, 2008Not all is well in college football country as the football polls of the AP, USA Today, the Harris Poll and the BCS are wreaking havoc throughout the land. It is OK to follow such "polls" as long as one does not take them seriously. But really, who is truly best team in the land?Should an 11-0 Alabama team that has deftly slipped its way through a weak schedule be ranked Number One in the nation? No way - if we look at objective criteria...
A Useful Firefox Extension : URLbarExt Incorporates Some Time-Saving Features : Copy or Shorten a URL or Go to Home Root Page with One Click : & More
Posted on November 27, 2008Via Shave Keystrokes Off Your Day With UrlbarExt at ReadWriteWeb we can confirm that UrlbarExt is a useful Mozilla Firefox extension.We quote from the Mozilla.org Firefox Add-ons webiste page about UrlbarExt:"UrlbarExt Extends Location Bar with set of icons to 1- Go up one level,or directly to the root of the current site(double click)...
Law Code of Hammurabi : Legal Principles Organized According to Calendration? : Evidence of Modernistic Trend Toward Separation of Church and State
Posted on November 26, 2008N.S. Gill at About.com some time ago featured the Code of Hammurabi, one of the earliest legal codes.See Hammurabi's Code of Laws in the translation by L.W. King.As written at the Library of Congress in the Country Study of Iraq:"The Amorites established cities on the Tigris and the Euphrates rivers and made Babylon, a town to the north, their capital...
THE YPPSYS DIVISION I-A FBS COLLEGE FOOTBALL RATINGS and RANKINGS for the 2008 SEASON : After the 13th WEEK of Play
Posted on November 26, 2008THE YPPSYS DIVISION I-A FBS COLLEGE FOOTBALL RATINGS and RANKINGS for the 2008 SEASON(after the 13th week of play)THE YPPSYS DIVISION I-A FBS COLLEGE FOOTBALL RATINGS after Week 13 of play. NAYPPA (net average yards per play advantage) is calculated according to CFBSTATS...
LawPundit Reader Satisfaction Survey
Posted on November 25, 2008This is your Chance!Take the LawPundit Reader Satisfaction Survey.
YPPSYS College Football Game Predictions and Results - 2008 Season - Week 14 - Week and Thanksgiving Weekend of Saturday, November 29, 2008
Posted on November 25, 2008Last week we went 35-12 in calling the winner of the game and 26-19-2 against the point spread. Our record for the season is 592-187 in calling the winner and 282-259-9 against the spread. We are beating almost all systems listed at the College Football Prediction Tracker...
Welcome D3boards
Posted on November 24, 2008We are getting quite a number of hits from d3boards.com, "Your Number One Source for Division III Sports Conversation."Welcome to LawPundit. Just plug in the search terms Mount Union or Larry Kehres in our website search box for some interesting D3 information...
Advertising Revenue and the Recession : The Changing Media Landscape
Posted on November 24, 2008Erik Sass at MediaDailyNews reviews the development of total advertising revenue from the year 1950 to 2008 in light of the "reality" of the "predicted recession".Newspaper ad revenue has been declining linearly since 1950 and is now being overtaken by broadcast TV ad revenue, which is also falling...
In re Bilski : Patentable Subject Matter : Federal Circuit Overturns Pure Business Method Patents : Requires Machine Process / Physical Transformation
Posted on November 23, 2008A LANDMARK DECISION IN US PATENT LAW : IN RE BILSKI (2008 WL 4757110 (Fed. Cir. Oct. 30, 2008) (en banc)). As written by Lewis R. Clayton of Paul | Weiss in his article ?Bilski?: Obtaining Business Method Patents Gets Harder in the New York Law Journal:"By a 9-3 vote, the en banc court affirmed the rejection of a business method patent application by the Board of Patent Appeals and Interferences...
Europeana the EU Multimillion-Euro Digital Library Crashes on Launch and Hopes to be Back by Mid-December in a More Robust Version
Posted on November 23, 2008Not everything is as easy as it looks. On November 20, 2008 the European Union Digital Libraries Initiative launched Europeana, a multimillion-euro digital library intended as a friendly and cooperative European competitor to things like Google Book Search...
NCAA Division II and Division III College Football Championship Playoffs plus the NAIA Football Championship Series - Status as of Nov. 23, 2008
Posted on November 23, 2008We offer some news and comments here on the NCAA Division II and Division III College Football Championship Playoffs plus the NAIA Football Championship Series.In Division III, last year's foes in the championship game, top-ranked Mount Union of Alliance, Ohio, and the 4th- viz...
EQLS : Second European Quality of Life Survey ? First Findings viz. Deuxième enquête européenne sur la qualité de vie - Premiers résultats
Posted on November 20, 2008Via EUobserver.com we have learned of the 2nd EQLS (European Quality of Life Survey) by Eurofound (European Foundation for the Improvement of Living and Working Conditions).The EQLS Survey will be published in full only in the year 2009, but as of November 18, 2008 we do now already have the first results of that survey in an English-language ...
THE YPPSYS DIVISION I-A FCS COLLEGE FOOTBALL RATINGS for the 2008 SEASON : After the 12th WEEK of Play
Posted on November 20, 2008THE YPPSYS DIVISION I-A FCS COLLEGE FOOTBALL RATINGS for the 2008 SEASON(after the 12th week of play)THE YPPSYS DIVISION I-A FCS COLLEGE FOOTBALL RATINGS(This is after the 12th week of play. NAYPPA (net average yards per play advantage) is calculated according to CFBSTATS...
Photo Blog of the World
Posted on November 19, 2008We have started a new photo blog at Photo Blog of the World.
Brackets NCAA Football Championship Playoffs 2008 : Division II - D2 and Division III - D3
Posted on November 19, 2008Playoff brackets for NCAA Football Playoffs in 2008 for Division II (D2) and Division III (D3) are found at the following links:Division II - D2Division III - D3
What Do Europeans Really Care About? Google Searches as Measured in the Individual Member Countries by the EU Observer Monthly Top 10
Posted on November 18, 2008EU Observer has a new feature by which they produce a monthly EU Observer list via Google Zeitgeist of the Top 10 percentage spikes in Google searches in the EU, which, as the EU Observer writes, "allows small countries such as Finland and Austria to figure in the results, if an event prompted a sudden surge in interest...
Take the ABA Journal Survey on the Impact of the Financial Recession on the Job Market in the Legal Profession in the USA
Posted on November 18, 2008The ABA Journal has asked us to post a note about their current survey of lawyers concerning the impact of the present and future state of the economy on the job market in the legal profession.The survey link is:ABA Journal Job Market SurveyStephanie Francis Ward writes that "[s]urvey results will be published in the January ABA Journal...
YPPSYS College Football Game Predictions and Results - 2008 Season - Week 13 - Week and Weekend of Saturday, November 22, 2008
Posted on November 18, 2008There is no way that Alabama should be ranked Number 1 this year. The pollsters are favoring a weak SEC whose Tennessee lost to Wyoming and whose LSU trailed Troy State 31-3 in the 3rd quarter. According to the Massey Ratings, the Crimson Tide has played only the 51st hardest schedule in Division I-A FBS football and according to Sagarin the 72nd hardest schedule...
Transformative Use as Fair Use : Harry Potter Lexicon by RDR Books Enjoined from Publication because of Excessive Amount and Substantiality of Use
Posted on November 14, 2008In Warner Bros. Entm?t Inc. v. RDR Books, 2008 WL 4126736 (S.D.N.Y. Sept. 8, 2008), the court after a bench trial enjoined publication of the RDR's The Lexicon: An Unauthorized Guide to Harry Potter Fiction and Related Material, finding in general that reference guides to fictional works can be transformative in nature and entitled to raise the fair use exception to copyright protection, but not in the instant case, where the amount and substantiality of the original Harry Potter material used in the RDR Lexicon was simply more than required for reference purposes, as the court wrote: "verbatim copying and close paraphrasing of language from the Harry Potter works"...
German Limited : A New Entrepeneurial Company "Unternehmergesellschaft (haftungsbeschränkt)" or "UG (haftungsbeschränkt)" as of 1 November
Posted on November 12, 2008Andreas Lindner at Faegre & Benson alerts us toSignificant Changes for German Law on Limited Liability Companieswriting"A new law bringing significant changes for limited liability companies incorporated in Germany takes effect on November 1, 2008...
YPPSYS College Football Game Predictions and Results - 2008 Season - Week 12 - Week and Weekend of Saturday, November 15, 2008
Posted on November 11, 2008YPPSYS (tm)College Football Game Predictions and Results - 2008 Season - Week 12 - Week and Weekend of Saturday, November 15, 2008. Odds are taken from the College Football Prediction Tracker from Tuesday, November 11. We do this all in good fun and disclaim any and all liability for any reliance of any kind on our prognostications...
Enough BCS ? Obama For College Football Playoffs at the NCAA Division I-A FBS Level
Posted on November 11, 2008President-Elect Barack Obama has this to say about the current BCS computer ranking system as opposed to the greatly discussed FBS Division I-A college football playoffsTo show the deep problems which are present in the currently flawed BCS system, the following could happen this year in a worst case scenario for the BCS...
Do Law School Graduates Make the Best Football Coaches? They May if Your Name is Derek Dooley of Louisiana Tech
Posted on November 09, 2008Derek Dooley is a Georgia Law School graduate who decided to go into football coaching after several years of practicing law at an Atlanta law firm. He is in his second year as head coach at Louisiana Tech (3-10 in 2006 under the previous coach and 5-7 last year in Dooley's first year as the head coach of the Bulldogs)...
The Key Secrets of Good Coaching & Leadership : Winning can be Taught & Learned : Personnel : Recruiting : Mentoring : Preparedness
Posted on November 08, 2008Coaching and good leadership go hand in hand, whether in sports, law or business. Winning can be taught AND learned. You just have to know what you are doing.The LawPundit discovered by chance some years ago that he had a natural talent for coaching as he co-coached an amateur European youth football (soccer) team in Germany...
Barack Obama and the German American Connection : States having a Plurality of German Ancestry and Higher Median Family Income gave Obama the Vote
Posted on November 07, 2008President-Elect Barack Obama's election as US President is based strongly on winning most of the States having a plurality of German American inhabitants, who, as the following maps show, helped to put Obama into the White House come Inauguration Day, January 20, 2009...
The Presidential Transition 2008-2009 & A Blueprint for Change : Newsroom, Agenda and Website : Change.gov : Website of President-Elect Barack Obama
Posted on November 07, 2008There are those who have voiced doubt about what Obama plans to do as the 44th President of the United States. In fact, his "Blueprint for Change" is quite clear.Change.govis the website of the "Office of the President-Elect"where President-Elect Barack Obama writes:"Today we begin in earnest the work of making sure that the world we leave our children is just a little bit better than the one we inhabit today...
Errors in Nebraska Cornhusker Playcalling : College Football Stats at cfbstats.com permit Playcall Analysis showing Husker Coaching to be Faulty
Posted on November 06, 2008As an alumnus of the University of Nebraska and of Stanford University, we continue to be great fans of the Stanford football resurgence under head coach Jim Harbaugh and we remain very strong critics of Husker offensive playcalling which we regard to be one of the keys to the mediocrity of the current Cornhusker season...
Barack Obama's Victory Speech Analyzed by the Gender Genie
Posted on November 05, 2008We analyzed Barack Obama's Victory Speech via the Gender Genie and came up with the following result:Words: 2082Female Score: 3038Male Score: 3307That is a good balance for a President.
The New World Under US President-Elect Barack Obama May Be a World of Change, but Lawyers and the Rule of Law still - and inescapably - Run that World
Posted on November 05, 2008One of the reasons that the LawPundit studied law was because it became clear to him in high school - when a pre-law program was selected as a course of study - that lawyers run the world, so it is no surprise to see that lawyers and Harvard Law School graduates dominate Barack Obama's transition team...
Asheville, North Carolina, City Hall
Posted on November 05, 2008The Asheville, North Carolina, City Building shows unique, unforgettable architecture which is an eclectic Art Deco masterpiece by Douglas D. Ellington, as our photograph clearly reflects:As written at Asheville City Hall:"The unusual octagonal roof is covered with bands of elongated triangular terra cotta red tiles...
The Grove Park Inn Resort & Spa, Asheville, North Carolina
Posted on November 05, 2008One of the truly unique hotels in the world is The Grove Park Inn Resort & Spa, Asheville, North Carolina. Here is a LawPundit photograph taken this June, 2008:The hotel has amazing views out the backbut it is very pricey.This photo gives a good idea of the raw megalithic dimensions of the main inner hall:It is well worth a visit if you are in the Asheville area of North Carolina...
Asheville, North Carolina : Number One Developing City in the USA?
Posted on November 05, 2008Asheville, North Carolina is consistently ranked as one of the top places to live in the USA.We were in Asheville this summer and have by chance seen that InstaPundit has been blogging from Asheville during the Presidential Election, putting up some photos, also of the Grove Arcade...
OQ - The Obama Quotient : Voting Rank by State in the 2008 Presidential Election : Youth Quotient Variable : Median Family Income Variable
Posted on November 05, 2008One of the great paradoxes of the Presidential Election outcome of November 4, 2008, is that the resulting electoral map, with few exceptions, meshes with a map of "Median Family Income" in the United States of America, with States having LOWER median family income voting for McCain and States having HIGHER median family income voting for Obama...
President-Elect Barack Obama - Future 44th President of the United States of America - Victory Speech Video : John McCain - Concession Speech Video
Posted on November 05, 2008The election victory speech of Barack Obama can be viewed in full video at:THE NEW YORK TIMES(with a transcript of the text of the speech)BBC NEWSBarackObama.comThe election concession speech of John McCain can be viewed in full video at:THE NEW YORK TIMES(with a transcript of the text of the speech)THE GUARDIANTHE TELEGRAPH
Obama Will Win - II - Law Pundit Predicts an Obama / Biden Presidential Election Victory Due to the Banking and Financial Crisis of the Past Months
Posted on November 03, 2008On February 12, 2008 we predicted that Barack Obama would win the Democratic Party nomination for President of the United States, and he did.It is political centrists such as ourselves, who often swing back and forth between the candidates, who determine the outcome of these elections, and, although we for a time thought that the McCain / Palin ticket might win for the Republicans, it is now clear, because of the intervening banking and financial crisis of recent months, that Barack Obama with his Vice-Presidential partner Joe Biden will tomorrow garner enough votes to win the U...
The New York Times features the upcoming International Phaistos Disk Conference sponsored by Minerva Magazine at Burlington House, Piccadilly, London
Posted on October 27, 2008Dear Readers of LawPundit,The New York Times has featured the upcoming International Phaistos Disk Conference in London at which we will be giving the first paper on October 31. John Tierney's TierneyLab at Why Not Test the Phaistos Disc? features an article from which we link the photograph below showing both sides of this enigmatic ancient CD and DVD precursor (info recorded on a disc), and which holds the clue to the origins of writing in Western Europe and thus also the development of our own Western Civilization in subsequent eras...
College Football Game Predictions and Results - 2008 Season - Week 11 - Week and Weekend of Saturday, November 8, 2008
Posted on October 26, 2008Dear Readers,We were on the road for a scientific conference in London this weekend and unable to timely post our football predictions for last week, but we should note that our stats would have predicted a Texas Tech win over Texas.YPPSYS (tm)College Football Game Predictions and Results - 2008 Season - Week 11 - Week and Weekend of Saturday, November 8, 2008...
New English-language Germany.info Online as the Website of the German Embassy, the German Consulates General and the German Information Center USA
Posted on October 25, 2008We received the following notice from and about the English-language website Germany.info:"We have officially launched the redesigned, streamlined, modernized, fully integrated website of the German Embassy, the German Consulates General and the German Information Center USA...
The Legal Market : Effect of the Financial Crisis on the Demand for Lawyers and their Services in Large Law Firms
Posted on October 23, 2008The current financial crisis is marked by six factors "likely to have a significant negative effect on [the] demand for legal services", says Paul Lippe, founder of Legal OnRamp, who lists the following likely legal market trends in the October 22, 2008 edition of the American Lawyer:1...
The Good, the Bad and the Ugly of US Supreme Court Decisions
Posted on October 23, 2008A take on the "Worst Supreme Court Decisions" is found at the Los Angeles Times in an article written by David G. Savage, reporting on a survey of law professors which included respondents "Jack Balkin, Yale; Mary L. Dudziak, USC; Jonathan Varat, UCLA; Richard Epstein, University of Chicago; Erwin Chemerinsky, UC Irvine; Goodwin Liu, UC Berkeley; Pamela Karlan, Stanford; Michael C...
College Football Game Predictions and Results - 2008 Season - Week 9 - Week and Weekend of Saturday, October 25, 2008
Posted on October 21, 2008YPPSYS (tm)College Football Game Predictions and Results - 2008 Season - Week 9 - Week and Weekend of Saturday, October 25, 2008. Odds are taken from the College Football Prediction Tracker from Monday, October 20. We do this all in good fun and disclaim any and all liability for any reliance of any kind on our prognostications...
Max Planck Encyclopedia of Public International Law Online (MPEPIL)
Posted on October 20, 2008Max Planck Encyclopedia of Public International Law Online (MPEPIL, www.mpepil.com) has just launched as Oxford University Press's newest online product. This monumental reference work, originally published in 1991, has been fully updated and released in an easy-to-navigate online environment...
Most Popular Christians : Patron Saints of Learning and the Environment : Religion and Ecology : Law, Religion and Learning
Posted on October 19, 2008To be mutually and symbiotically effective, both the law and organized religion must maintain a realistic approach to the basic issues of modern everyday life, such as religion and ecology, or law, learning and religion.An effective blend of these requires a clear understanding of the history of law and religion, but who today has such knowledge?In this day of global learning and planetary environmentalism, we might for example ask: who is the Christian patron saint of learning? or the patron saint of ecologists? and what relevance do these patrons have for believers today? Are such religious figureheads relevant for modern problems?Full in the spirit of learning, N...
Understand the Present Financial Crisis by Peering into the Past : Archaeology Websearch Blog : Digging the Internet
Posted on October 16, 2008You can't live by law alone.To fully understand the current financial crisis, it is instructive to peer into the past to see that the ups and downs of civilization are part of a process that has been going on for millennia.For those of our readers interested in the history of mankind,we have developed theArchaeology Websearch Blog : Digging the Internetas a specialized webtool for searching the Internetin the areas of ancient history, archaeology, and anthropology,broadly defined...
Stressed? Archaeology Travel Photos Might Give You Ideas for a Cultural Vacation
Posted on October 16, 2008This is a slide show of the Archaeology Travel Photos group at Flickr, which as of this date is approaching 1000 members who have uploaded nearly 12000 photos from around the world. We have no control over the photos, but many of them are outstanding photos of archaeological sites by vacationing photographers...
LawPundit Blog Subscribers RSS Feeds Are All Working Again
Posted on October 15, 2008Dear LawPundit RSS subscribers:Although we asked you to change your subscriptions feeds in this posting, especially your Blogline aggregator feeds, all LawPundit RSS feeds are now working again, so no more changes are necessary.http://feeds.feedburner...
Viagra et al. Frozen : FTC and Chicago Judge Shut Down World's Biggest Spam Ring
Posted on October 15, 2008Here is welcome news to all Internet users.Via an ABA Journal Law News Now posting concerning Internet Law, Debra Cassens Weiss alerts us to a case where a federal judge in Chicago has frozen respective assets and issued a temporary injunction against a Viagra and similar product spam operation responsible for sending billions of those Viagra and other messages that clog the world's mailboxes...
College Football Game Predictions and Results - 2008 Season - Week 8
Posted on October 15, 2008NOTICE: SPRS (Sport Pundit Rating System) Name Change to YPPSYS (tm) viz. YPP-SYS (tm) We have discovered that confusion might be remotely possible between our SPRS college football prediction system and something called Thompson SPRS which we noted for the first time on October 12, 2008 at The Prediction Tracker summaries but which we have been unable to find online...
Passing and Rushing Statistics Show that the Nebraska Cornhuskers Suffer Under Poor Offensive Playcalling by the Coaching Staff
Posted on October 13, 2008One of the excellent and useful sports websites online is College Football Football Statistics (cfbstats.com).Using that website, one can isolate grievous mistakes that coaching staffs are committing - one would presume - without being aware of what they are doing, otherwise they would change and correct their errors...
SPRS Football Rating System Name Change to YPPSYS (YPP-SYS)(tm)
Posted on October 12, 2008SPRS (Sport Pundit Rating System) Name Change to YPPSYS (tm) viz. YPP-SYS (tm)We have discovered that confusion might be remotely possible between our SPRS college football prediction system and something called Thompson SPRS which we noted for the first time today (October 12, 2008) at The Prediction Tracker summaries but which we have been unable to find online...
Cairn of Barnenez (Tumulus of Barnenez) in Brittany (Bretagne, France) to be Submitted to UNESCO for Status as a World Heritage Site
Posted on October 10, 2008Jane at The Modern Antiquarian writes: "Barnenez will make you gasp in wonder. It's so big and grand." Barnenez is a Breton megalithic site in Brittany (Bretagne, France).A Breton FarmerCopyright © by Yvon 2008 (published by LawPundit with permission)...
Fact Check the U.S. Presidential Debates and Other Political Statements
Posted on October 09, 2008Fact check the U.S. Presidential debates and other "facts" at factcheck.org.Hat tip to Lessig Blog.Fact Check is:"[A] nonpartisan, nonprofit "consumer advocate" for voters that aims to reduce the level of deception and confusion in U.S. politics. We monitor the factual accuracy of what is said by major U...
Lessig Blasts Crony Capitalism in the STANFORD Magazine September/October 2008 Issue : Change Congress : A Movement to End Congressional Corruption
Posted on October 09, 2008In his article, "How the Founders Failed", in the most recent issue of STANFORD Magazine (September/October, 2008), which just arrived per snail mail, Lawrence Lessig really lets "crony capitalism" have itIn that article - as excerpted from a speech that Lessig, the C...
College Football Game Predictions and Results - 2008 Season - Week 7
Posted on October 08, 2008College Football Game Predictions and Results - 2008 Season - Week 7(week and weekend of Saturday, October 11, 2008)The odds used below are those posted at the College Football Prediction Tracker on Wednesday, October 8, 2008. The unique system used for game prognostications is SPRS, which uses primarily our own derived NAYPPA system (based on yards per play stats from cfbstats...
LawPundit Blog Subscribers Please Change RSS Feed
Posted on October 07, 2008Dear LawPundit subscribers:Please change your RSS subscription feed to LawPundit toeither to the newly burned LawPundit RSS feed at FeedBurner athttp://feeds.feedburner.com/lawpundit/ClQyor to the RSS XML Atom feed athttp://www.lawpundit.com/blog/atom...
Blawg Review #180
Posted on October 05, 2008THIS IS THE 180th EDITION OF Blawg Review.Today, on German-American Day, October 6, 2008, a day proclaimed by the President of the United States, LawPundit, as a law blog domiciled in Germany and authored by an American expatriate, born in Germany, raised in the United States, and formerly lecturing on Anglo-American law at the University of Trier Law School in Germany, is honored to host the 180th edition of Blawg Review...
Porsche, Volkswagen, Germany and the European Union squabble over the Veto Powers of the German State of Lower Saxony over VW Management
Posted on October 04, 2008Porsche has recently increased its stake in Volkswagen (VW) to 35.14%, giving it a controlling interest in VW. Furthermore, it is rumored that Porsche may try to increase its controlling interest in VW to 50% or more in the coming months, although, of course, no one knows for sure...
India Patents at the India Patent Blog of Senthil Kumar
Posted on October 03, 2008In view of the increasing importance of the Indian and Far East economic spheres, we would like to point to a new patent blog on patents from India at the India Patent Blog of Senthil Kumar.
The Global Top 100 Law Firms for the year 2008 : Profits per Partner : Most Lawyers : Most Revenue
Posted on October 02, 2008The Global 100 Law Firm rankings for the year 2008 are available at Law.com,ranked by 1) Most Profits per Partner , 2) Most Lawyers, and 3) Most Revenues.As written at Law.com:"[t]he Global 100 is a joint project of The American Lawyer and Legal Week, a sibling publication...
Attention! (Achtung!) German-American Day Blog Posters: Please Note that LawPundit will host the 180th Blawg Review on October 6, 2008
Posted on October 02, 2008LawPundit - an English-language law blog by an American expatriate domiciled in Germany - will host the 180th edition of Blawg Review on Monday, October 6, 2008, a day which is celebrated as German-American Day in the USA.If you have a blog posting that is somehow related to German-American Day this year, or if you have a legally-related blawg posting - for example on German-American law or transatlantic relations - that you would like to see linked or referred to in some way, please go to the Blawg Review and follow their submission instructions...
Administrative Message to LawPundit Subscribers whose RSS Feeds may not have been working the past two days
Posted on October 02, 2008Dear LawPundit Subscribers,The posting Eight Things All RSS Publishers Should Remember at CuteWriting has as its number one rule: 1. Using FeedBurner? Know the feed limit.Google owned FeedBurner, which burns and handles our RSS feed, can not fetch more than 512 KB of content at any one time...
New UK Rules for Company Name Registrations under § 69 of the Companies Act 2006 enter into force October 1, 2008
Posted on October 01, 2008The trade mark blog Class 46 alerts us that:"New rules enter into force in the UK today under section 69 of the Companies Act 2006. These rules enable businesses to object to opportunistic company name registrations and are intended to equip brand-owners with similar powers to those conferred by various dispute resolution policies against cybersquatters or ?opportunistic? domain name registrants...
How Do You Grade the Work of Law Students? Is Student Performance in Part a Function of the Professor's Competence in Teaching the Materials?
Posted on September 30, 2008At the ABA Law Journal Law News Now, Debra Cassens Weiss writes about Greta Van Susteren and her law school grading practices during her tenure as an Adjunct Professor at Georgetown Law School 1984-1999.What interested me is this quotation:"This may be a little bit bizarre, but in a setting, at least at Georgetown, if someone is not doing well, I think it's the professor's fault...
World Financial Markets Seek a State of Equilibrium as the Values of Assets Seek to Reach Realistic Levels
Posted on September 30, 2008All things in the universe seek a state of equilibrium, and this applies equally to the world financial markets.At the National Post, Terence Corcoran has written an article that Financial markets go up and down as they should. As a result, the proposed financial bailout (A US "Legislative Proposal for Treasury Authority to Purchase Mortgage-Related Assets"), as rejected by US Congress in the person of the U...
Learn from Golf, Gene Sarazen and 1929 : Don't Panic, Take it Easy and Go to the Links As the World Financial Markets Struggle for Inevitable Balance
Posted on September 30, 2008We read this story about the 1929 stock market crash many years ago in a type of businessman's chain letter and were glad to find it again online at the Aircraft Resource Center:Here is the story in the approximate version that we heard it 30 years ago:"The question:Over a generation ago, in 1923, who was:1...
Bavarian State Elections Point to Populist Turmoil in German Politics : Free Voters Coalition Comes out of Nowhere to Win 10% of the Bavarian Vote
Posted on September 30, 2008The populist emergence of Sarah Palin of Alaska as the Vice-Presidential nominee of the Republican Party in America is not an isolated phenomenon of the USA.The state elections just held on Sunday in Bavaria, Germany closed with a dramatic populist result as the ruling conservative CSU party (Christian Social Union) for the first time since 1962 failed to obtain an absolute majority of the Bavarian vote...
College Football Game Predictions and Results - 2008 Season - Week 6
Posted on September 29, 2008The odds used below are those posted at Yahoo Sports on Monday, September 29, 2008. The unique system used for game prognostications is SPRS, which uses primarily our own derived NAYPPA system (based on yards per play stats from cfbstats.com) plus the Massey Ratings strength of schedule (SoS) for making college football predictions, although we handle SoS differently here than for a full season...
College Football Game Predictions and Results - 2008 Season - Week 5 (Part 2)
Posted on September 29, 2008We became used to that kind of playcalling under former head coach Callahan. One might consider looking at the University of Tulsa game films and the offense that Gus Malzahn runs there. Why is a top offensive coach like that not running the Cornhusker offense?Are the Huskers competitive again? We doubt it...
College Football Game Predictions and Results - 2008 Season - Week 5 (Part 1b)
Posted on September 29, 2008The Florida Gators (5.8, 3.5, SoS=147) (Gainesville, Florida) are favored at home by 23 1/2 points over Mississippi Rebels (6.5, 4.3, SoS=46) (Oxford, Mississippi). Our ratings make Florida about a 1.2 rating point favorite x 9 = 11 points plus the 3-point home field advantage = 14 scoreboard points...
Federal Circuit Affirms District Court Set Aside of the $1.5 Billion Jury Verdict in the MP3 case of Lucent Technologies vs. Gateway, Dell & Microsoft
Posted on September 26, 2008The United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit has affirmed the United States District Court for the Southern District of California in that district court's set aside of a $1.5 billion jury verdict for Lucent Technologies in a highly significant industry standard ISO 11172-3 Audio Layer 3 (MP3) patent case which we wrote about previously as follows:1) Patent Insanity in the USA Continues as Jury Awards Record MP3 Verdict "Only one word accurately defines the current state of US patent law and its judicial consequences - and that word is "comedy"...
College Football Game Predictions and Results - 2008 Season - Week 5
Posted on September 22, 2008After a strong week of prognostication, in which we beat the spread 26-17-1, we now go into week 5 with presumably more information available, so that for the first time this season, we rely solely on the 2008 football stats to make our predictions for the games for which odds are made (the line, the spread)...
College Football Game Predictions and Results - 2008 Season - Week 4
Posted on September 19, 2008Odds used are those posted at Yahoo Odds on Monday, September 15, 2008. The system used for game prognostications is SPRS. The stats is parentheses give the net average yards per play gained on offense and allowed on defense thus far this season. We disclaim any and all liability for any reliance of any kind on our prognostications...
College Football Game Predictions and Results - 2008 Season - Week 4 (part 2)
Posted on September 19, 2008Arkansas State (7.7, 4.3) is favored at home by 5 points over Middle Tennessee (4.7, 5.0).Our call: 35-28 for Arkansas StateLast year, these teams, clearly stronger this year, were nearly even in the ratings and rankings, with Middle Tennessee holding a slight edge...
Short-term European Schadenfreude and the US Investment Banking and Subprime Mortgage Crisis on Wall Street
Posted on September 18, 2008A thought-provoking analysis of the US investment banking and subprime mortgage crisis is given at the New York Times by Nelson D. Schwartz and Carter Dougherty in As Europe Watches Wall Street Fall, Schadenfreude Gives Way to Worry.Whenever fortunes are being lost, fortunes are being made...
Job Earnings Statistics of US Census Bureau led by Law Occupations (Lawyers, Judges, Paralegals) at Twice the National Median Household Income
Posted on September 14, 2008Have you ever thought about what an average lawyer, teacher, taxi driver or dishwasher earns? Is dishwashing really at the bottom of the earnings list from which there is nowhere to go but up to make one's millions? Indeed, what do people in the various jobs, occupations and professions in the United States actually earn? This posting can tell you - for example, the dishwasher is in fact at the absolute bottom of the US income and earnings scale...
Real Estate Investment in the European Union : Buying in Berlin
Posted on September 10, 2008The New York Times Great Homes and Destinations tells us that Berlin is a great place now to buy real estate.Hat tip to CaryGEE.
Why do People in the USA Vote for the Republican Party : The Role of Morality and Emotion versus the Exercise of Reason in explaining Voting Behavior
Posted on September 10, 2008At Edge.org, Jonathan Haidt, Associate Professor of Psychology at the University of Virginia, who researches morality and emotion, has a short thought-provoking politically-oriented piece titled What Makes People Vote Republican?What particularly interests Haidt is the following question:"Why in particular do working class and rural Americans usually vote for pro-business Republicans when their economic interests would seem better served by Democratic policies?"Haidt argues - in summary of his observations - that morals and values are the deciding factor:"People vote Republican because Republicans offer "moral clarity"?a simple vision of good and evil that activates deep seated fears in much of the electorate...
The LawPundit Wins the Men's Golf 2008 Club Championship at the Mosel Golf Club in Cochem, Germany
Posted on September 09, 2008Over the past weekend, the LawPundit won the men's golf 2008 club championship at the Mosel Golf Club in Cochem, Germany, which was quite an event for this writer given the LawPundit's age - 61. The LawPundit, a long hitter, was aided by the terrible weather on the weekend, with high winds and prolonged rain, which made the course very difficult to play for nearly everyone, especially the shorter hitters...
LawPundit Predicts a McCain / Palin Presidential Election Victory
Posted on September 09, 2008For months, we have supported Barack Obama in the US Presidential campaign. This we have done for many reasons. As a graduate of Harvard Law School and as the first black editor of the Harvard Law Review, Obama had what were arguably the best educational credentials of any candidate...
College Football Game Predictions and Results - 2008 Season - Week 3
Posted on September 08, 2008Week 3 College Football Games with Oddsas published at Yahoo Sports, Monday, September 8, 2008(Numbers in parentheses are our own SPRS ratings for a team, adjusted if necessary for current season performance - adjustment are made only if there is a large discrepancy visible already between this year and last)Thursday, September 11, 2008Rutgers is favored at home by 4 1/2 points North Carolina...
Palin's Last Speech at the RGA Republican Governors Association
Posted on September 06, 2008As written at FoxNews.com, "Governor Sarah Palin attended a private luncheon of the Republican Governor?s Association today at the Russian Museum of Art in Minneapolis. After the luncheon she addressed the press...."
The Great USA Divide 2008 : The Choice of Vice-Presidential Nominees Turns the Presidential Election Upside Down
Posted on September 05, 2008Political centrists such as the LawPundit are extremely sensitive to changes in the momentum of current events. One such fundamental change has been the choice of Vice-Presidential nominees by the Democratic and Republican Parties in the United States...
R&R for Stressed Professionals : Does a Discreet German Five-Star Spa Hotel in Traben-Trabach Have the Answer? The Daily Telegraph Reports
Posted on September 05, 2008The Daily Telegraph just featured an article by Adriaane Pielou, Ayurvedic spas: Detox is a girl's best friend, reporting about the Parkschloesschen, a discreet five-star spa hotel in Traben-Trarbach, Germany, which offers professionals and executives from around the world "a welcome antidote to a stress-filled life"...
College Football Game Predictions and Results for the Weekend of September 6, 2008 (Week 2 of the NCAA Season)
Posted on September 03, 2008These are our SPRS-based predictions and results for the second week of college football in the 2008 / 2009 season, first posted September 4, and then updated regularly by the final scores. We do this because it interests us. We disclaim any and all liability for any reliance of any kind on our prognostications...
Conservatives Liberals Libertarians and the Art of Seeing and Believing
Posted on August 26, 2008A fried of mine sent me the following bumper sticker:Conservative: Seeing is BelievingLiberal: Believing is SeeingOur reply went something like this:The distinction between Seeing and Believing is an artificial one. Belief, verily, is the Absence of Proof...
College Football Game Predictions Weekend of August 28, 2008
Posted on August 24, 2008These are our SPRS-based predictions for the first week of college football in the 2008 / 2009 season. We do this solely because it interests us and we disclaim any and all liability for any reliance of any kind on our prognostications. May the best team win...
How is the Economy Doing? One Way to Judge is to Check Out the Increasing Crowds at Discount Supermarkets : German Discounter ALDI Surges in the USA
Posted on August 24, 2008When world leaders or Presidential candidates in the USA make statements about the state of the economy, who is telling the truth?One way to judge how the economy is doing is to look at the clientele shopping at discount supermarkets. This Week in Germany points to the rising success of food discounters ALDI and Lidl throughout Europe:"Rising food costs surely explain much of the discounters' success: As in America, the middle classes are trying to save money and are flocking to the cheaper stores to buy their groceries, which can cost some 30 to 50 percent less than at ordinary supermarkets...
Usain's Bolt : Jamaica Lightning Runs 9.69 100-Meter in the 2008 Olympics : But Will You Ever See It? Copyrights Limit the Sports Broadcasting World
Posted on August 17, 2008Toss the idea of the Internet as a large open worldwide community out the window.Our copyright laws and the invisible webs of business and monopoly powers and dependencies impose substantial limits on the Internet, not even to mention the intentional squelching of Internet content by governments...
"Rise Up!" and be Queen or King for a Day : Badoo Makes it Possible for its Users to Announce "I am here"
Posted on August 15, 2008One of the rising stars in social networking is the London-based website Badoo. As written at the Wikipedia, Badoo has a number of interesting features, with the outstanding one being its method of finance:"Badoo is a multi-lingual, London based, social networking website...
The United States Supreme Court under Chief Justice Roberts
Posted on August 15, 2008Via the August 2008 edition of Law@Stanford, a monthly e-newsletter for alumni and friends of Stanford Law School, we were directed to an article by Jeffrey Rosen at the New Republic on the United States Supreme Court under Chief Justice Roberts, suggesting that Roberts is becoming more successful in getting a more united Supreme Court in terms of their decision-making...
Landmark Federal Circuit Decision holds that Open Source Copyrights are Legally Enforceable
Posted on August 14, 2008Here is a great Federal Circuit decision on Copyrights in Open Source which the New Media & Technology Law Blog (Jeffrey D. Neuburger) describes as follows:"There are so few judicial opinions dealing with open source licenses that any single one is of great interest, but the pro-open source ruling of the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit in Jacobsen v...
Medical Alert : Can Sweetener Aspartame Cause Depression after High Doses of 0%-Sugar Zero-type Soft Drinks? Can Phenylalanine Cause Seizures?
Posted on August 14, 2008Sainsbury's large retail supermarket chain in the UK banned the controversial sweetener aspartame from soft drinks on its shelves in 2007, but aspartame-containing soft drinks are still readily available around the world.Natural News writes about Aspartame as follows:"The problem with aspartame lies in overconsumption...
Top 100 Most Prestigious Law Firms in the World According to Vault.com
Posted on August 12, 2008[This posting has been updated from a previous version.]Vault.com has just published its annual listof the Top 100 Most Prestigious Law Firms,as determined by the Vault.com associate survey.Our former law firm, Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison LLP, which, in our opinion, remains the top litigation, telecommunications and entertainment law firm in the country, remained at the same overall 13th spot - in the eyes of the surveyed law associates everywhere - that it held last year...
The Million Dollar Blawg : Calculate the Value of Your Weblog with Dane Carlson's Business Opportunities Blog Worth Calculator
Posted on August 12, 2008Dane Carlson's Business Opportunities Weblog has a blog valuation service - the Blog Worth Calculator - whereby you merely plug in the respective URL and it calculates the value of almost any blog based on "Data from Technorati and inspired by research from Tristan Louis...
Networking for the Legal Profession + Ways to Get Wild About Work, Increase Energy, Raise Kids & Improve the Environment, Reducing a Family Footprint
Posted on August 12, 2008Building a Solo Practice has a posting titled Networking for Shy Lawyers, linking to 25 posts as compiled by the M.A.P. Maker on networking for shy people.DO LOOK at both those websites.Building a Solo Practice by Susan Cartier Liebel is very popular among solo practitionerswhile M...
HEADLINE UPDATE : Russia Ends War with Georgia over South Ossetia : The Roots of the Conflict by Anatol Lieven
Posted on August 12, 2008UPDATE : RUSSIA ENDS WARJust minutes ago, via CNN from Moscow:"Russian President Dmitry Medvedev announced Tuesday that he has ordered an end to military operations against Georgia. Russian President Dmitry Medvedev has called a halt to the advance of Russian troops in Georgia...
Usefulness of Expert Witnesses in Trade Mark Disputes
Posted on August 11, 2008All things in law and life are decided upon facts or evidence, at least what we view to be facts or evidence, or the absence of same.Throughout our professional life, we have been very skeptical of "experts", especially if this involves any of the humanities...
Email Archiving and Hosting Outsourcing Solutions for Firms and Businesses in Compliance with Legislation : SEC CFTC Sarbanes Oxley NASD NYSE FRCP
Posted on August 11, 2008Is your professional, firm or business email archiving in compliance with legislation in force? SEC? CFTC? Sarbanes-Oxley? NASD? NYSE? And what about the FRCP? And what about email hosting outsourcing?GFI Software, a software company specializing in content and network security, messaging and compliance solutions for SMBs, at very competitive prices, has compiled various documents focusing on email archiving laws affecting businesses in the United States...
Russia Georgia Caucasus Ossetia Abhkazia : Ethnolinguistic Map : Empty Google Map : Ancient Peoples of Region : Jason and the Argonauts : Zemanta
Posted on August 11, 2008What does your average Internet commentator know about the Caucasus? We think it is very little, but we leave you to answer that question as you read Internet commentary on the current situation between the Black and Caspian Seas. We hope to add a bit of knowledge below...
Fair Use Reform in the Context of Overenforcement of Copyrights
Posted on August 10, 2008This posting continues where some of our last postings at LawPundit left off, particularly concerning free speech and copyrights.Solove's blog, Concurring Opinions, just posted links to articles in the last issue of the Iowa Law Review, Volume 93, Issue 4 (June 2008), including Fair Use and Copyright Overenforcement by Thomas F...
Anonymous Heinous Postings Directed at Two Female Yale Law School Students Lead to Revelation of Poster Identities : Free Speech Law in Need of Change
Posted on August 10, 2008This posting follows on the heels of our previous posting about the closing of the Patry Copyright Blog.One of our pet peeves on the Internet is anonymous posting. It is one of the main reasons that we do not allow comments to this blog - due to negative experience in doing so previously - because we do not have the time to filter out spam or comment garbage by anonymous posters...
Mobile Phone Functionality Added to LawPundit (in the USA only)
Posted on August 10, 2008Using MoFuse (Mobile Fusion) we have "mobilized" LawPundit so that our postings can be received by mobile phones, also iPhone (thus far, however, only in the USA). Mobile phone users in America can now view the mobile phone version of LawPundit by entering their MOBILE phone number in the appropriate box in the left column of this blog and sending it off...
William Patry Copyright Blog Gone With the Wind
Posted on August 10, 2008Here today, gone tomorrow.William Patry is closing down his copyright blog, the Patry Copyright Blog, for reasons expressed in his posting End of the Blog, which we summarize and comment below:1. False identification of the Patry Copyright Blog with Google, plus crazies among the commenters...
Preseason College Football Ratings Rankings and Previews for the 2008 / 2009 Season
Posted on August 01, 2008Can you believe, pink and black? Those were the original colors chosen unanimously as the school colors of ... the mighty Penn State Nittany Lions, who now of course sport blue and white. The University of Washington colors of purple and gold trace back to a poem by Lord Byron titled Destruction of Sennacherib...
New Search Engine Cuil's Premiere Violates the First Rule of Startup Show Business : Don't Go On Stage Until You are Ready
Posted on July 30, 2008Cuil is a new search engine startup which had a faltering premiere online on Monday, July 28, 2008. The startup, headed by some search-savvy former employees of Google and backed up by a great deal of startup capital, began with a great deal of fanfare, but fell flat on its face out of the starting blocks...
Punitive Damages Law : Award Against Exxon Valdez Slashed by US Supreme Court, Pointing to Possible Constitutional Limit to Exemplary Damages
Posted on July 27, 2008In the aftermath of Phillip Morris USA v. Williams, we posted that the writing was clearly on the wall to the effect that punitive damages had "peaked out" in American law.That conclusion was strongly supported in the US Supreme Court's recent decision in the Exxon Valdez punitive damages case, Exxon Shipping Co...
Barack Obama in Berlin, Germany, July, 2008 Speaks to "the Berliner"
Posted on July 24, 2008Click here to go to the video and/or text of Barack Obama's speech in Berlin, in which he spoke, to gigantic throng of maybe about 200,000 people, mostly Berliner, and stated inter alia as follows:"Thank you to the citizens of Berlin and to the people of Germany...
Real Estate : The Zindex and Zestimates at Zillow Provide Nationwide Home Valuations at Estimated Market Value by Geographic Location
Posted on July 23, 2008The Real Estate market is in a turbulent period, but modern online information helps to manage the situation. Take a look at the website Zillow.Zillow provides nationwide maps and listings of real estate, including residential property valuations.Zillow's Zestimate ® is their home valuation using Zillow's estimated market value...
Readers of LawPundit : Hacienda Heights, California : Location of the Hsi Lai Temple : Buddhism and Chinese Culture
Posted on July 21, 2008We recently had a visitor at LawPundit from Hacienda Heights, an unusual unincorporated census-designated place in Los Angeles County, which is definitely one of the most interesting communities in the State of California, if not the entire United States...
Facebook Sues German Social Website StudiVZ (Studienverzeichnis, Studentenverzeicnis, "Students Directory") for Intellectual Property Infringement
Posted on July 21, 2008Facebook, which has not been successful in establishing itself on the German market for online social networking, has in California federal court filed an intellectual property law suit against the leading German-language (Germany, Austria, Switzerland) social networking website StudiVZ (Studienverzeichnis, Studentenverzeichnis, i...
The Up Side of the American Flag : "for the most part, for over 200 years, we've gotten it right"
Posted on July 20, 2008We ran across this blog and this piece of thought and we thought it was good, so we are sharing it with our readers, who might otherwise think that we are too critical of America:Some thoughts on the US of A from momchick at Livin' My Life Like It's Golden:"Now back to my flag...
The Morphology of Legal Reality : Form and Structure in a 4% Physical World Suggest Deeper Forces as Roots for the Rule of Law
Posted on July 20, 2008Our previous posting on Law, Physics, Legal Theory, Cosmology, Fine-Tuning and the "Useful Parameterization of Ignorance" may at first glance appear to be a rather distanced comparison of two fully disparate conceptual worlds, but in fact our fully justifiable juxtaposition of cosmology and legal theory points inexorably to a much deeper level hidden in the morphology of legal reality...
Oil and Gas Prices, Nancy Pelosi (House Speaker) and The Strategic Petroleum Reserve, Energy in the USA and Europe, 2008 Truck, Auto and SUV Sales
Posted on July 20, 2008We were just watching a CNN interview with US House Speaker, Nancy Pelosi, in which she again advocated opening up the US Strategic Petroleum Reserve to deal with the US energy problems created by the soaring price of oil and gas.Although our political direction is a centrist one, and even though we support Barack Obama in the current Presidential Election campaign, we can only shake our head at the stunningly bad judgment demonstrated by the Pelosi proposal, and we must side with Michelle Malkin on this gaseous issue...
The Law of King Athelstan of England Revisited : Some Wide Speculations about Prehistoric Megalithic Culture
Posted on July 19, 2008This crossposting from the LexiLine group is in part a revisitation of the Law of King Athelstan of England about which we posted previously at LawPundit and is intended only for those of our readers who are interested in some relatively wide speculations about prehistoric megalithic era...
Greg "The Shark" Norman Leads the British Open at the Royal Birkdale Going into the Final Round
Posted on July 19, 2008Tiger Who?How can we not write about this?Just when everyone thought that the professional golfing world was going to fall into a deep abyss because of the sudden prolonged absence of Tiger Woods due to a knee operation, a 53-year-old former Number One world golfer has resurfaced with a vengeance and brought an excitement to golf that no one would have thought possible just a few days ago...
Famed Country Lawyer Gerry Spence Starts a Blawg
Posted on July 19, 2008Famed country lawyer Gerry Spence (see our previous posting about him) started a blawg a few days ago which has already drawn a good deal of comment from the blogosphere.Take a look at his first blog posting, May we get together?
The American Lawyer 2008 A-List of Top 20 US Law Firms based on Revenue per Lawyer, Pro Bono Work, Associate Satisfaction & Diversity Representation
Posted on July 19, 2008Looking for The American Lawyer 2008 A-List of the top 20 US Law Firms? The prestigious list is created by ranking 4 criteria: revenue per lawyer, pro bono work, associate satisfaction and diversity representation - with revenue per lawyer and pro bono scores counting double...
Moses, Exodus, 10 Plagues of Egypt & Ipuwer Papyrus : A Question of Evidence : Errors in the Chronology of the Ancient Near East, Egypt & the Bible
Posted on July 19, 2008People trained in the law have regrettably left the formulation of ancient history to disciplines not trained in evidence, and the current chaos in Biblical and ancient chronology is the pre-programmed result, giving us an erroneous history which has resulted in catastrophic consequences for current-day events in the Middle and Near East...
A Shambolic Woolly Paper : Baroness Murphy at Lords of the Blog Draws a Bead on Lord Chancellor Jack Straw and his Proposals for Lords Reform
Posted on July 19, 2008Imagine if someone called one of your written projects "shambolic".What would it mean?Baroness Murphy of the UK House of Lords at Lords of the Blog in her posting Laws are Like Sausages? did just that a few days ago to Jack Straw, Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice, calling his White Paper proposals for Lords reform "a shambolic woolly paper"...
Do You Scrobble? Next Generation Makeover at Social Music Website Last.fm
Posted on July 18, 2008Do you scrobble?"Scrobbling a song means that when you listen to it, the name of the song is sent to Last.fm and added to your music profile.Once you've signed up and downloaded Last.fm, you can scrobble songs you listen to on your computer or iPod automatically...
Satire and Parody in the US Presidential Campaign 2008
Posted on July 17, 2008Shakespeare depicted life as either comedy or tragedy.Barack Obama, for example, has recently been the subject of a satirical cover at The New Yorker magazine. Laugh or cry.In case you are not familiar with it through Jay Leno, the website JibJab.com has some videos which parody various subjects, including the US Presidential Campaign:It is all a matter of taste (or not), but see Time for Some Campaignin' by JibJab...
The Science of Nudging and Why Barack Obama Might Be Elected President of the United States : Improving Decisions About Health, Wealth, and Happiness
Posted on July 16, 2008Who will win the US Presidential Election in 2008?Behavioural economics might tell us.According to its theories, the election might then well go to the candidate who best masters "the science of nudging", and at the moment that candidate might well be Barack Obama, whose vision of change is what a behavioural economist might call an exercise in "choice architecture" - a classic nudge...
US Foreign Policy under President Obama : Senator Barack Obama's July 15, 2008 Speech Outlines his New Strategy for the United States and a New World
Posted on July 16, 2008Barack Obama has just delivered a major speech, setting forth his major foreign policy strategies for his campaign battle against John McCain in the 2008 US Presidential Election.Obama's speech is found online at Senator Barack Obama?s New Strategy for a New World, where it is available both in a video as well as a print version...
Choosing the Right Law School: What About Golf ? Equal on the Tee : US Supreme Court Chief Justice Roberts, Golf Pro Tiger Woods and Golfist Mike Park
Posted on July 15, 2008The Golf Digest College Guide to Golf 2007-2008 ranks Stanford University at Number 1 for golf. We definitely agree. Stanford's championship course was one of the variables which in part determined our own choice of law school out of ten possibilities a number of years ago...
America.gov Tells America's Story : The Palestinian-Israeli Conflict
Posted on July 15, 2008America.gov is a useful website produced by the Bureau of International Information Programs, U.S. Department of State, and covers important aspects of U.S. foreign policy and American life and culture.Of interest for our international readership is the section on Democracy Around the World, including the accompanying blog, Democracy Roundtable, by moderator Bridget Hunter...
Make Love Not War : The Barcelona Process : The Union for the Mediterranean (UfM) is Approved at the Paris Summit
Posted on July 14, 2008Here is an interesting geopolitical question. What country in Africa, NOT located on the Mediterranean, is a part of the just approved Union for the Mediterranean (UfM)? See UfM map. This country is geographically larger than either France, Germany or Spain, more than twice as large geographically as Iraq, nearly six times the geographic size of Syria, and also larger geographically than either Egypt or Turkey...
Net Neutrality a Rising Issue as FCC warns Comcast About File Exchange Restrictions placed on Web Use by Paying Customers
Posted on July 12, 2008Net neutrality encompasses the idea that providers of Internet access services should not be able to place any discriminatory restrictions on web use by their users.The issue in the instant case is a ComCast practice of restricting BitTorrent file exchanges without even informing the affected users as to the nature and extent of the practice...
Ross Perot Returns Indirectly to the Political Scene with Perot Charts Charting Government Fiscal Irresponsibility
Posted on June 15, 2008Did you know that in the United States "in the last four years total tax collections have risen at the fastest pace in the past 40 years...." That is one of the surprising statistics presented at the newly created (starting June 15, 2008) website Perot Charts...
COST and not CHANGE should be the Key Word for the 2008 US Presidential Election
Posted on June 14, 2008A March 6, 2008 SurveyUSA survey of an Obama-McCain Presidential election match-up shows McCain winning 26 States and 258 electoral votes, with Obama winning a fewer 24 States but 280 electoral votes, enough for election. Since a number of States are very close calls, the race at the moment is surely a toss-up...
Law, Physics, Legal Theory, Cosmology, Fine-Tuning and the "Useful Parameterization of Ignorance"
Posted on June 12, 2008"What is Law?" and to what degree does "Law" by nature approximate the intricate system of fine-tuning required for the Einstein-based Lambda-CDM (?CDM) model of cosmology to work as predicted?Most people think that they know what "Law" is - nearly - but perhaps we know less than we think about this intricate virtually self-adjusting societal mechanism, which seems to have a dark energy soul of its own...
The Bloody Old Britain of O.G.S. Crawford as seen by Kitty Hauser : Book Reviews
Posted on June 07, 2008Current Archaeology, in reviewing a new book on O.G.S. (Osbert Guy Stanhope) Crawford, known as "Ogs", titled Bloody Old Britain by Kitty Hauser, calls Crawford "one of the greatest figures of 20th century Archaeology" and writes next to a photo of Crawford as follows:"Crawford on his bike...
A Vision of Change and the Need for Argument in America : Gerry Spence Says that Without It Our Land is a Wasteland
Posted on June 07, 2008Gerry Spence, a legend of our time, has just won his last jury trial and is retiring at age 79 as undefeated in his criminal trials.Gerry Spence, known as "America's Finest Trial Lawyer", writes in his book How to Argue and Win Every Time as follows about the American nation:"The art of arguing is the art of living...
ABA Journal Latest Legal News Widget Added to LawPundit
Posted on June 05, 2008Pursuant to our previous posting we have in the right column now added the ABA Journal Latest Legal News Widget to LawPundit.
American Bar Association (ABA) Journal Blawg Search, News Widget, Twitter Feed, Facebook Page and Webby People's Voice Award
Posted on May 30, 2008The American Bar Assocition (ABA) Journal is on the ball, which is more than can be said for Microsoft Windows Live MSN Hotmail, which erroneously put the following important and obviously non-spam email from Edward A. Adams, Editor and Publisher, American Bar Association Journal, into our spambox...
Where to Dine in New York City : Top 10 Restaurants by Zagat
Posted on May 27, 2008The Sunday Telegraph of April 20, 2008 had a highly palatable article by Douglas Rogers in the Travel section, Critic's Choice: Tim Zagat's Gourmet Tour of New York, who (nearly) toured the New York top ten restaurants in one day with Zagat, "who knows them better than anyone"...
Vilnius, Lithuania to be European Capital of Culture in 2009
Posted on May 27, 2008Via ViaMichelin.com, we pass on to our readers interested in the Baltic, that Vilnius in Lithuania will be the European Capital of Culture in 2009. An interesting program is planned, so it looks like a potential New Year's destination for international travelers...
Private Equity Joint Bids ("Club Deals") and the WatchGuard Case Revisited : The Amended Complaint Claims Directors' Breach of Fiduciary Duty
Posted on May 20, 2008We posted previously at LawPundit in our posting A Private Equity Joint Bid ("Club Deal") for Acquisition of a Target Company held Not per se Illegal under the Sherman Act about "a private equity antitrust class action collusion suit (Pennsylvania Avenue Funds v...
World Politics and the New Political Divide : An Iron Curtain of Autocracy is Arising In the Developing Nations
Posted on May 19, 2008At the New York Times Sunday Book Review of May 18, 2008, David E. Sanger in Democracy, Limited reviews Robert Kagan's new book, THE RETURN OF HISTORY AND THE END OF DREAMS, 116 pp, Alfred A. Knopf, $19.95, writing inter alia:"?Growing national wealth and autocracy have proven compatible, after all,? Kagan notes...
J.K. Rowling Rightly Wins Child Privacy Case in the United Kingdom Pursuant to Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR)
Posted on May 09, 2008"J.K. Rowling didn't need the Dark Arts to make the paparazzi go poof", writes Gina Serpe at Yahoo! TV.We have previously posted on the J.K. Rowling copyright infringement case, taking the opposing side, so it is only fair that we post about this litigated privacy case which Rowling (using her real name Joanne Murray) has now won in the United Kingdom, rightly so in our opinion...
Global Warming Is Probably Not Man-Made but Rather Caused by a Solar Cycle : Also the Solar System is Experiencing Global Warming
Posted on May 07, 2008The Foundation for the Study of Cycles, founded by Edward R. Dewey, of which we were a contributing member* many years ago, studied long-term and short-term cycles of all kinds, including solar cycles, which we - already 30 years ago - saw as a key to understanding various cyclic fluctuations in nature and in human society...
A New Husker : Mount Union Cornerbacks Coach Ross Watson Joins Nebraska Cornhuskers Football Program as a Graduate Assistant on Defense
Posted on May 07, 2008If you are a Husker football fan, as we are, you have to love this.Ross Watson, who was the cornerbacks coach for the fabled Mount Union football team the past two years, joined the Nebraska football program in March, 2008 as a graduate assistant on defense...
The Harry Potter Legal Saga : To Whom Do the Characters Truly Belong?
Posted on May 04, 2008We have been in England and Scotland for several weeks, including a visit to Alnwick (pronounced "Anick" in England), the location inter alia of the Alnwick Garden and the Alnwick Castle, a Harry Potter film location.Speaking of Harry Potter, the current issue of Law@Stanford writes:""POTTER TRIAL: ON LAST DAY, DEFENSE OUTSHINES ROWLING"The Harry Potter Lexicon trial, in which the law school's Fair Use Project (FUP) defended a book publisher against a copyright lawsuit brought by J...
Patent Webinar on May 13, 2008 with the U.S. Commissioner for Patents
Posted on May 04, 2008Philip Brooks' Patent Infringement Updates alerts us to an upcoming patent webinar on May 13, 2008 with the U.S. Commissioner for Patents, John J. Doll.
European Union Lisbon Reform Treaty : Consolidated EU Version in All Official Languages
Posted on May 04, 2008EU Law Blog has a posting linking to the newly released consolidated European Union Treaty which incorporates the amendments made by the Lisbon Reform-Treaty (.pdf and Word formats).
Give Me Back My Love by Maywood and Other Great Songs : Late at Night, Rio, I'm in Love for the Very First Time : Dynamic Music Sung in Fabulous Voice
Posted on April 15, 2008We heard the wonderful song Give Me Back My Love on the radio this week for the first time ever, listening by chance to a schmalzy station that we generally ignore (SWR4 Rheinland-Pfalz), and were knocked over by the music and the voice of this fantastic song...
The Upcoming 2008 NFL Draft : Top Football Players from Smaller Schools May Be Surprisingly High Draft Picks
Posted on April 15, 2008In the upcoming 2008 NFL Draft, the players from small schools that we would consider as potential high draft picks are:1. Tyrell Johnson, Strong Safety, Arkansas State.Johnson has great strength and agility, excellent speed, and is one of those players who has the instinct and desire which puts them in the right place at the right time in critical game situations...
Obama Clinton McCain : President and Senators : Not Everyone is a Natural Leader : Barack Obama IS : Hillary Clinton IS NOT : John McCain IS NOT
Posted on April 14, 2008David Brooks at the New York Times has it right at The Obama-Clinton Issue.A President is different than a Senator. Great leaders are not groupies.Almost everyone who views the world realistically, and especially people with any kind of experience in organizations, will surely agree with our observation that leadership potential varies among human beings...
Globalization, The Changing World and Legal Order, Private International Law, Territorial Legal Systems, Cyberspace, Choice of Law
Posted on April 14, 2008Conflict of Laws blog, in association with the Journal of Private International Law and sponsored by Clifford Chance LLP, carries a short article on Reshaping Private International Law in a Changing World by Horatia Muir-Watt, Professor of Private International and Comparative Law at the University of Paris I (Panthéon-Sorbonne)...
NCAA Basketball Championship Game 2008 : Prediction of Winner between the Kansas Jayhawks and the Memphis Tigers
Posted on April 06, 2008This is just for fun. We disclaim any liability for the consequences of anyone relying on these predictions for any purpose.Using our beta AKBPSYS (AK Basketball Prediction System), we correctly called the Kansas win over North Carolina and the Memphis win over UCLA...
Who in America really wants "more of the same"? 19%
Posted on April 05, 2008In a recent post at LawPundit we wrote:"Who in America really wants "more of the same"? Surely not the majority."Just two days later, on April 4 2008, the New York Times carried an article by David Leonhardt and Marjorie Connelly the title of which says it all:81% in Poll Say Nation Is Headed on Wrong TrackWhat that means is that the vast majority of the American nation, even those who voted for Clinton or McCain in the primaries, confirm that Obama's message of change is ringing loud and true...
The Phenomenal Impact of Barack Obama on America's Youth
Posted on April 04, 2008The current Presidential election campaign is already an event without precedent, as Barack Obama, win or lose, is exerting an incredibly positive influence on the youth of the country, which will last far beyond this election, with surely unforseeable but beneficial consequences for the United States and the rest of the world...
NCAA 2008 Basketball Semifinal Championship Game Predictions
Posted on April 04, 2008This is just for fun. We disclaim any liability for the consequences of anyone relying on these predictions for any purpose.Sagarin's ratings have North Carolina 1st, Kansas 2nd, Memphis 3rd and UCLA 4th.Sagarin's predictor (pure points) would have Kansas 1st, North Carolina 2nd, UCLA 3rd and Memphis 4th...
The Obama Campaign is Operating in the Black : The Clinton and McCain Campaigns are in the Red : Leadership Begins BEFORE One Gets in the White House
Posted on April 02, 2008Judging by the ability to raise money for the Presidential election campaign and consequently the capability to operate on a sound fiscal basis, Barack Obama has left Hillary Clinton and John McCain in the dust. See the Kenneth P. Vogel article at CBS at Cash-Strapped Clinton Fails To Pay Bills, where Vogel writes:"Hillary Rodham Clinton?s cash-strapped presidential campaign has been putting off paying hundreds of bills for months...
LawPundit Link at the New York Times brings New Visitors to LawPundit
Posted on April 02, 2008We greet all new visitors from the New York Times.Over at The Caucus, the New York Times politics blog, LawPundit is linked at From Around the Web at the blog posting Clinton Bowls Over Media, and this is bringing some new visitors to LawPundit.Enjoy...
LawPundit and the Golf Side of Business : All Work and No Play Makes for a Dull Day : Time to Get to the Links
Posted on April 02, 2008Dear Readers,This posting will be of interest mostly to those of you who know me personally. Our posting activity here at LawPundit will decline substantially now as the golf season has begun, and we have some pictures to show you why - fresh air, fun and exercise...
Where do the Poor People Live? Obama-Clinton Presidential Ticket Likely : John McCain Unlikely to Win because of State of U.S. Economy
Posted on April 02, 2008Both Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton have toned down their campaigns against each other, which we think is a sign that a Barack Obama-Hillary Clinton presidential ticket is in the offing, which would heal the acrimonious party division caused by the primary campaigns, and which would virtually guarantee the Democrats the election - and that after all, is the main thing, recovering government power and making the changes that need to be made...
April Fools' Day Jokes are not Exempted from the Legal Dangers of Libel and Defamation
Posted on April 01, 2008It is April Fools' Day, but be careful what you write or say, as the attempt to be funny or to play a practical joke on others or at the expense of others does not protect the writer or speaker from libel and defamation suits. Read attorney Michael Hiestand at the National Scholastic Press Association in Don't be the punchline of an April Fools' mistake...
A Theory on Harvard Law School Alumnus Leonid Rozhetskin's Disappearance in Jurmala (near Riga) Latvia : Kidnapping
Posted on March 30, 2008Criminal law was always the most interesting of all legal studies, so that detective stories always catch our attention.We posted on the Rozhetskin case previously here and after reading the most recent news accounts worldwide, we have a theory about the case, for which we initially developed an interest only because Rozhetskin disappeared from Jurmala, a great Latvian beach and villa resort on the Baltic Sea which we have ourselves visited and liked immensely, and so we thought it was a shame that this wonderful leisure and recreation area near Riga was now burdened with this kind of negative notoriety...
The Financial Times Interviews Russian President-elect Dmitry Medvedev who Plans to Strengthen the Rule of Law and the Independence of the Courts
Posted on March 29, 2008The Moscow Times carried an AP story at Medvedev Sits Down With FT which indicates that President-elect Dmitry Medvedev of Russia plans to strengthen the rule of law and the independence of the courts.We found a more extensive presentation of Medvedev's interview with the Financial Times at the Voice of America article by Peter Fedynsky, Medvedev Calls for Rule of Law in Russia, where Fedynsky writes:"Dmitry Medvedev told the Financial Times the challenge facing Russia is to translate its recent economic success into social programs, including housing, healthcare, and education...
The Qatar Doha Debates at BBC World Highlight World Political Issues in an Arabic Setting : The Next Debate is April 1, 2008
Posted on March 28, 2008One very interesting and highly viewed Middle East forum (estimated audience up to now is about 300 million, but not well known in the United States, as far as we can tell) is found at The Doha Debates from Qatar which are transmitted via BBC World and sponsored by the Qatar Foundation...
From KAU to KAUST : Saudi Arabia Goes High Tech at the University Level : With Nondiscrimination in Religion, Race and Gender
Posted on March 28, 2008Via the @Stanford Newsletter, the Stanford News Service writes at Stanford to help new Saudi university in applied math, computer science:"Stanford is joining a team of universities working to build a major science and technology university along a marshy peninsula on Saudi Arabia's western coast...
Arbitral Standards of Review in Hall Street v. Mattel : US Supreme Court Sets Clear Standard : Statutory Grounds Exclusive for FAA Judicial Review
Posted on March 27, 2008Via the Disputing blog, which we have added to our blogroll, we were led to this week's United States Supreme Court arbitration law decision in Hall Street v. Mattel (Hall Street Associates v. Mattel, Inc., ___ U.S. ___ (2008) (Cause No. 06-989)):Justice Souter wasted no time in stating in the first paragraph of his majority opinion:"The Federal Arbitration Act (FAA or Act), 9 U...
European Digital Rights (EDRI) Defends Civil Rights in the Information Society in Europe
Posted on March 26, 2008European Digital Rights (EDRI) is an organization in Europe which defends civil rights in the "information society" in Europe. As written at their website:"European Digital Rights was founded in June 2002. Currently 28 privacy and civil rights organisations have EDRI membership...
Harvard Law School Alumnus Leonid Rozhetskin Disappears in Latvia
Posted on March 25, 2008We posted previously about the disappearance of Harvard Law School alumnus Leonid Rozhetskin, writing:"Via All About Latvia, which inter alia has a column on Google News about Latvia, we were led to the Moscow Times, where we learned that the Russian-born Harvard Law School educated U...
European Union (EU) Establishes a New Procedure in the Area of Freedom Security and Justice : The Urgent Preliminary Ruling Procedure : March 2008
Posted on March 25, 2008The Court of Justice of the European Communities, the Curia in Luxembourg, has issued a press release in which it outlines the completely new Urgent Preliminary Ruling Procedure which started application on March 1, 2008 as a European Union procedure in the area of freedom, security and justice:"The Treaty of Amsterdam on the European Union (EU) which came into force on 1 May 1999 states that the EU: must be maintained and developed as an area of freedom, security and justice;(an area) in which the free movement of persons is assured;in conjunction with appropriate measures with respect to external border controls, asylum, immigration and the prevention and combating of crime...
Summer Vacation 2008 : Try the Kiel Week (Kieler Woche) June 21-29 , 2008 : Biggest Summer Festival in Northern Europe : Sailing Sports and Much More
Posted on March 24, 2008Looking for something different this year for your summer vacation?Take a look at our blog Kiel & Kieler for more information relating tothe Kiel Week (Kieler Woche),Northern Europe's biggest summer festival.It annually attracts over 3 million visitors from more than 70 nations...
Money Can Buy Happiness if You Give To Others : The Joyful Side of Philanthropy
Posted on March 23, 2008An article at Yahoo Health by Amanda Gardner titled Give and Be Happy reports on a study which indicates that:"Money can buy happiness, at least when you spend it on others."The reason, writes Gardener, is that "pro-social" giving enhances the community:""Reaching out and doing things for other people allows you to kind of create a community," said Dr...
Happy Easter from LawPundit : Cistercian Monks from Austria Join Universal Records : 50's Easter Bunny : Dancing Hare : Sexy Alien Cartoon Band
Posted on March 23, 2008With a closing message on their YouTube Video of "Life is Short, Pray Hard" the Cistercian Monks of the Heiligenkreuz Abbey in Austria, who have just signed on with Universal Music, give us a religiously musical Easter Message (via Gizmodo):Some might prefer a more nostalgic 5o's approach to the Easter Bunny, complete with Cadillac, but modern rap:The Dancing Hare has some cool moves with some upbeat music:The Sexy Alien Cartoon Band is an animated supervideo production (viewed nearly 2 million times) which parodies (makes fun of) the blatant sexuality which pervades modern music videos...
NCAA® March Madness® on Demand : Free Live Streaming Video of All NCAA® Division I Men's Basketball Championship Games : NIT Brackets : CBI Brackets
Posted on March 22, 2008Postseason college basketball is underway in the United States.For those sports fans out there who may not be aware of it....The website of the NCAA at NCAA® March Madness® on Demand provides free live streaming video of all 64 NCAA® Division I Men's Basketball Championship games...
Recent News From Our General Non-Law Blogroll: Blogs Beginning with B
Posted on March 20, 2008There are now so many blogs out there that is impossible to keep track of them all nor to do all those justice that should be on one's blogroll. Nevertheless, we have gone through our general non-law blogroll (we just finished going through our law blogroll) to update our links and to comment on what is being posted out there in the general blogosphere...
The New York International Auto Show's Hyundai Genesis Coupe plus Recent News From Our General Non-Law Blogroll: Blogs Beginning with A
Posted on March 19, 2008There are now so many blogs out there that is impossible to keep track of them all nor to do all those justice that should be on one's blogroll. Nevertheless, we have gone through our general non-law blogroll (we just finished going through our law blogroll) to update our links and to comment on what is being posted out there in the general blogosphere...
Obama Speech on Race Relations and His Vision for "A More Perfect Union"
Posted on March 19, 2008Rergardless of your political persuasion, we would highly recommend your viewing this video speech by Barack Obama on race relations and his vision of a "A More Perfect Union".In our view, it is also important for other nations, not just America, to hear that speech, because it goes to the core of many of the world's most serious problems, also religious problems, which in our view are - in their foundation - racial problems, pitting various racial groups against each other...
Links on the LawPundit Main Page : (2) (u,v,w,x,y,z) The Law Blogroll - Blawgs Beginning with Letters U, V, W, X, Y and Z
Posted on March 18, 2008We have gone through our links on the LawPundit law blogroll to update URLs and to provide selected recent information about those linked websites or blogs. This posting covers Links on the LawPundit Main Page : (2) (u,v,w,x,y,z) The Law Blogroll - U,V,W,X,Y,Z:Useful Arts will be blogging at the Virtual Law Conference, April 3-4, 2008, in New York City...
Links on the LawPundit Main Page : (2) (t) The Law Blogroll - Blawgs Beginning with the Letter T
Posted on March 17, 2008We have gone through our links on the LawPundit law blogroll to update URLs and to provide selected recent information about those linked websites or blogs. This posting covers Links on the LawPundit Main Page : (2) (t) The Law Blogroll - T:Golf season is under way so that our postings here are a bit shorter than normal...
The House of Lords at Lords of the Blog are Online Starting Today March 17, 2008
Posted on March 17, 2008You have to hand it to the highly traditional House of Lords and their new experimental and collaborative (nine) Lords of the Blog, a pilot project being managed by the Hansard Society.Lords of the Blog went online March 17, 2008, confirming that blogging is no longer an avantgarde avocation but has truly entered the professional mainstream bigtime...
Links on the LawPundit Main Page : (2) (o,p) The Law Blogroll - Blawgs Beginning with the Letters O and P
Posted on March 15, 2008Links on the LawPundit Main Page : (2) (o,p) The Law Blogroll - Blawgs Beginning with the Letters O and P:The Online Guide to Mediation by Diane Levin has been renamed the Mediation Channel at the new location mediationchannel.com. An interesting posting there is Brain research shows differences in perception between East and West which also links to a self-test...
Links on the LawPundit Main Page : (2) (q,r,s) The Law Blogroll - Blawgs Beginning with the Letters Q,R and S
Posted on March 15, 2008A blockbuster, if true (why are we always so skeptical about pre-event reports?): Simon Fodden at slaw.ca in Nine Lords A'Blogging writes that the British House of Lords according to Lord of the Blog starts blogging tomorrow, March 17, 2008 at the similarly named Lords of the Blog as a 6-month public relations experiment...
Links on the LawPundit Main Page : (2) (j) The Law Blogroll - Blawgs Beginning with the Letter J
Posted on March 14, 2008We have gone through our links on the LawPundit law blogroll to update URLs and to provide selected recent information about those linked websites or blogs. This posting covers Links on the LawPundit Main Page : (2) (j) The Law Blogroll - J:joegratz.net is by San Francisco attorney, Joe Gratz, and focuses on copyright law...
Links on the LawPundit Main Page : (2) (k,l) The Law Blogroll - Blawgs Beginning with the Letters K and L
Posted on March 14, 2008We have gone through our links on the LawPundit law blogroll to update URLs and to provide selected recent information about those linked websites or blogs. This posting covers Links on the LawPundit Main Page : (2) (k,l) The Law Blogroll - K, L:Karel?s Legal Blog is unusual in that it is written by an attorney who specializes in The Netherlands Antilles and Aruba...
Whatever Happened to the House of Lords? A Supreme Court of the United Kingdom will take up work Starting in October 2009
Posted on March 14, 2008Time marches on, and there is in fact some visible modernity in law after all, even in a land as rich in tradition and legal glory as the United Kingdom.Middlesex Guildhall (renovation in process)Future home of the Supreme Court of the United KingdomLinked from Feilden & Mawson LLP, ArchitectsIllustration by Stephen WiltshireThe Ministry of Justice of the UK informs us about the essentials:"The introduction of a Supreme Court for the United Kingdom will provide greater clarity in our constitutional arrangements by further separating the judiciary from the legislature...
Links on the LawPundit Main Page : (2) (m,n) The Law Blogroll - Blawgs Beginning with the Letters M and N
Posted on March 14, 2008We have gone through our links on the LawPundit law blogroll to update URLs and to provide selected recent information about those linked websites or blogs. This posting covers Links on the LawPundit Main Page : (2) (m,n) The Law Blogroll - M, N:The Magistrate's Blog is twice as popular in the UK as the official Magistrates Association website (which has the egregious error that its "ticker" only works with IE)...
Links on the LawPundit Main Page : (2) (i) The Law Blogroll - Blawgs Beginning with the Letter I
Posted on March 13, 2008We have gone through our links on the LawPundit law blogroll to update URLs and to provide selected recent information about those linked websites or blogs. This posting covers Links on the LawPundit Main Page : (2) (i) The Law Blogroll - I:i-legal.info out of the UK presents podcasts as legal advice audios from Fisher Jones Greenwood Solicitors...
Latvia and Estonia Follow the Czech Republic in Signing Bilateral Visa Exemption Agreements for Travel of their Citizens to the United States
Posted on March 13, 2008At eurotopics.net we read:"Following the Czech Republic's example, Latvia and Estonia have now also signed individual agreements with the United States which exempt their citizens from visa requirements for travel to the US. The EU is trying to negotiate a common visa agreement for all member states...
Links on the LawPundit Main Page : (2) (h) The Law Blogroll - H
Posted on March 13, 2008We have gone through our links on the LawPundit law blogroll to update URLs and to provide selected recent information about those linked websites or blogs. This posting covers Links on the LawPundit Main Page : (2) (h) The Law Blogroll - H:Handakte is a blog in German which posts about recent legal developments in Germany and has a posting indicating that the Deutsche Presserat (German Press Council) plans to extend its press code (Pressekodex, Kodex) to online content:"Der Deutsche Presserat beabsichtigt, seine Zuständigkeit auf journalistisch-redaktionelle Inhalte der elektronischen Presse auszudehnen...
Harry Potter and the Cyclopians : A New Chapter by J.K. Rowling? The Case of the Century in Copyright and Trademark Law?
Posted on March 12, 2008At fault for the title of this posting is our manticore.One of the great intellectual property law cases of our time, a dramatic work with a platinum cast, has been underway for some time now in the trademark and copyright infringement action by Warner Bros...
Links on the LawPundit Main Page : (2) (g) The Law Blogroll - G
Posted on March 12, 2008We have gone through our links on the LawPundit law blogroll to update URLs and to provide selected recent information about those linked websites or blogs. This posting covers Links on the LawPundit Main Page : (2) (g) The Law Blogroll - G:The Georgetown Law Faculty Blog inter alia contains postings from John Mikhail, who specializes in the confluence of moral theory and law...
Links on the LawPundit Main Page : (2) (f) The Law Blogroll - F
Posted on March 11, 2008We have gone through our links on the LawPundit law blogroll to update URLs and to provide selected recent information about those linked websites or blogs. This posting covers Links on the LawPundit Main Page : (2) (f) The Law Blogroll - F:The Faculty Blog at the University of Chicago Law School is one of our personal favorites, and they currently have an ongoing debate on the legal regulation of virtual worlds...
A Private Equity Joint Bid ("Club Deal") for Acquisition of a Target Company held Not per se Illegal under the Sherman Act
Posted on March 11, 2008We just received in the mail a Paul|Weiss article about a private equity antitrust class action collusion suit (Pennsylvania Avenue Funds v. Edward Borey, et al., No. C06-1737RAJ, W.D. Wa.) which was dismissed on February 21, 2008 by Judge Richard Jones in what appears to be a case of first impression, holding that a joint bid by private equity firms (a so-called "club deal") is legal under the circumstances of that case, so we pass on more links relating to that decision: a WSJ Deal Journal article by Peter Lattman, a Linklaters Technical Bulletin, the HRO Antitrust Alert, the DLA Piper Antitrust Alert and the Truth on the Market blog, which discuss the decision...
Obama Shows He Can Play Hardball
Posted on March 09, 2008Clinton started it, and Obama is finishing it, giving due notice to his opponents, also when he is President, that he can play hardball.1. Hillary Clinton can forget about getting many delegates in Mississippi as the Obama campaign launches a radio ad using Hillary's comments badmouthing Mississippi...
Was the Presidential Eligibility Clause of the Constitution of the United States Preempted by the Fifth & Fourteenth Amendments to that Constitution?
Posted on March 09, 2008The Constitution of the United States, as the oldest Federal Constitution in existence, is one of the great documents of mankind, and its adoption as the foundation of American government is a significant landmark in the development of the law of nations, in the formulation of the extent of powers of just governments, and in the protection of the rights of citizens...
Who Wants to be President? Who CAN be President? Jack Balkin Makes a Brilliant Case that No Current Candidate is Constitutionally Eligible
Posted on March 07, 2008So you think you know the U.S. Constitution?There is little doubt any more that if Hillary Clinton were to be foolishly granted the Democratic Party nomination by her party members, she will surely pull Trick 17 out of her hat by having John McCain declared ineligible for the Presidency because of his birth in the Panama Canal Zone, little knowing that she too, is ineligible for the Presidency herself, by virtue of the U...
Play By the Rules : Howard Dean Sticks to the Correct Principle
Posted on March 07, 2008Although we are political centrists and support Barack Obama in this election, we are not great friends of either the Democratic Party or Republican Party, since we see little evidence in either party of model excellence or model ethics. It is a dirty business, often fought by dirty players...
The Democratic Dogfight : Professor Larry J. Sabato at BBC News
Posted on March 07, 2008Professor Larry J. Sabato, director of the Center for Politics at the University of Virginia, and the author of A More Perfect Constitution, in Dogfight drags Democrats down comments at BBC News on the current state of things in the Presidential Election campaigns of Obama and Clinton...
WikiPatents : Community Patent Review : DataBase of 4 Million Patents
Posted on March 07, 2008For those who do not know it, take a look at WikiPatents, Community Patent Review:"The WikiPatents Community contributes to the US patent system by reviewing issued patents and pending patent applications. WikiPatents features a wiki-like interface to review, rate, and discuss patents -- plus free patent PDF downloads, file histories, and advanced patent searching...
The Patentability of Business Methods and the Upcoming Federal Circuit Hearing en banc in Ex parte Bilski
Posted on March 07, 2008Erika Harmon Arner of Finnegan Henderson has a nice summary, including the precise issues involved, of what is involved in the upcoming Federal Circuit hearing en banc in Ex parte Bilski and the patentability of business methods.For background, seePatently-OPATENTly - unOBVIOUSPatent ProspectorPeter Zura's 271 Patent BlogAnticipate This!
Military Blog Blocking and Government Leaks : American Troops vs. Hillary Clinton
Posted on March 07, 2008This posting relates to the previous blog posting.On a related issue, see the Wired article by Noah Schachtmann at Air Force Blocks Access to Many Blogs. Since the blog blocking done there is often done first, with questions asked later, is this not a prima facie case of prior restraint? We can understand why the military would have such a policy, but, on the other hand, it does seem to run counter to our ideas of democracy...
Google and Blogger Down for More than 24 Hours in Germany March 6 - March 7 2008 : Was the Pentagon the Cause?
Posted on March 07, 2008Google.com (USA), which we use, and Blogger were not accessbile to us here in Germany for more than 24 hours starting yesterday afternoon - and as far as we could tell by asking around, also not to others. On the other hand, sites like google.co.uk and google...
Obama Delegate Projections After Yesterday's Elections
Posted on March 05, 2008This is an email to me from the Barack Obama campaign via BarackObama.com:Andis -- Our projections show the most likely outcome of yesterday's elections will be that Hillary Clinton gained 187 delegates, and we gained 183. That's a net gain of 4 delegates out of more than 370 delegates available from all the states that voted...
Obama vs. McCain : The Coming Presidential Election Match : A Letter from the Barack Obama Campaign After Vermont, Texas, Rhode Island and Ohio
Posted on March 05, 2008This is an email to me from the Barack Obama campaign via blue state digital:Andis -- We may not know the final outcome of today's voting until morning, but the results so far make one thing clear. When the dust settles from today's contests, we will maintain our substantial lead in delegates...
The Divisive Hillary Clinton Miasma Campaign Against Barack Obama as Alinsky Radicalism, described in Hillary Clinton's Senior Thesis About Alinsky
Posted on March 05, 2008Did you know that the polarizing divisiveness that Hillary Clinton engenders is intentional by design as a potent political offensive weapon, and predicted by her senior thesis at Wellesley College? That thesis as a searchable PDF is found at GOPublius and we comment on it extensively below...
Obama Unifies, Clinton Polarizes : The Unity of the Human World
Posted on March 04, 2008One of the things that we like about Barack Obama is that the entire approach of his campaign is oriented toward unifying people, rather than polarizing competing factions, as Hillary Clinton has been doing, whereby she has lost our support, support which she had at the beginning of the primary campaign season...
Ballot Shortages in Ohio
Posted on March 04, 2008Ballot Shortages Plague Ohio Primary Amid Unusually Heavy Voter TurnoutYou wonder how the rest of the world views that kind of U.S. planning competence.
The Mean and the Evil Vie for Power or for Inheritance: The Hillary Clinton Campaign
Posted on March 04, 2008One of the disturbing things in life is to discover how mean and evil some people can get when they are vying for power or for inheritance, in this case, political inheritance. When the chips are down, one sees the true character of a person, and in the case of Hillary Clinton, it isn't good...
Special Interest Groups Keeping Clinton Alive in the Election Race
Posted on March 03, 2008Daily Kos in the March 2, 2008 article EMILY's List, AFSCME and Federation of Teachers Have Kept the Clinton Campaign Alive by DHinMI shows us how special interest groups and their monies greatly affect American political elections far out of proportion to their actual voting numbers...
Young Voters are the Key to the Texas and Ohio Democractic Primary Elections for the 2008 Presidential Nominee
Posted on March 03, 2008The future of America - as in any country - is dependent on its young people.As noted at the Cincinnati Enquirer by Gregory Korte in Young voters getting noticed, the new young voter does not view the world so much in terms of political partisanship - thank goodness for that - but more readily reacts directly to a candidate's interactivity with the voter:"If anything turns off young voters, it's the sense that the result of the election is predetermined before they go to the polls, said Abby Kiesa, youth coordinator for the Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement at the University of Maryland...
Limbaugh Urging Republicans to Vote for Clinton in Ohio and Texas : The Reason is Clear : McCain Would Easily Beat Clinton But Might Lose to Obama
Posted on March 03, 2008At Fox News, the O'Reilly Factor, there is a March 3, 2008 article titled Rush Limbaugh Explains Why He's Urging Republicans in Texas and Ohio to Vote for Hillary Clinton on Super Tuesday 2.Obviously, none of the reasons given there are the ones that really count...
The True Path to Freedom, One Step at a Time : Calculate Your Own Ecological Footprint on Our Planet Earth and Reduce the Size of that Footprint
Posted on March 03, 2008The "True Path to Freedom" may be a somewhat different one than the politicians envision.Is it really the "other" guy who always holds the key to the true path to freedom on this planet, or do you also hold that key?At the Path to Freedom website you can calculate your own personal ecological footprint on our planet Earth, as there are links there to various ecological footprint calculators, including theEarth Day Footprint Quiz...
Need a Break? Clever Magazine is the Place to Find Intellectual Balance
Posted on March 03, 2008Life, said Aristotle (very nearly), is balance.If you need a break, take a look at Clever Magazine, "The ezine for the neglected demographic!"In the hectic of modern-day life, just think about what Melissa Westemeier writes there in Every Day is Earth Day:"Everything we?re doing takes years, seven years for a prairie to mature, twenty years for an oak tree to produce its first acorn...