My parents got their first computer in 1994. My mom is 81 and uses email every day.
I’d hope that outside the court most of the Justices have private email. But you never know. It’s surprising how many older people are afraid of computers.
I love the visual of this description. I can just see some dude in a suit and white gloves with the paper on a silver tray.
*“She says justices write memos, which are then printed out on ivory paper that looks like it came from the 19th century. The memos are walked around the building by someone called a ‘chambers aide.’”
*
What I understand is that the Supreme Court has e-mails that the Court staff uses, along with at least some of the Justices.
However, the Supreme Court is an institution that is steeped in traditions which are rigidly maintained. So, when Justices are formally communicating with each other on Court business, they do so by written memoranda, rather than e-mailing the other Justices.
I sincerely doubt it has much to do with fear of technology. Supreme Court justices have to decide cases about some pretty complicated stuff, after all. Many judges just tend to care quite a bit about the, I don’t know, dignity of the station. Email isn’t very dignified. It’s not like judges are doing a lot of typing in general - they have people for that.
I worked for a judge in his 40s who didn’t use email professionally, ever. The secretary would print out his emails and he’d draft responses (for her to type and send) if necessary, same as any other correspondence, but the only time I ever saw him actually personally logged in was the occasional Friday night when he’d click through and delete everything and tell me if he got any good football jokes.
I’m not sure why but I tend to see Blackberries mostly in courthouses and hospitals more than anywhere else these days. I know I used to have one because they were the only smart phone that came without a camera for the longest time and certain places wouldn’t let you carry camera phones around. Perhaps doctors and lawyers are too busy with their professions to bother keeping up with the latest gadget.
Obama is the first president to use email. It’s infuriating when the government is this hidebound- not because the act of using email is so important, but because it raises some big questions about how familiar the government is with the technology it’s regulating or ruling on.
Mr. Obama may not personally be particularly adept with technology ( which is not his job ), but he has people seconded from Microsoft, Twitter, Google, and now McAfee in his administration; plus has advisory meetings with those and other tech firms’ chiefs to keep him up to date; and his appointees are given jobs by tech firms, such as Victoria Espinel who is expected to join the BSA/Software Alliance as CEO, after a stint in government as the White House IP Enforcement Chief. During her time at the White House, Espinel encouraged various private-sector members to develop a set of best practices on ways to combat online piracy and the sale of counterfeit products on the Web. Last month the White House partnered with Google, Yahoo, Microsoft and other online advertising companies to unveil a set of best practices aimed at keeping ads off of pirate sites.
She also advocated for Congress to make illegal streaming of online content a felony, when appropriate, in a 2011 white paper that outlined legislative recommendations on intellectual property enforcement.
Not only is the White House against the destructive nature of Open Source, but it struck a blow against it by using OS for the last campaign, but high-mindedly refused to release the codebase developed with it’s help.
Because a lot of businesses have contracts with Blackberry to get sweet industry deals and such, mostly because Blackberry knows that’s their only customer base anymore.
I was responding to the post above mine which indicated the government was hidebound, and by inference technologically challenged. Which is unlikely considering the U.S.'s overweening technological superiority.
This just in: Kagan Says Supreme Court Justices Played Video Games For Research. As the FARK headline put it, “You know that 13-year-old that was kicking your ass on Xbox Live, questioning your sexuality as well as your relationship with your mother, all while dropping f-bombs like they were going out of style? There’s a very real chance it was Justice Scalia.”
