Monthly Archives: November 2014

It’s That Time of Year Again

Posted on November 24, 2014 by Michael Froomkin

…when I ask you to vote for Jotwell at the ABA Law Blog 100 competition (look under “profs”). Mom – you don’t have to be a lawyer to vote.

Posted in Jotwell | Comments Off on It’s That Time of Year Again

Nice Surprise

Posted on November 24, 2014 by Michael Froomkin

CameraZOOM-20141124151542845Someone sent me this via a student-run candygram service today.

Posted in Law School | Comments Off on Nice Surprise

My Email is Down

Posted on November 21, 2014 by Michael Froomkin

Email to my usual UM Law address has been down for the last 24 hours due to multiple hardware failures of the law school’s network hardware. Barring miracles, latest projections don’t have it up until Monday if then.

If you need to reach me, or have tried recently to reach me, please use the following formula until further notice:

myfirstname.mylastname@gmail.com

where you make the appropriate substitutions for “myfirstname” (michael) and “mylastname” (starts with an “f”).

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DETEKT

Posted on November 21, 2014 by Michael Froomkin

EFF and other fine groups announce DETEKT, a spyware detection tool. It’s a joint project with Amnesty International, Digitale Gesellschaft, and Privacy International. Read the disclaimers and instructions carefully.

Note also that they seem to be on a very short release cycle: I downloaded version 1.1 at work yesterday (nothing detected), and just downloaded version 1.3 at home today.

Disclosure: I’m a proud member of the Electronic Frontier Foundation Advisory Board.

Posted in Software, Surveillance | Comments Off on DETEKT

Why Obama’s Immigration Plan is Legal

Posted on November 20, 2014 by Michael Froomkin

Here, via Marty Lederman, is the opinion of the Office of Legal Counsel underlying President Obama’s new ‘deferred action policy’ on certain classes of undocumented immigrants.

Spoiler alert: the President is exercising powers delegated to him by Congress plus a dose of prosecutorial discretion. This really isn’t as if a future President were to say, “we will not enforce the estate tax.”

Posted in Law: Constitutional Law, Law: Everything Else | Comments Off on Why Obama’s Immigration Plan is Legal

I Like This Study

Posted on November 18, 2014 by Michael Froomkin

Electric shock study suggests we’d rather hurt ourselves than others:

[A] new study that forced people into the dilemma of choosing between pain and profit finds that participants cared more about other people’s well-being than their own. It is hailed as the first hard evidence of altruism for the young field of behavioral economics.

Posted in Science/Medicine | Comments Off on I Like This Study