Beaneball

Don't read this post if you've TIVO'd The Law Firm and haven't watched it yet, for spoilers abound. So Roy Black's dismissal last night of Kelly looked totally justified. She looked completely lost in something as simple as an opening statement and, whether the judge was being difficult or not (she wasn't, she just wanted Kelly to do what she told her to do), as Black pointed out, you have to get the job done, and she didn't. It's to Michael's credit, by the way, that he didn't out-and-out stab her in the back when Black asked him how she'd done on the case; his response was just as "lukewarm" as Black stated it was, but that's in shart contrast to the assassination that was going on at the other side of the table. I eagerly await Yin's sure-to-be-forthcoming post about the episode. Speaking of the other side of the table, Jason's dismissal disturbed me in more ways than one. Sure, he has my name, and I always want to see people named Jason succeed, but more importantly, it really seems like he got fired for a mistake that everyone tried to make a big deal out of but was really just a slip, the type of mistake that everyone (even the "legendary Roy Black," I'd wager) makes at some point in their life. Who should have been removed instead? The way the show was cut, it was hard to see the performances of anybody who wasn't eventually involved in the dressing-down ceremony at the end. That said, what did Anika do for her team? During every argument between Olivier and Regina, she just seemed to sit there, staring blankly, waiting for it to end. The personal disagreements probably affected their case, so didn't Black have the best case for firing one of those three? I think he wanted to make an example the first week by firing attorneys from the winning teams, to make perfectly clear his point that nobody is safe, even if your side wins. Speaking of dressing-down, what was up with Black's lambasting of Chris (easily my favorite on the show so far), who, at least according to the way the episode was cut, probably did the best job of any of the twelve players? Black's claim was that if he wanted a researcher who would sit behind the scenes, he would have hired a researcher, but he wanted a great trial lawyer. My question: if he doesn't want them to quietly and competently go about researching their cases, then why doesn't he hire researchers to work under the lawyers? Brash and loud obviously don't always get the job done, as Olivier showed, so a little more respect for the behind-the-scenes worker, please? By the way, the bios on the official web site give insight into why Olivier acts the way he does: perusing the US News and World Reports law school rankings for 2006, he went to, by far, the highest-rated school of any of the associates (George Washington), so maybe you can see some arrogance coming of that. Plus, he's easily the best dressed guy on camera (that includes Roy Black in his awful pinstriped power suit that he doesn't have the body type to pull off). UPDATE: The reviews are pouring in, including Yin's and, (via Yin), Eric Goldman's. Goldman brought up the point that most disturbed me about the show, but that I forgot to mention above: the three-legged dog. The plaintiff's lawyers in the dog case decided to bring the dog to court, in a transparent attempt at garnering sympathy from the judge. The defense argued that this was ridiculous and the judge agreed, saying that if this were not a TV show, he would have declared a mistrial and sanctioned those lawyers. Roy Black, on the other hand, showing his true (despicable) stripes, lambasted the defense for not being ready for the dog, saying that things like bringing the dog in are what good lawyers do. As Goldman says, "Ethical qualm? Not in Roy Black's world! Like any good plaintiff's lawyer, he wants the team to push the ethical limits, and sympathy-inducing stunts appear to be both fair game and perhaps required." In addition, of course, the argument that the defense wasn't ready for the dog, while it may be true, isn't really applicable because the defense did argue effectively against the dog and won that argument. The only reason the case was not dismissed was because this is a TV show. Black willfully ignored that detail, because it didn't fit his overall theme, and, at least to me (and Goldman), doesn't come off well for it.

Posted by jason in Television at 16:31 | |

I watched the first episode of "The Law Firm" tonight and I think it can become a regular Thursday evening event for the rest of the summer. I won't post details or my rudimentary analysis (complaints) because I don't want anyone to stumble across any spoilers, considering it hasn't even aired yet in the two western time zones and is just starting in Central. Suffice it to say that trial law doesn't appeal to me and that Roy Black, however talented he may be as a trial lawyer, isn't who I aspire to be. Again, more tomorrow.

Posted by jason in Television at 03:10 | |

I semi-extensively overhauled the backend of the site - ideally, the front end won't be affected at all (though you may have noticed the ugly green "blog" thing at the left - ideally, that's the start of a tab system that'll contain various sections of an expanded "Beaneball" that's more than just this blog). If your user experience is adversley affected in any way (or if your user experience sucks in the first place), don't hesitate to let me know.

Posted by jason in The Blog at 04:24 | |

Andrew Orlowski (on Polish brothers!), who was quoted by John Dvorak in the piece I criticized last week, commented on that post today. The first part of his comment talks about the meaning of the word "criticism":

" ... if you ask critics of the system to explain it, then of course they're going to give negative answers! That's like asking me to explain why George Bush's foreign policy is solid and then using my answer as evidence that it sucks." That's strange. The dictionary defines criticism as 1. The act of criticizing, especially adversely. 2. A critical comment or judgment. 3. a. The practice of analyzing, classifying, interpreting, or evaluating literary or other artistic works. b. A critical article or essay; a critique. c. The investigation of the origin and history of literary documents; textual criticism. So your simile is only true if you ignore meanings 2 and 3. The role of criticism is essentially positive - mine certainly is.

I'd like to quote the OED on "criticism" to supplement the definitions above: "1. The action of criticizing, or passing judgement upon the qualities or merits of anything; esp. the passing of unfavourable judgement; fault-finding, censure." This is basically the same as the first definition of Orlowski's, but more fleshed-out. The other definition that is applicable is: "3. (with pl.) An act of criticizing; a critical remark, comment; a critical essay, critique." That's a lot of use of "criticize," which is sort of circular. Let's look up "criticize":

1. intr. To play the critic; to pass judgement upon something with respect to its merits or faults. (Often connoting unfavourable judgement.) 2. trans. To discuss critically; to offer judgement upon with respect to merits or faults; to animadvert upon. b. To censure, find fault with.

To me, the key is in three places: the "especially" in Orlowski's first definition, the "esp." in the first definition of "criticism" and the parenthetical statement in the first definition of "criticize." In other words, yes, the definition of "criticize" allows for positive commentary, as noted by much of the text of all the definitions, but the connotation, which is at least as important as the denotation, is a negative one. Amusingly enough, Orlowski himself uses "critical" in this sentence in a piece he wrote for The Register, connoting exactly what I'm saying the word connotes: "The first point is made repeatedly by Dvorak's critics, but having digested 300 comments on Slashdot, almost of all of which are critical, I haven't seen a genuine attempt to answer his broader question." I feel ridiculous for having spent so much time on this, but in the end, given Orlowski's statements on his views on CC in his comment on this blog and in his article (that he linked to in his comment) here, Dvorak would have been better to use, perhaps, "commentator." Or, better, provide a link to something Orlowski has written that indicates his views on CC. Orlowski's view, as I'm understanding from his piece at The Register is, amusingly enough, best encapsulated by his quote in Dvorak's piece: the "It does nothing" line. I disagree with his premise, however, which is stated succinctly when he writes, "[W]hat we have is a compensation crisis, not a copyright crisis." (Emphasis in the original) Perhaps we do have a compensation crisis, but that isn't the point of the Creative Commons. The point is, directly from their website, "to build a layer of reasonable, flexible copyright in the face of increasingly restrictive default rules." Lessig and company do see a copyright crisis when they see huge conglomerates of companies owning huge numbers of copyrights in many creative arenas and an American government only too willing to bow to the wishes of those corporations. Orlowski writes

The social contract that's endured for over a hundred years is really simple. The rights holders can't control the flow of culture - but they can make money off it, and this is willingly given with various provisos. As long as they don't get too greedy, and charge too much; as long as they continue to invest in the storage and transmission technologies that make it more accessible; and most importantly if they ensure that the money goes round fairly: then everyone's pretty much happy.

The CC people see, and Orlowski apparently disagrees, that the rights holders are moving toward a system where they do control the flow of culture. They believe that corporations are too greedy, and that the money isn't really getting around. A related point that Orlowski makes that I disagree with is that computers and networks are simply a "boundary case" in copyright law. His basic contention is that copyright law isn't broken just because the computer lobby says it is; it only seems that way to that lobby. Where we don't see eye-to-eye is apparently in the place of that computer lobby in society. I think digital networks and related technology is and will become so pervasive that this lobby only appears to be a fringe group because they're at the forefront of a wave, not because they're a bunch of weirdos who can't deal with the rest of us. Their life is rapidly becoming everybody's life. In the end, instead of all this exposition, I suppose I could have just left Orlowski's words in his comment on this blog alone: "[Creative Commons] is demonstrably absorbing a lot of people's time and energy. This may be better spent on more achievable and practical goals." Again, where the disagreement resides is in Lessig's belief (which I've been pulled around to) that the copyright situation is a problem and is only getting worse (thus that CC isn't a waste of time, since it tries to attack an extant problem), compared with Orlowski's belief that it's just a small segment of (nerdy) society that's worried about these things, to no good end.

Posted by jason in Computer at 02:49 | |

Ken Macha said it best: "You can't be perfect every night. It's not that easy." At least the Angels also lost, so, even though the A's lose the wild card lead, they remain five games back in the division. Tonight, Scott Elarton goes for the Indians against Dan Haren for the good guys. That matchup seriously favors the A's, so I'll be disappointed if they don't take advantage of it.

Posted by jason in Baseball, Oakland A's at 13:56 | |

Oakland is now the sole leader in the wild card chase, having smoked Cleveland last night while Minnesota was idle. It's exciting to be a fan of this team right now. After 99 games last year, the A's were just one game better than their current record, but they were closer to second place, sitting a game and a half back of Texas, and two and a half up on the Angels. They were also tied for the wild card lead with Boston. With the exception of the AL West, the team that would eventually win each division was already in the lead, though Houston, which took the wild card in the NL, was five games back. In 2003, the A's were 56-43, two games better than their current record. They were four games back of Seattle and trailed the wild-card-leading Red Sox by three contests. Three division winners, including the A's, were not commanding their respective divisions at this point: the Cubs were 4.5 games back and in third place; and the Twins were 5.5 back and also in third place; in addition, the Marlins, who eventually won the NL wild card, were four games back of that lead and in fourth place. In 2002, the A's were 58-41, four games better than today, but they stood in third place, albeit just two games back of first (Seattle). They trailed wild-card leading Anaheim by just a game, though Boston was also ahead of them in that chase. In the other five divisions, the eventual winners were already in the lead. Two of those leads were commanding: Minnesota by 14 games and Atlanta by 12.5. The eventual AL wild card was Anaheim, who was leading that chase at this point (though the A's and Mariners swapped places around the Angels) while the Giants made their half-game lead over the Dodgers stand up, taking the extra playoff spot in teh NL. There were no close divisions nor even close wild-card chases at the end. In 2001, the A's were 53-46, a game worse than they are now, and they were already 19 games back of Seattle in the West. They were also five games back of Cleveland, which was in a virtual tie for first place with Minnesota, in the wild card chase. Cleveland ended up winning their division while the A's outpaced the next-best second-place team by a whopping 17 games. Thus, in a space of 63 games, the A's gained 22 games in the wild card standings, which is simply astounding. Five of baseball's six divisions were lead (or tied, in the case of Cleveland and Minnesota) by the team that eventually went to the playoffs. Chicago, though, blew a lead of three games over Houston and seven and a half over St. Louis, as the latter two teams finished the season tied (St. Louis was awarded the wild card). St. Louis had been 6.5 games back of the wild card at that point in the season. My point? There's a lot of baseball left to play. The A's lead the wild card, but it's not exactly a stranglehold, especially considering the quality of some of the teams chasing them (the Yankees could go on a crazy streak where they score 12 runs every day from here to the rest of the season; the Twins could have a team RA of about 2.3 from here on out; and Baltimore could get a new shipment of syringes for Sammy Sosa). On the other hand, a five game lead for the Angels isn't insurmountable, either. It would take continued hot play by the A's to make it up, but that's not out of the question. I don't think Anaheim is in for an epic collapse, but they're going to have to slow down a little bit if the A's want to catch them, because I don't think it's possible for them to play .833 ball from here on out.

Posted by jason in Baseball, Oakland A's at 14:34 | |

Here's an article in the San Francisco Weekly about Joe Morgan and why he hates Moneyball. It's worth a gander. I picked up the link from Aaron Gleeman.

Posted by jason in Baseball, Magazines, Reading at 16:17 | |

Here's a fantastic post on the Sports Law blog containing a table that lists a very extensive list of arrests of NBA players, the charge, the player's age at the time, and, crucially, how many years of college the player had before joining the NBA. The point? To investigate whether the claim that not going to college makes players more prone to getting into trouble when they are teenagers in the league. The result? There are a whole lot of thirty-somethings on the list, and a whole lot of four-years-of-college types, with very few zero-years-of-college players. Granted, there's an effect here of there really not being that many no-years-of-college players in the league as a whole, but it's a striking counterpoint to a piece of conventional wisdom.

Posted by jason in Basketball at 01:11 | |

John Dvorak, who is, I suppose, a well-respected columnist in computer-geek circles, comes up blasting Creative Commons (CC) in his latest column. CC is, in its own words, "a nonprofit that offers a flexible copyright for creative work." Basically, you visit a website, answer three or four questions about what kind of "permissions" you want to place on your work (should it be reproducable for commercial purposes? How about non-commercial?) and they give you some code to put near the work (whatever it may be: blog, painting, video, etc.) to let everyone know what you're allowing and not allowing them to do with it. You should know that I am a supporter of the system (as you may have gleaned from my last post about Larry Lessig), so I may not be seeing things with a clear eye when I disagree with what Dvorak has to say. Regardless, though, away we go. Dvorak's first objectionable statement comes in his fourth paragraph:

I have begged critics of the system, such as The Register's Andrew Orlowski, to explain to me how Creative Commons works or what it's supposed to do that current copyright law doesn't do. He says, "It does nothing."

Uh, if you ask critics of the system to explain it, then of course they're going to give negative answers! That's like asking me to explain why George Bush's foreign policy is solid and then using my answer as evidence that it sucks. In the next paragraph, Dvorak writes, "Creative Commons is similar to a license." Actually, it is a license. The word "license" is splattered everywhere on the Creative Commons website. I'm not sure what he means by this, anyway. Is it a bad thing that a CC license is, well, a license? Why? In the same paragraph:

This means that others have certain rights to reuse the material under a variety of provisos, mostly as long as the reuse is not for commercial purposes. Why not commercial purposes? What difference does it make, if everyone is free and easy about this? In other words, a noncommercial site could distribute a million copies of something and that's okay, but a small commercial site cannot deliver two copies if it's for commercial purposes. What is this telling me?

The point is not that "everyone is free and easy about this." He mistakes people who use CC for a bunch of hippies who want everything to be public domain. Lessig in particular is a supporter of property and of intellectual property. He believes that America has gotten too protectionist about it, but he by no means believes that everything created should just sit out there for anyone to use and profit from. To answer Dvorak's question in the last sentence: What we're telling you when we don't want commercial usage of our work is that we don't want someone else profiting from what we've created unless they're going to ask us (and, most likely, pay us) for said work. If, however, some other blogger wants to take some idea that I have and build upon it on his (also non-commercial) blog, then more power to him. I have decided to allow a derivation of my work to appear on his site (with the restrictions that he must credit me and must license his work under the same license as I did mine). What I don't want is ESPN to steal my brilliant idea to make thousands of dollars if they're not going to pay for that privilege. In the next paragraph:

I could always use excerpts for commercial or noncommercial purposes. It's called fair use. I can still do that, but Creative Commons seems to hint that with its license means that I cannot.

Now Dvorak stops looking angry and starts looking ignorant. On the bottom of the page that explains the license I've chosen for this blog (clink the CC image or the text below it) are the words (in bold!), "Your fair use and other rights are in no way affected by the above." I don't see anything being "hinted at" in that sentence. Lessig may be an idealist and an academic, but he's still a lawyer by training, and lawyers are nothing if not notorious for their attention to detail. Dvorak is worried that, because my license does not allow commercial usage of my work, he cannot excerpt portions of my response in order to respond in kind (basically, that he cannot do with my work exactly what I am doing with his) because he writes for a commercial site. That assertion, however, is flat-out wrong. Fair use is not being eroded by CC. If he wanted to quote something I said earlier and respond to it on the PC Mag website, he would be free to just as if I had any other copyright on this text. He next complains about the CC-Public Domain license.

If I write something on my blog, for example, and decide not to cover it with the general copyright notice, I can simply say that it is in the public domain and be done with it. I do not need permission from Creative Commons, nor do I need to mention Creative Commons or anything else.

His point is that CC is only serving as a middle-man here, not adding anything useful, and in fact complicating matters, since you could just write "Public domain" on the work and be done with it. What he misses is that not everyone understands copyright. Not everyone has read Lessig's books or other resources and realizes what their rights and freedoms are and are not. A middle-man is helpful in this case, because you may not realize that you can put your work in the public domain so easily. CC, in essence, eases your mind that everything is being done legally. Finally,

Years ago, to gain a copyright, you had to fill out a form and send in the material to the Library of Congress. Now you just use the word "copyright," add your name and a date, and publish it. What could be easier? Apparently simplicity was more than some people could handle, so they invented Creative Commons to add some artificial paperwork and complexity to the mechanism. And it seems to actually weaken the copyrights you have coming to you without Creative Commons.

I don't even know how to respond to this. He completely misses the point of CC in that last sentence. Of course it weakens the copyright you would have if you just put "All rights reserved" on your site! That's the point! If you're using CC, it's because you don't want to reserve all the rights you have to the work. You've decided to waive some of those rights. If my work is really popular (it's not, but whatever) and I'm ok with other bloggers reproducing it, do I really want to put "All rights reserved" on my site, then have to deal with each case of usage individually? Of course not. I want to take care of large swaths of usage in one fell swoop, and that's what CC provides me. I honestly don't know, and maybe someone can tell me: is Dvorak usually this ignorant? Does he usually do this little research for his columns? I doubt he's stupid, but this article does not paint him in a good light.

Posted by jason in Reading at 15:28 | |

Ken Arneson at Catfish Stew continues to write the best, most creative stuff of any A's blogger out there. Scratch the qualification: of any baseball blogger out there.

Posted by jason in Baseball, Oakland A's, Reading at 14:15 | |

Be honest with me: did you really think Rich Harden would be this good already? He's 23 years old, he's in his second full big league season (third overall) and he's doing the kinds of things that, despite missing time with an injury, have to make awards voters give notice, if not for this year then for next. The only other starter in the American League with a better ERA than his 2.11 mark (so long as you're not counting Al Leiter) is Erik Bedard, who, like Harden, doesn't have enough innings to qualify for the official title. Harden is 18th in all of baseball in pitcher VORP, despite having anywhere from four to seven fewer starts than the other pitchers in the top thirty (again, except for Bedard, who, in just ten starts, is ranked 22nd). He's on his way to surpassing his 75th percentile PECOTA VORP projection and approach his 90th percentile projection, again despite missing a healthy chunk of time with an injury. All of this love is appropriate because, of course, Harden shut down the Angels last night, throwing eight and two thirds innings of shutout baseball before giving up a run and being removed for Huston Street. If the Yankees bullpen hadn't been so combustible (or better, if the Yankees' powerful offense had managed to scratch out more than just a couple of runs against Chan Ho Park, of all people), the A's would be in second place right now. We'll have to wait another day for that, however, and settle for moving to seven and a half back of Anaheim. The A's are also just two and a half back of the wild card leaders, though there are four teams ahead of them and one just a half game behind. As one of the Mets announcers pointed out last night (even TV guys say something smart sometimes), the big hurdle is often less how many games you have to make up than how many teams you have to jump over. It's one thing to gain two games on Minnesota, but it's an other thing entirely to do that while all the other teams around you are also losing ground. In fact, it's nearly impossible because many of those other teams are playing each other at the time. For example, the Yankees are tied for the wild card lead and thus the A's should be happy that they lost, but Texas beat them, and the Rangers are ahead of the A's in the chase for the playoffs, so they can't be too happy. Anyway, tonight's game (on ESPN2!) is a rubber match and pits Barry Zito against Paul Byrd. The Anaheim hurler is having a surprisingly good year (ERA well under four) that looks. I see three factors: a lower than average home-run rate, a lower than average walk rate, and a lower than expected BABIP. Two of those three are in his control, of course, and are of the utmost importance to a guy who doesn't strike out many batters (which he doesn't). But the Angels' defensive efficiency implies that about 30% of his balls in play should drop for hits, while in reality it's happening to about 27% of the balls. Unfortunately for Oakland, that's not really significant on a micro level. In other words three more hits for every hundred balls in play works out to fewer than one per game. Anyway, with Aaron Small (yes, the same one who once pitched for Oakland; raise your hand if you remember him) going for the Yankees tonight as they continue their open casting call for pitchers, the A's have to look at this game as a chance to move up on the wild card leaders rather than on Texas. I don't have high hopes for Small surviving the Texas heat. Meanwhile, Erubiel Durazo "will need season-ending surgery and is expected to be sidelined an additional nine to 12 months." (AP) Obviously, the A's would have liked to get him back to add a potentially powerful bat to the lineup. Even without that, though, the opportunity to trade him for a goodie or two this offseason loomed. Just as with Octavio Dotel, however, Durazo's value is now nil to the A's. They can't trade him, they don't want to sign him, and while members of the current team have stepped up admirably to fill the holes left by these two (Huston Street, Dan Johnson), we're talking about something approaching $10 million worth of payroll that has no value whatsoever to the A's. That's just plain unfortunate.

Posted by jason in Baseball, Oakland A's at 14:05 | |

I finished Lawrence Lessig's Free Culture last night, and I think I have a new purpose in life. Ok, so maybe that's a little strong. The idea of the book is that media companies today are (a) bigger and more consolidated than in the past; and (b) have deeper and longer copyright protection than ever before. The combination of these two things, Lessig claims, will vastly reduce the ability of the citizens of this country to freely produce creative work because large portions of creative work are, in fact, based upon the work of the past. With mammoth corporations zealously protecting their copyright using squads of lawyers, people will have trouble accessing, much less using, culture from the past. Lessig's arguments are convincing and tailored to appeal to both those on the left and the right. He sometimes comes off as the ultimate free marketeer and sometimes as a big-government liberal. Whichever side he's arguing from, though, he makes his case well that big media has successfully lobbied Congress to pass laws that do not fit in America's tradition of "free culture." Many of his points revolve around the fact that the justice system in the United States vastly favors those who can pay lawyers for hours and hours of work, to the point that in many cases, justice can not be served at all. The bullying of alleged file sharers by the RIAA ("You might win if you fight us in court, but it'll cost more money in legal fees than you have, so we'll just settle for taking your entire life's savings.") is one such example. Whether or not I end up working in intellectual property (and the book has definitely pushed me in that direction), there are implications here for any area of law. Will I be able to do what I think is right and still make a living? How often, and to what degree, will I be forced to compromise my own values because they conflict with those of my client? How can I avoid such situations? These aren't questions I have answers to, and I'm not sure anybody else does, either. EDIT: (Cross-posted at Non Compos Mentis)

Posted by jason in Books, Non-Fiction, Personal, Reading at 15:22 | |

I've joined the blog of my Hampshire friend Brady, Non Compos Mentis. We're both going to law school in the fall, so the idea is to compare and contrast our experiences on the blog. Check it out!

Posted by jason in Education, Personal, The Blog at 14:38 | |

Rich Harden's amazing, isn't he? He carried a perfect game into the eight inning last night against Texas before giving up a single to Alfonso Soriano. He finished the night with a two-hit shutout in which he struck out eight and walked nobody, and did this all while throwing just 81 pitches. With that low a pitch count, Oakland should bring him back on one day's rest to start the finale of the series, too! Offensively, the A's made sure that even if Harden gave up a few runs, they'd take the game anyway, scoring twice in three different innings. The way they scored was rather funny. Aside from Eric Chavez's solo home run in the second, every Oakland run scored on either an out (two run-scoring ground balls, two sac flies) or an error (Chan Ho Park's throwing error in the fifth). That's not a great way to sustain rallies, but it does indicate that Oakland had plenty of men on base. The win puts Oakland a game and a half behind Texas in the standings. The A's have three games remaining against Texas in this series. If they win all three, they'll have booted the A's out of the Bay and taken over second place by a game and a half. Unfortunately, a sweep is the only way to take over second. Even if they win two out of the next three, they'll wind up a half game back when Texas moves on. By the way, I'll have some notes on the Kotsay extension and the trades of Eric Byrnes, Chad Bradford, and Omar Quintanilla soon, as well as a collection of links.

Posted by jason in Baseball, Oakland A's at 14:35 | |

This is sort of sweet, if a little bizarre.

Posted by jason in Football, News at 21:17 | |