I twit. When Twitter first came on the scene, I was certain I wouldn’t. I was wrong. Before going any further, I call what I do on Twitter a “twit.” I’ve called it that since the beginning, because the place is called twitter. This makes some people furious, because, they tell me, it’s a “tweet.” Is it called “Tweeter”? You can call it whatever you like. I will call it what I like. Get over it.

Over the years since I first wrongly decided Twitter was worthless, I’ve written about it numerous times, as it plays a role in digital life whether I like it or not. It is a poor medium for many purposes: arguments on Twitter are terrible and a waste of time, as it’s impossible to engage in any depth of thought within the constraint of 140 characters.

Serial twitterers are annoying.  Any jerk can @me and expect me to twit with them, as if I’m obliged to engage with anyone with a computer keyboard. Continue reading →

The pressures to select a jury, to move a case to trial, have become somewhat overwhelming in New York, following the exposes of long, inexplicable delays.  The Office of Court Administration has “standards and practices,” which are used to smack judges whose numbers aren’t where the newspapers think they should be. For some judges, the smack is well deserved.

For others, particularly those who have stood up to power by ruling against the local political structure and pissing off a lot of people, standards and practices is a sword hanging over their head, an excuse to sacrifice them on the altar of regularity.

Queens Supreme Court Judge Joel Blumenfeld stood firm when he ruled against the Queens District Attorney’s practice of eliciting confessions from defendants after arrest but before they got to see their lawyer.  This put a target on his back. Continue reading →

While I’m a big fan of a few of the folks writing over at Above the Law, like Elie Mystal, Mark Herrmann, Keith Lee, Tamara Tabo, and even Staci Zaretsky, when she isn’t obsessed with lady parts, the relatively new third-string assistant editor in charge, Joe Patrice, isn’t a favorite of mine.

It’s not that Patrice, of whom I knew nothing, did anything to me. It started when he was given charge of Non-Sequitors, my favorite daily feature at ATL under Elie as it highlighted funny or interesting posts in the blawgosphere that I never would have seen otherwise. But Elie used to search out those posts, find the good stuff, and then offer it with a heaping helping of Elie snark.

Patrice handled it differently. You see, blawgers get emails daily from people who want us to see and, in their dreams, promote their posts. Continue reading →