Law and Software

Everyone and their cat can play the Prelude in C from the WTC on their lever harp thanks to Anne-Marie O’Farrell’s workshops and now her published lever changes. Even more so now that it is on the grade 4 ABRSM syllabus.

Anne-Marie also includes a transcription of the C minor prelude from the lute suites in her collection.

But the other week I stumbled on this. A harpist who goes by the name Lira Siren 天琴座海妖 . Her YouTube channel is awesome. A couple of years ago she posted Prelude 12 on YouTube.

I’m giving some online music lessons. I have been successfully using Zoom with Midi instruments for about 4 months now. This article is long because I do cover “almost” solutions before the one that works. You might be trying to get these “almost” to work – but they won’t. The solution does work very effectively for the situation where both teacher and student have digital/midi instruments. Feedback/suggestions welcome.

I have a Roland RD64, not a “real piano.” I use a Mac (currently on Mojave). And am using Zoom as the platform.

If you are using a piano, violin or other instrument, your microphone is going to do all the mixing you need. If you are using a digital instrument, why would you want to deal with microphone positioning when you have USB output.

However, going digital means learning far more than you ever wanted to know about Apple’s core audio, and Zoom’s features and limitations.

Here’s my story.

I’d like to make a few comments. They may be helpful

Since the election, many people are making scary comments and predictions about immigration in the new Donald Trump world.  I don’t believe that these nightmare predictions trouble the undocumented community too much – you are a tough bunch. People who have fled the gangs in Central America or other terrible experiences, and have risked their lives crossing desert and the Rio Grande are survivors. People who have lived here for years, honestly and bravely raising their families for a better life despite all the roadblocks that face them are determined in the face of adversity.  But your children, raised here – even if not born here – are American kids (as President Obama calls them). And for them, the country they  love is changing in inexplicable ways. And their social media is full of very dire and terrifying opinion.  This post is for these children and young adults. I have learned a huge amount from you all, and some I count as precious friends. more…

I have two active sites. This one, and law191.org – my community immigration law office site. I keep them separate because I am not writing a splog. I need this blog space to write about anything and everything without worrying whether clients will approve or disapprove or whether it will affect my search position.

This post is about improving google’s assessment of my office site’s performance from embarrassing to  the high 90s. As an immigration lawyer, being found in search is very important. As a low-fee community lawyer, being found organically is the only game in town because high-stakes advertising isn’t in my budget.

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Giving back is good. This truth we hold to be  self-evident. Lawyers learn the importance of service from their first days in law school. Securities lawyers take asylum cases, high-powered litigators mediate landlord-tenant disputes and fight evictions. So many important issues that need the volunteer pro-bono attorney. So much neglect, so many wrongs that need to be righted. And these challenges are often a welcome change from the day to day lawyering that these lawyers are skilled in. more…

I have Chrome on my Amazon firephone. I use gmail all the time. And I didn’t try to install google play services. I know there are ways to do it – but I don’t like the idea of installing rogue “copies” of key google services. Yawn, boring lawyer. more…

Today someone came in to the office wanting a second opinion about their immigration lawyer. That is all I want to say about that. I won’t give such an opinion, but I will talk to people about expectations. I’m not going to say whether someone’s lawyer was right or wrong, too expensive, too distracted or part of the problem. But I do want to talk about some things you need to keep in mind. more…

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I wrote this analysis earlier in the year, when Judge Hanen applied his injunction. But I wrote it for myself, not with a view to publish. I assumed that the lawyers would raise all these issues and more, and the appeals court would sort out the mess. Since Judge Hanen severely reprimanded the government lawyers for “misleading” him about the three-year DACA awards that were accidentally given after his injunction, I assume that the misinformation in his opinion was also accidental – probably due to misleading arguments in briefs offered to him by the parties. more…

I haven’t changed my view from August about deferred action. But it is all we’re likely to get for a while, so I’ll quit complaining about it, and get on with the work.  My concern is that the nonprofits gearing up for the very large DAPA demand are going to follow the same strategy of workshops and volunteers that they used for DACA.

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