Author Archives: Michael Froomkin

George C. Onoprienko

Posted on May 13, 2009 by Michael Froomkin
UM Law School Professor Emeritus George C. Onoprienko passed away on Monday, May 11, 2009.

Professor Onoprienko taught at the Law School for 40 years before retiring in 1997. He spent his retirement years in Jensen Beach, Florida.

Professor Onoprienko's contributions to the School and to the local community were numerous. As a member of the Miami Dade County task forces on battered women and abused children, he researched and drafted legislation that was passed by the Florida Legislature. He was a past chairman of the American Bar Association Committee on Ethics in Family Law, and served as a member of the Florida Bar Appellate Rules Committee. His publications included Cases and Materials on Florida Appellate Practice and Procedure: Civil, Criminal, and Administrative and Cases and Materials on Florida Domestic Relations.

Professor Onoprienko is survived by his wife Doris and his brother John. Condolences may be sent to: Mrs. George Onoprienko (Doris), 188 N.E. Balsam Way, Jensen Beach, FL 34957. A memorial service will be held on Saturday, May 16th at 11:00 a.m. at the Aycock Funeral Home, 950 N.E. Jensen Beach Boulevard, Jensen Beach, Florida.

Posted in U.Miami | Comments Off on George C. Onoprienko

I Shouldn’t Have Laughed

Posted on May 13, 2009 by Michael Froomkin

Just received a long email that started as follows:

Please be advised that Miami-Dade Water & Sewer Department (WASD) will be performing water valve maintenance on the Coral Gables campus beginning May 18th through June 30th 2009.

During this maintenance period, the facilities could experience short-term interruptions of water.

It is signed by

James E. Sprinkle, Jr.
Sr. Manager,
Facilities & Operations
University of Miami

Honest.

Posted in U.Miami | 1 Comment

Cute Cats and Activists

Posted on May 13, 2009 by Michael Froomkin

I commend to you Ethan Zuckerman's The Cute Cat Theory Talk at ETech.

Posted in Internet | Comments Off on Cute Cats and Activists

‘Better Privacy’ Firefox Add-On Eats Hidden Cookies

Posted on May 12, 2009 by Michael Froomkin

I recommend the Better Privacy Firefox Add-On

I thought I worked hard to block unwanted cookies. bit this thing found between 140 and 160 flash-based cookies on the various machines I use. Scanning the list, I told it not to delete the Pandora cookies, and eat the rest. It's possible that I deleted something I'll miss, but I rather doubt it.

I really wish there were a best practices norm that people who use cookies have to make them human-readable, so you know what they say about you. Failing that, they should at least be expected to deploy a tool on their homepages that would explain to you what their cookies say about you.

Posted in Software | 5 Comments

Yuks

Posted on May 11, 2009 by Michael Froomkin

Not so very long ago we were all told that a black man would be President when pigs fly.

And, who knew?!

On the 100th day of Barack Obama’s Presidency… swine flu!

(via Gene Spafford’s mailing list)

Posted in Completely Different, Politics: US | 1 Comment

Why Aren’t Hardware Limits on Netbooks an Anti-Trust Violation?

Posted on May 11, 2009 by Michael Froomkin

Continuing on today's theme of asking dumb questions about areas of law I don't know enough about, here's a question about anti-trust law, spurred by the news that Administration Plans to Strengthen Antitrust Rules.

Why isn't this, which no one even attempts to hide, an anti-trust violation???

Basically, Microsoft will only allow netbook makers to load XP on machines that are a touch on the slow side, and don't have quite enough RAM — and have been crippled to prevent users from increasing it.

PC makers must limit screen size to 14.1 in. and hard-drive capacity to 160GB. Ultralow-cost PCs with touch screens will also be eligible. Earlier terms set in April did not allow touch screens at all and limited screen sizes to 10.2 in. and hard-drive capacity to 80GB. The processors are still limited to a single-core chip running at no more than 1 GHz, with memory limited to 1GB of RAM.

Why isn't this illegal? Don't the anti-trust laws prevent a software maker with a dominant position from dictating hardware to pc makers in order to protect the market share of a different product?

Then again, it may be wrong to blame Microsoft for what may actually be a case of collusion with the hardware people:

The goal of the program is apparently to limit the hardware capabilities of such PCs so that they don't eat into the market for mainstream PCs running Windows Vista, something both Microsoft and PC vendors would want to avoid.

That sure sounds like the sort of collusion I thought the anti-trust laws prevented. Everyone is being so open about this, I have to assume that there's a reason why it's legal. I'm just wondering what it could be.

Posted in Law: Everything Else | 8 Comments