Author Archives: Michael Froomkin

IPv6 Service Restored

Posted on July 27, 2011 by Michael Froomkin

ipv6 readyI’m happy to report that Discourse.net is again responding to IPv6 requests at 2607:f298:1:102::1f7:4c71.

Thank you to the alert reader who noticed that it wasn’t working.

Posted in Discourse.net | Comments Off on IPv6 Service Restored

Extreme Makeover: Law School Edition

Posted on July 27, 2011 by Michael Froomkin

That’s the title of the the Daily Business Review article on plans for our new addition to the law school, and a makeover of much of the existing structure.

It’s a long article, including a lot of history of various rejected proposals, one of which was a brand new building on a prime site near the Metrorail that would have cost well over $100 million which we don’t have to spend. (But if you’d like to spend it for us, I suspect they’d name the law school after you.)

Here’s what the article says about plans for the next phase:

[Dean] White is planning a major overhaul of the current building, including adding more communal space for students, adding and redoing classrooms and outfitting them with state-of-the-art technology, adding a brand new courtroom for mock trials and opening a new cafe to cater to the whole school. White does not yet have a cost estimate for the remodel but has already hired top New York architectural firm Kohn Pederson Fox Associate to draw up plans. She plans to show the designs to the university’s board of trustees in September when she presents the proposal for a vote.

If approved by the board, which is expected, White estimates the renovations would take 18 months to complete, Current facilities would remain open during construction.

“We are deeply engaged in the preliminary stages of working with architects and will be making a proposal to the trustees in September,” White said. “The plans are fairly far along. The building will be an addition to a major renovation to the site of our current building.”

We’re certainly tight for space, and key parts of the physical plant are getting long in the tooth, so extension and renovation are good things — or will be when they’re over. As I’m currently experiencing remodeling of my floor of the law school (and repainting and re-carpeting of my office) — which means I can’t work there this summer — I suspect the process of getting to the finish line will be fraught.

Current facilities would remain open during construction. Sounds noisy.

Posted in Law School, U.Miami | 2 Comments

How Many Sane GOP House Members Exist? And Does It Matter?

Posted on July 26, 2011 by Michael Froomkin

This is probably a very dumb question, so forgive me in advance:

Suppose after Boehner’s latest effort tanks that the somewhat-less-evil Reid bill gets before the House somehow or other and the CNN Doomsday Clock keeps ticking. And suppose that the very large majority of the 193 Democrats in the House (modulo a Blue Dog here or there) are prepared to vote for it.

Then all you need is 30-40 somewhat sane (or subject to Wall St. pressure) Republicans out of the 240 in their caucus, right? Is party discipline so strong, madness so widespread, that they don’t exist?

Or am I missing something more basic about House procedure which might prevent that vote from happening?

Posted in Econ & Money, Politics: Tinfoil, Politics: US | Comments Off on How Many Sane GOP House Members Exist? And Does It Matter?

It Might Also Lower the Unemployment Rate

Posted on July 26, 2011 by Michael Froomkin

Digby has a market-based solution to the problem of the “resume holes” for the long-term unemployed:

I have a business idea. Who wants to incorporate and and sell themselves to jobless people as their "current job" for resume purposes? You could just charge a little fee if the person gets the job. Why not? It’s no more immoral than saying people shouldn’t be allowed to work if they aren’t already working.

In a world in which employers and even spouses of Presidential candidates don’t seem troubled by mail-order degrees, why not mail-order employment history too?

Posted in Econ & Money | Comments Off on It Might Also Lower the Unemployment Rate

Microsoft Word Does Regex

Posted on July 26, 2011 by Michael Froomkin

Who knew, or even suspected?  Microsoft Word does regex!, via Joho the Blog.

Of course, most people who understood that are probably wondering why anyone who speaks regex well enough to want to use it in searches in Word would be using MS Word rather than Open Office or LaTeX….

Posted in Software | 1 Comment

I Preferred the Singularity

Posted on July 26, 2011 by Michael Froomkin

I was sorry to learn that there is likely a very rational explanation for the Pioneer anomaly, the 30-year mysterious deceleration of the Pioneer spacecraft once it got out of the solar system, a mystery much loved by science fiction readers. I would have liked the mystery even better if there had been an unexplained acceleration, but you can’t have everything.

It seems that no singularities are involved after all, and that gravity doesn’t get stronger or weaker at long distances either. Heat ‘Most Likely Cause’ of Pioneer Anomaly:

A number of possible explanations have been proposed over the ensuing decades, including the possibility that gravity behaves differently at such large distances from earth — thereby requiring a modification of gravitational theory.

But over the last couple of years, evidence has been pointing more strongly to heat as the most likely culprit. Specifically, heat from the plutonium inside the spacecraft’s generators, some of which got converted into electricity while the rest of it radiated into space. If it did so unevenly, radiating more heat in one direction than in another — only a 5 percent difference is required — that might be sufficient to give rise to the Pioneer anomaly.

Found via Slashdot.

Posted in Science/Medicine | 2 Comments