Product Development Central

Someone should do this with babies (hell yes there's a market; we play music for them in utero, for Pete's sake), and this with bloggers (wherein you could at least get a taste of the real OC).

Whither WEP, Cont.

Well, this provides no immediate solution to my problem but looks exciting, "PARC Aims To Smarten, Lock Down Mobile Tech:"

Aiming to tackle the time and effort required to log on securely to WiFi networks — which have become popular but also have been hampered by security concerns amplified by user resistance to encryption and authentication schemes — PARC pointed to its secure wireless technology as a straightforward way for home and corporate users to achieve robust mobile security.

First Thing We Do, Let's Frag All The Lawyers

Bob Ambrogi points to two games that let you unleash your inner client, both from out-law.com: "Zap the suits, save the pizza aliens and dotty millionaires," and "Beware: Lawyers at Work." 'Cause smacking a lawyer has roughly the same universal appeal as puppies.

Jenny Levine spotlights a picture blog from the public library in lovely San Marino, CA. Who will be the first law firm or law school with a mo- or photo-blog? I double-dog dare you. Send links.

Along these lines, kudos to Rick Klau and Matt Homann for challenging the legal field on its invariably ponderous (and sometimes felonious) path toward innovation. Matt is setting up a wiki and engaging in other tree-shaking activities:

In weekly posts, I'll ask five people — who are experts in their fields — to give me five ideas on a given topic. Every week, the five people will come from a different (usually non-legal) discipline, but the topic will always focus upon the innovative marketing, pricing, and delivery of legal services. [...]

[H]ere is my weekend agenda for renewing my creativity and recommitting myself to making my practice better...

Good stuff. I give my own practice about a B+ on this front, partly for our good actions and partly for our good intentions. We can and should all do better.

Things That Just Work (And Things That Don't)

I've spent too much of this Memorial Day wrestling with my husband's ThinkPad in an effort to get it to connect to our wireless network in a way that would ease the minds of our respective law firms' risk management aficionados. I'm about done trying broker accords between XP and OS X. Any insights into the following will be greatly appreciated.

Whither WEP? When WEP's on, the ThinkPad's offline. Period. Only way it will connect is if our packets are lolling out the windows like so many Amsterdam call girls. (This is with an Airport Extreme and v. 3.1.1 of the software.)

Paper Please. Is it too much to expect the ThinkPad to see the fully compatible USB printer attached to the Airport?

Serendipity to the rescue, however. My misery always loves Dr. Weinberger's company, and he offers this splendid account of why he had to take back his daughter's Samsung-Napster MP3 player:

I had a bad feeling about the Napster from the moment I started installing the software. It kept adding layers and layers of cruft, forcing me to upgrade my Windows Media Player, bundling in a CD burner, forcing me to register at Napster.com...window after window of incomprehensible files and DLLs until I wanted to scream that it ought to take its over-educated, over-engineered supercilious ass to the mountains and take up goat herding. And, sure enough, although Windows recognized the Napster device, the Napster software didn't. After four hours of trying, I gave up.

Plus, while moments ago Googling "callgirl" and "call girl" to get the preferred usage, Belle de Jour, Diary of a London Call Girl, popped up in my search results. Would that this could last: she's presently number — you guessed it — 69 in Technorati's Top 100.

Sounds Terrific

Soundwalk audio walking tours presently cover just certain NYC neighborhoods, but look for more to come. (Spotted on CNBC World, and Time Asia has a nice article.) Downloadable as MP3s from eMusic, also available from Audible and iTunes, or buy the CDs and rip 'em yourself.