Looking for some simple ways to make life just a little bit better? Dennis and Tom challenge themselves to fire through 20 simple technology-related tips in just 20 minutes, from useful shortcut commands, to favorite apps, to smarter tech habits, and more!
On 07/22/2021,
in law schools, legal technologies, legislatures / government / legal, productivity / tips and tricks, tools,
by Daniel Christian
On 07/05/2021,
in 21st century, 24x7x365 access, A/V -- audio/visual, Emotion, engagement / engaging students, experimentation, future, graphics, human-computer interaction (HCI), ideas, immersion, innovation, legislatures / government / legal, training / L&D, vendors, Virtual Reality (VR) / worlds / learning, vision/possibilities, XR - extended reality,
by Daniel Christian
Could VR Stadiums Be The Future Of Live Esports? — from vrscout.com by Kyle Melnick
Virtex wants to revolutionize the way we view live esports by replicating the IRL stadium experience in VR.
Also see:
- Augmented, Virtual Realties Hold Promise for Government — from govtech.com
Excerpts:
From firefighting and social services to increased accessibility, public-sector agencies are using virtual and augmented reality to improve how staff train to interact with citizens — and it’s only the beginning.
…
From field operations to personnel training to service delivery, “there are a lot of opportunities to improve government through these immersive experiences,” she said. While state and local governments are still in the early stages of AR and VR adoption, a number of emerging use cases suggest the technology’s potential power.
On 07/02/2021,
in career development, change, game-changing environment, law schools, legal technologies, legislatures / government / legal,
by Daniel Christian
LawNext: Defining the ‘Future Ready’ Lawyer, with Wolters Kluwer VPs Martin O’Malley and Dean Sonderegger — from legaltechmonitor.com by Bob Ambrogi
Excerpt:
As the legal profession continues to transform and evolve, how can a law firm or legal department be “future ready”? What are the characteristics that define future-ready organizations and foretell their continued success?
Also relevant/see:
On 06/30/2021,
in entrepreneurship, ideas, innovation, law schools, legislatures / government / legal, society, United States,
by Daniel Christian
What Are The Four Types of Intellectual Property Rights? — from intelligenthq.com
Excerpt:
Anything created by a person, including intangible concepts and ideas, can be legally protected from theft and reproduction without permission through intellectual property rights laws. To get this protection, you will need to get comprehensive intellectual property services from attorneys specializing in intellectual property cases.
On 06/28/2021,
in Access to Justice (A2J), Cost of legal services - including access, law schools, legal reform, legislatures / government / legal, policy, society, sociology, United States,
by Daniel Christian
NLADA Welcomes DOJ’s Advice to Chief Justices to Ensure Fair Process to Keep Families in Their Homes — from nlada.org
Excerpts:
NLADA welcomes the Associate Attorney General’s letter urging Chief Justices and State Court Administrators to consider eviction diversion strategies that can help families avoid the disruption and damage that evictions cause. Together with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s decision to extend the eviction moratorium and the additional steps announced by the White House, this letter is an important tool in a package of federal resources to help our country and courts navigate this crisis.
The housing crisis, exacerbated by the pandemic, disproportionally affects women and communities of color. More than 80 percent of people facing eviction are Black. We know that when families have access to counsel provided by civil legal aid attorneys, approximately 80 percent of families stay in their homes, and that rates of homelessness have had a direct correlation to coronavirus rates. These numbers represent men, women and children who are integral to communities across the country, and we are pleased by today’s actions to help families and communities struggling in our nation.
On 06/25/2021,
in law schools, Legal operations, legislatures / government / legal, Microsoft, productivity / tips and tricks, tools,
by Daniel Christian
How to Add a Signature in Word on a PC or Mac — from businessinsider.com by Melanie Weir
Excerpt:
- You can add a signature to a Microsoft Word document in several ways, depending on the computer you’re using.
- You can upload a physical signature using a scanner or a cell phone, add additional text like your job title, and then save it to be reused later.
On 06/16/2021,
in 21st century, 24x7x365 access, A/V -- audio/visual, Artificial Intelligence/Agents/LLMs/and Related, Daniel S. Christian, data related items, digital learning, emerging technologies, engagement / engaging students, ethics, Europe, faculty, future, game-changing environment, global / globalization, instructional design, K-12 related, law schools, Learning Experience Design, Learning from the Living [Class] Room, legislatures / government / legal, morals/values, online media, pace of change, platforms, policy, presentations, social learning / networks, social media, society, teachers, the downsides of how people use tech, training / L&D, trends, United States, vendors, vision/possibilities,
by Daniel Christian
The Future of Social Media: Re-Humanisation and Regulation — by Gerd Leonhard
How could social media become ‘human’ again? How can we stop the disinformation, dehumanisation and dataism that has resulted from social media’s algorithmic obsessions? I foresee that the EXTERNALTIES i.e. the consequences of unmitigated growth of exponential digital technologies will become just as big as the consequences of climate change. In fact, today, the social media industry already has quite a few parallels to the oil, gas and coal business: while private make huge profits from extracting the ‘oil’ (i.e. user data), the external damage is left to society and governments to fix. This needs to change! In this keynote I make some precise suggestions as to how that could happen.
Some snapshots/excerpts:
From DSC:
Gerd brings up some solid points here. His presentation and perspectives are not only worth checking out, but they’re worth some time for us to seriously reflect on what he’s saying.
What kind of future do we want?
And for you professors, teachers, instructional designers, trainers, and presenters out there, check out *how* he delivers the content. It’s well done and very engaging.
On 06/02/2021,
in Bias | Diversity Equity & Inclusion (DE&I), career development, law schools, legal reform, legislatures / government / legal, workplace,
by Daniel Christian
16 BigLaw firms have no Black partners, including firm ranked No. 1 for diversity — from abajournal.com by Debra Cassens Weiss
Excerpt:
Many law firms that ranked relatively well on the American Lawyer’s 2021 Diversity Scorecard have no Black partners, including an immigration law firm ranked No. 1 for diversity.
The number of Black partners increased only slightly last year, rising from 2.1% to 2.2%, Law.com reports.
Law firms with no Black partners that ranked well on the 2021 Diversity Scorecard are: Berry Appleman & Leiden ranked No. 1 on the diversity scorecard; Wood Smith Henning & Berman, ranked No. 6 on the diversity scorecard; Kobre & Kim ranked No. 8 on the diversity scorecard; Irell & Manella; ranked No. 9 on the diversity scorecard; and Knobbe Martens, ranked 15th on the scorecard.
Law firms surveyed for the scorecard are among the nation’s 200 top grossing firms (the Am Law 200) and the nation’s 250 largest law firms (the National Law Journal 250).
On 06/02/2021,
in 21st century, career development, law schools, legal reform, legislatures / government / legal, policy, society, sociology, United States,
by Daniel Christian
June 2021: Rethinking Lawyer Regulation — by Jim Sandman
Excerpts:
The National Center for State Courts estimates that in 76 percent of civil cases in state courts, at least one party is unrepresented. That figure does not include family law cases. If it did, the percentage would be even higher. It is common for more than 90 percent of tenants facing eviction in the United States to be without counsel, even though more than 90 percent of landlords have lawyers. It is common for more than 80 percent of domestic violence victims seeking protection orders to be without counsel.
The model on which our adversary system of justice is based – with each party represented by counsel who present evidence and arguments on behalf of their clients – is a fiction in the majority of civil cases in the United States today. Unrepresented litigants fend for themselves in tens of millions of cases every year involving the most basic of human needs: shelter (evictions and foreclosures), family stability (child custody child support, adoptions, and guardianships), personal safety (protection orders against abusers), and economic subsistence (access to unemployment insurance, health care, food, and other benefits programs). The lack of access to counsel affects not just low-income people, but the middle class and small businesses, too.
Our nation is defaulting on its foundational promise of justice for all. We need solutions commensurate with the magnitude and the urgency of the problem, and those solutions must include regulatory reform.
On 05/31/2021,
in 21st century, analytics, Artificial Intelligence/Agents/LLMs/and Related, Bias | Diversity Equity & Inclusion (DE&I), Canada, career development, data related items, emerging technologies, Google, health, India, law schools, leadership, legal reform, legislatures / government / legal, Natural Language Processing (NLP), robotics, society, surviving, the downsides of how people use tech, United States, vendors, voice recognition / voice enabled interfaces, workplace, youth,
by Daniel Christian
Microsoft President Warns of Orwell’s 1984 ‘Coming to Pass’ in 2024 — from interestingengineering.com by Chris Young
Microsoft’s Brad Smith warned we may be caught up in a losing race with artificial intelligence.
Excerpt (emphasis DSC):
The surveillance-state dystopia portrayed in George Orwell’s 1984 could “come to pass in 2024” if governments don’t do enough to protect the public against artificial intelligence (AI), Microsoft president Brad Smith warned in an interview for the BBC’s investigative documentary series Panorama.
During the interview, Smith warned of China’s increasing AI prowess and the fact that we may be caught up in a losing race with the technology itself.
“If we don’t enact the laws that will protect the public in the future, we are going to find the technology racing ahead, and it’s going to be very difficult to catch up,” Smith stated.
From DSC:
This is a major heads up to all those in the legal/legislative realm — especially the American Bar Association (ABA) and the Bar Associations across the country! The ABA needs to realize they have to up their game and get with the incredibly fast pace of the twenty-first century. If that doesn’t occur, we and future generations will pay the price. Two thoughts come to my mind in regards to the ABA and for the law schools out there:
Step 1: Allow 100% online-based JD programs all the time, from here on out.
Step 2: Encourage massive new program development within all law schools to help future lawyers, judges, legislative reps, & others build up more emerging technology expertise & the ramifications thereof.
Google’s plan to make search more sentient — from vox.com by Rebecca Heilweil
Google announces new search features every year, but this time feels different.
Excerpt:
At the keynote speech of its I/O developer conference on Tuesday, Google revealed a suite of ways the company is moving forward with artificial intelligence. These advancements show Google increasingly trying to build AI-powered tools that seem more sentient and that are better at perceiving how humans actually communicate and think. They seem powerful, too.
Two of the biggest AI announcements from Google involve natural language processing and search.
…
Google also revealed a number of AI-powered improvements to its Maps platform that are designed to yield more helpful results and directions.
Google’s plans to bring AI to education make its dominance in classrooms more alarming — from fastcompany.com by Ben Williamson
The tech giant has expressed an ambition to transform education with artificial intelligence, raising fresh ethical questions.
Struggling to Get a Job? Artificial Intelligence Could Be the Reason Why — from newsweek.com by Lydia Veljanovski; with thanks to Sam DeBrule for the resource
Excerpt:
Except that isn’t always the case. In many instances, instead of your application being tossed aside by a HR professional, it is actually artificial intelligence that is the barrier to entry. While this isn’t a problem in itself—AI can reduce workflow by rapidly filtering applicants—the issue is that within these systems lies the possibility of bias.
It is illegal in the U.S. for employers to discriminate against a job applicant because of their race, color, sex, religion, disability, national origin, age (40 or older) or genetic information. However, these AI hiring tools are often inadvertently doing just that, and there are no federal laws in the U.S. to stop this from happening.
These Indian edtech companies are shaping the future of AI & robotics — from analyticsinsight.net by Apoorva Komarraju May 25, 2021
Excerpt:
As edtech companies have taken a lead by digitizing education for the modern era, they have taken the stance to set up Atal Tinkering Labs in schools along with other services necessary for the budding ‘kidpreneurs’. With the availability of these services, students can experience 21st-century technologies like IoT, 3D printing, AI, and Robotics.
Researchers develop machine-learning model that accurately predicts diabetes, study says — from ctvnews.ca by Christy Somos
Excerpt:
TORONTO — Canadian researchers have developed a machine-learning model that accurately predicts diabetes in a population using routinely collected health data, a new study says.
The study, published in the JAMA Network Open journal, tested new machine-learning technology on routinely collected health data that examined the entire population of Ontario. The study was run by the ICES not-for-profit data research institute.
Using linked administrative health data from Ontario from 2006 to 2016, researchers created a validated algorithm by training the model on information taken from nearly 1.7 million patients.
Project Guideline: Enabling Those with Low Vision to Run Independently — from ai.googleblog.com by Xuan Yang; with thanks to Sam DeBrule for the resource
Excerpt:
For the 285 million people around the world living with blindness or low vision, exercising independently can be challenging. Earlier this year, we announced Project Guideline, an early-stage research project, developed in partnership with Guiding Eyes for the Blind, that uses machine learning to guide runners through a variety of environments that have been marked with a painted line. Using only a phone running Guideline technology and a pair of headphones, Guiding Eyes for the Blind CEO Thomas Panek was able to run independently for the first time in decades and complete an unassisted 5K in New York City’s Central Park.
Deepfake Maps Could Really Mess With Your Sense of the World — from wired.com by Will Knight
Researchers applied AI techniques to make portions of Seattle look more like Beijing. Such imagery could mislead governments or spread misinformation online.
