A Columbia Law Student Blog - Three Years of Hell to Become the Devil

August 25, 2006

And like that... he is gone

So that's it. RIP Three Years of Hell, June 2, 2003 to August 25, 2006. After all these words, there are only a few things left to say.

Two sites, the Imbroglio and the Volokh Conspiracy, have given me a slightly premature sendoff, and their words are very kind. (The site has received its final Kerr Package.) In answer to Ambimb's question as to why the site is closing, the answer is simply that the project is done. I don't know what my next big task will be. I've got two articles in process (much more difficult now I don't have free Lexis access). There's a few chapters written of a novel, a thought made more exciting by three friends who have already written books. The more I look at law and technology, the more I think that an open-source, XML-based framework for writing judicial opinions would bring caselaw closer to the public (as well as weaken the WEXIS duopoly). Perhaps that's a project worth looking into. Whatever the case, I'm sure I'll have no problem coming up with other tasks to occupy my (soon to dwindle rapidly) free time. This story was always meant to have an ending, and after all these months, it is finally here.

Thank you to the professors and students at Columbia Law School who made this journey such a rich experience. The same goes to the bloggers across the 'sphere who've linked, commented and otherwise spread the word. (A special note should go to Martin, who started me on this path.) My family, although asked not to comment on the blog itself, never failed to give me encouragement (and fodder for quite a few posts) throughout my years here.

And finally, of course, thank you to all of you who've read this site over the last three years and a bit. Journeys are made better with travelling companions, and I couldn't have asked for a finer bunch.

Best regards,

A.R.

Posted by Anthony at 7:09 PM | | Comments (8) | TrackBacks (1)

And for those without blogs...

Dear Wormwood:

Our correspondence over these last few years, put together, may be the single longest thing I've ever written. For old time's sake, however, I hope you'll allow me to give you one last list, a few things I hope you'll take with you in your own purgatorial journeys.

At long last, Wormwood, our conversation is at an end. Please take with you my best wishes, and may your time in law school bring you every joy possible.

Continue reading "And for those without blogs..." »

Posted by Anthony at 6:32 PM | | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Advice for 1Ls Starting a Blog: A Much Shorter Part II

Dear Wormwood:

I promised you two letters that might help your friend Scrimgouge in starting a 1L blog. The first letter focused mostly upon matters that any blogger, legal or otherwise, might find useful, be they technical or stylistic. But both you and Scrimgouge are now law student, which makes your efforts (and yes, dear Wormwood, I really am hoping that you too might start blogging) a bit different. So with the basics out of the way, I'd like to make a few quick notes and observations on what I've learned from law school blogging.

  1. Eschew anonymity: I've covered the reasons for this in one of my most oft-read posts. I know I bang on upon this, but anonymity certainly isn't as safe as you'd suspect. Besides, it's only polite that when you violate Godwin's Law, your opponent knows where to send the summons and complaint.
  2. Don't be surprised if your first year makes for the most interesting blogging: First year blogs are great, indeed positively addicting. Most 1Ls find themselves thrust into this bizarro land where Socratic Method suddenly makes sense as a pedagogical technique and everything--and I mean everything--starts being seen through the lense of law. On the other hand, 1L bloggers know that most of their readers aren't other law students, but their friends, family and associates from back in the "real world." The need to explain the pressure-cooker anxiety, and the urge to translate the experience to outsiders, makes for excellent writing.

    1L year is all about learning the game. 2L year, you merely refine it. By 3L, you're looking for another game to play because you know exactly how much class you can snooze through with minimal effect on your grades. Why do you think Scott Turow didn't write a sequel?

  3. Give your fellow students (and professors) some space: TYoH followed two pretty simple rules. First, don't mention a non-blogging professor by name. Refer to them instead as "Prof. Contracts" or "Prof. CivPro." It's not much, but it does mean that your blog entries won't end up as Google hits for their name. Secondly, if you have a story to tell about a fellow student, even if you're not mentioning them by name, shoot them a quick email with a draft of the post before you publish. They may not want their lives appearing online. Most of the time, no one will care, but it's a good habit that saves trouble later on.
  4. Blog about what fascinates you: Your text really comes alive when you have an interesting story to tell, or when you're passionate about an issue. All law student bloggers eventually create their own niche. I've posted quite a lot on gay marriage, for instance, but also on the appropriateness of professional status for legal practitioners (much more obscure) and strange tax issues. The Ambivalent Imbroglio should be one of the first reads for any law student thinking of becoming a public defender (or a prosecutor, for that matter). You don't have to comment fully on everything. If you find something interesting but don't have anything to say on it, an entry with a quick link is perfectly fine. Write in depth on those issues you care about.
  5. Engage others: Yesterday I wrote about connecting to other bloggers, but focused mostly on law professors or major players. Yet the real and lasting relationships in blogging will come from your own cohorts, your peers out there on the great wide internet. I've copied fair amounts of code from Heidi's effort. I've made fast friends with Chris. I've pimped Jeremy's book. These are the things I smile about when I remember TYoH, and I'll bet I do so a decade from now. Your cohort will be a source of support when things go wrong, both scholastically and technically. They'll also be something you'll carry away from law school.
  6. Keep a sense of humor: All too often, you'll be inspired to shout. When you do, put the post in "draft" and leave it to the next day. Remember that at the right moment and you'll thank me later.
  7. Keep in touch: Perhaps not advice, so much, but if there's a 1L out there starting a blog and they need a bit of help, don't hesitate to ask. I'm sure it's going to be a lot of fun reading your work in the years to come.

And that, dearest Wormwood, is that. I hope that Scrimgouge finds the next three years as exciting as I did.

Posted by Anthony at 4:45 PM | | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Welcome to the Continuum! or Passing the Torch

Say hello to Luis Villa, a 1L at Columbia law school. He's another coder turned lawyer, and his musings on code and law strike a cord.

If there's any other Columbia Law School bloggers who would like to tie their blogs into the Columbia Continuum, feel free to email me. (I will be keeping that site working, and maybe even improved, after this site goes quiet.)

UPDATE: Welcome also to Legal Economics, another Columbia 1L. This guy will have no trouble in Reg State. Too bad it's not a required class anymore, eh?

(Please note that the Continuum requires an RSS feed, so if you're on Blogger or Blogspot, you should get a Feedburner account.)

Posted by Anthony at 4:21 PM | | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (0)

Down to the Wire

Right... self-imposed deadline of tonight to finish this thing off, and still four or five posts that I need to complete. Right now all that quick typing in exams is coming in handy!

Posted by Anthony at 4:17 PM | | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

August 24, 2006

Advice for 1Ls Considering a Blog: A Very Long Part One

Dear Wormwood:

Who is this Scrimgouge whose email address you've forwarded me? It's certainly very flattering that he's asking you to ask me for advice on starting a law school blog. Nevertheless, there's no good reason for him to ask me at one remove. [1] You know full well I'd speak at the opening of a Doritos bag, and give away advice just as profligately.

Since your friend has asked, I'm happy to oblige. This particular project has run for over three years, and I'd like to think that in that time I've learned a few things that might help out a beginner. Of course, with the start of the fall semester, there is currently no shortage of advice for new law students, and I'm sure that similar wisdom about blogs is a dime a dozen. Hopefully your friend Scrimgouge will find one or two chestnuts here that he hasn't managed to gather elsewhere. Sadly for him, however, whatever angels generally look over my shoulder and force me to be brief have taken a tea break. What follows is quite lengthy indeed.

To help out a bit, I've divided the post into five sections that continue after the cut:
First, the commonplace.
Second, decide what you want to do.
Third, learn a bit about the technology.
Fourth, connect, connect, connect (to the Web).
Fifth, connect, connect, connect (to other bloggers).
Finally, have fun.

I hope it helps.

Continue reading "Advice for 1Ls Considering a Blog: A Very Long Part One" »

Posted by Anthony at 6:51 PM | | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Could Be Worse

A friend of mine just gave me a "post bar exam gift": a copy of Ichisada Miyazaki's China's Examination Hell: The Civil Service Examinations of Imperial China. From the first page:

Competition for a chance to take the civil service examinations began, if we may be allowed to exaggerate only a little, even before birth. . . . Prenatal care began as soon as a woman was known to be pregnant. . . .

Legal education system take note: you have something to aspire towards.

Posted by Anthony at 3:01 PM | | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Grumpy Old Man Alert: "In My Day, We Didn't Have the 'SONI' System Like You Youngsters. We Read Two Hundred Spam Emails From Every Society Imaginable, And We LIKED It."

Forwarded from a current Columbia Law Student, from one of Student Services' fantastic new staff members:

We have put in place a new system, the Student Organization News and Information (SONI) System, which allows student organizations and journals to email students directly and allows you to select to which student organization and journal email lists you wish to subscribe or unsubscribe.
We hope that you find this system a helpful way to receive information from student organizations, and a good way to cut down on your email traffic.

The SONI system works as follows. All students in the Law School are initially subscribed to each student organization's email list. You may choose to unsubscribe from any list, at which point you will no longer receive email from that particular organization or journal. If you wish, you can later choose to resubscribe.


What a fantastic idea! I'm sure this entry will attract a lot of groans from the Class of 2006 and older, though. They can take heart: scuttlebutt is that you still can't avoid the daily deluge of emails from the public interest folks.

Posted by Anthony at 10:36 AM | | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

August 23, 2006

New York Pungent

Strange circumstances conspire to bring me back to New York just before the blog ends. I drove through Jersey late last night. A blind man could smell his way up the Jersey Turnpike. My memory of New York will be forever mixed with the smell of garbage. Tokyo has its sweating salarymen with natto-breath crowding the subway. Summer winds blow stinging road dust into your eyes in London. But the smell of rotting dinners sets New York apart, simply because it's always there, and especially strong in the summer. No part of Manhattan escapes it. Walk up from a Times Square subway exit, the cleaned-up area for tourists, and spoilt meat assaults your nose. Walk down Broadway for a romantic meal and you're certain to pass at least three corners reeking of fish. Take a badly air-conditioned cab through slow traffic to a job interview on 54th street and you have a choice: roll up the windows and sweat or arrive with your suit smelling as if you cleaned a drainage ditch in it. Maybe as the years go by I'll grow nostalgic and I'll forget. But for the present, summer in New York is remembered with my nose.

Posted by Anthony at 8:33 PM | | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

August 18, 2006

The Beginning of the End

Dear Wormwood:

The bar exam is over. I've moved away from D.C. to Another State. [1] And today the last signs of law-student living left me: my free Lexis account no longer works.

I feel I shall soon have withdrawal symptoms.

In any event, it's about time for this project to end. After all, Wormwood, while your journey through law school is beginning, it's time for me to go on about my life. There's still a little left I have to say, mostly about blogging, school, and a few observations to send you on your way. But even of that, there's not much. I'm going home to visit my parents this weekend, but I should be back to writing on Monday.

So by way of forewarning, Wormwood, you can expect the final entry of TYoH to appear one week from today, on Friday, August 25th. Now I just have to get everything in order. There is, of course, a project plan.

[1]: Incidentally, if I hadn't believed it before, this move would have convinced me that the Scion xB is great value for money. Over 30 miles to the gallon and I can fit massive amounts of cargo in the back.

Posted by Anthony at 1:07 AM | | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Giving The Devil His Due

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Death of a Nation

By on Aug 03, 2010 in Blog, Cambodia, Featured Posts, Laura's Blog
Daughter Death of a Nation

Young girl stands with her mother in Phnom Penh, Cambodia

Leaving Angkor Wat and the temples in Siem Reap behind, we were up bright and early to catch an early morning bus to Phnom Penh. The city is the largest in Cambodia and the capital of the country since the French colonized it in the 19th century. As one of the most beautiful cities built under French rule in Indochina, it was once called the “Pearl of Asia.” Where grand boulevards studded with French colonial buildings hug the banks of the Mekong River, a pearl it may have once been. But long gone are those days.

On my travels, I’ve been trying to do as much reading as possible on the places we’re visiting. Getting a better understanding of the history, land, politics and people has helped me go a bit deeper and make the experiences even more rewarding. Pulling into Phnom Penh after reading a few memoirs on what had recently gone on here, the pages came alive.

Umbrella Death of a Nation

Street scene in Phnom Penh

Cambodia suffered a bloody genocide from 1975 to 1979. Nearly three million Cambodians – in a country of eight million people, that’s roughly one out of every three – were tortured and killed under the rule of the socialist ruling party called the Khmer Rouge. In one of the most brutal racial cleansings, the Khmer Rouge executed monks, students, engineers, factory workers, doctors, librarians, teachers, lawyers or anyone suspected of being educated. They murdered aunts, uncles, mothers, fathers, grandmothers and grandfathers and young, innocent children. The put an entire nation in labor camps and destroyed a beautiful country.

The country is still recovering from the bloodbath and nowhere is it more apparent than in Phnom Penh. Paying a visit to the S21 Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum and The Killing Fields made my blood curdle and brought to life all the suffering.

S21: Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum

800px Tuolsleng1 e1280849231455 Death of a Nation

Inside the walls of the Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum

The Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum, or S-21 as it is otherwise known, is a former high school in a suburb of Phnom Penh. Today it’s a museum and a testament to the 20,000 lives that were tortured here.

Prison Cells Death of a Nation

The walls of the once classrom are lined with tiny prison cells

Four months after the Khmer Rouge took power, they converted this high school into a prison and interrogation center. The classrooms became torture chambers and small prison cells. The windows were barred with barb-wire and iron bars. Those that passed through these doors were repeatedly tortured and forced into naming family members and friends against the regime, who were in turn arrested, tortured and killed. Of all 20,000 Cambodians that entered these doors, only seven survived.

Female Prisoners Death of a Nation

Female prisoners look helpless in the photos as they await execution

Upon arrival, prisoners were photographed and interrogated, and then the torture began.The torture system here was designed to make prisoners confess to the crimes the captors were accusing them of. The prisoners were routinely beaten and tortured with electric shocks, scalding metal instruments and hanging. Other prisoners were cut with knives or suffocated with plastic bags. Instances of people having their fingernails pulled out while pouring alcohol on the wounds and holding a prisoner’s head under water were not uncommon.

Torture Chamber Death of a Nation

A high school classrom-turned-torture chamber at S21 Prison Camp

Today the prison has been left just as it was found when the Khmer Rouge was defeated. Haunting empty classrooms house small prison cells. Blood stains soak the floor among piles of prisoners’ clothing. Torture chambers are still intact and the barbaric tools used to torture are on display. And in the cabinets where, perhaps, high school trophies were once displayed, lie piles of human skulls.

Waterboardi Death of a Nation

Thousands of prisoners' heads were held under water in this wooden box

It’s hard to describe the feeling you get walking the grounds of a place where such horrific events took place not too long ago. What made the experience so powerful, so raw and so real, were the thousands of faces staring at you. The photos the Khmer Rouge took of the prisoners are on display here. Blank, tormented faces gaze into the camera, seemingly pleading for help. The suffering becomes real and personal.

Males Death of a Nation

Haunting photos of male prisoners prior to execution at S21

I can’t get these faces out of my mind. Can you?

pixel Death of a Nation

Comments (4)

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  1. roundwego says:
    August 15, 2010 at 3:34 am

    @Megan – I love your comment, “confronting travel day.” Yes, indeed it was. I am sure you had a few of those on your recent adventures in the Middle East. I think our most confronting travel day happened in Egypt.

  2. megan says:
    August 14, 2010 at 5:32 pm

    I know what you mean about the pages coming alive when you arrive in Phnom Penh – after reading as much as I could about Cambodia beforehand, I felt exactly the same. It was so easy to imagine the streets emptied of people, and looking at the buildings you can tell they haven’t changed much since.

    And visiting S21 and the Killing Fields was hands down the most confronting travel day I’ve ever had. It’s very difficult to take in, but so important to remember.
    megan´s last [type] ..Photo Friday 8

  3. roundwego says:
    August 9, 2010 at 5:47 am

    @Cdowl – It was a very moving experience, one that will certainly stay with us. Thanks for reading up on our Cambodia adventures!

  4. Chris Dowling says:
    August 8, 2010 at 1:26 pm

    difficult to comprehend…. must have been very hard to view and write about. man’s inhumanity to man at it’s worst.