The Grand Manner Online (A Dev Diary)

So I had some plans for this year. Plans that are now laughably outdated. Like:

1. Writing and publishing papers on computational law

2. Traveling to San Francisco for MCLE on ethics and computational law

3. Getting a peer-reviewed online law journal off the ground

4. Going back to Japan for a holiday

Numbers 2 and 4 are definitely cancelled. I don't think I can spend hours in an airtight can breathing circulated air through a mask. So all travel plans are gone.

Numbers 1 and 3 are delayed. To write a paper I need lots of face time with research assistants, the time to chase down citations in a library (not all our resources are online…yet). The new law journal was supposed to have issued its first call for papers last March, but then we were all lurched into the unknown by the plague, so we had to rethink the lineup of articles and pivot to a special issue.

So the most important thing I'm doing right now is trying to get the College’s online learning system up and running. The tech is actually the easy part - we now have a Moodle installation working, and Sir JJ was able to enroll his students into an Oblicon bridging program. The hard part is training teachers and staff. Next to that is trying to port the law school experience, the “grand manner” (whatever that means), online. Is that even possible? So every now and then I’m going to document the experience of setting up my classes online, like a dev diary. Hopefully there are lessons I can cascade to my colleagues.

I'm scared that this is too big for me. I'm scared that my talents are gone. Let me invoke the spirits of those who have tread this path. Of Malcolm. Of Sinco. Of Salonga. Come to me. Come to this black mirror.  I call you now.