Law.com Subscribers SAVE 30%

Call 855-808-4530 or email [email protected] to receive your discount on a new subscription.

Legal Incubators and Legal Hackers

By Dan Lear
May 02, 2015

The seminal book on the origins of hacking and the hacker culture is Steven Levy's Hackers: Heroes of the Computer Revolution. One of my favorite stories from the book is of an early hacker at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Bob Wagner, who was not content to use a wimpy, clunky electromechanical calculator to complete homework for a Numerical Analysis class. Consequently, Wagner wrote a program of almost three thousand lines of code that made the computer emulate the calculator's exact functionality. Then, Wagner used the calculator program on the computer to do his math homework.

His grade when he turned in his homework: Zero. “You used a computer!” The professor told him. “This can't be right.”

Read These Next
Why So Many Great Lawyers Stink at Business Development and What Law Firms Are Doing About It Image

Why is it that those who are best skilled at advocating for others are ill-equipped at advocating for their own skills and what to do about it?

Bankruptcy Sales: Finding a Diamond In the Rough Image

There is no efficient market for the sale of bankruptcy assets. Inefficient markets yield a transactional drag, potentially dampening the ability of debtors and trustees to maximize value for creditors. This article identifies ways in which investors may more easily discover bankruptcy asset sales.

The DOJ's Corporate Enforcement Policy: One Year Later Image

The DOJ's Criminal Division issued three declinations since the issuance of the revised CEP a year ago. Review of these cases gives insight into DOJ's implementation of the new policy in practice.

A Lawyer's System for Active Reading Image

Active reading comprises many daily tasks lawyers engage in, including highlighting, annotating, note taking, comparing and searching texts. It demands more than flipping or turning pages.

Blockchain Domains: New Developments for Brand Owners Image

Blockchain domain names offer decentralized alternatives to traditional DNS-based domain names, promising enhanced security, privacy and censorship resistance. However, these benefits come with significant challenges, particularly for brand owners seeking to protect their trademarks in these new digital spaces.