I frequently take handwritten notes using my iPad and a stylus. People sometimes ask me why I’m not just typing my notes, using an external keyboard. Sometimes I do, such as if I am in a meeting or monitoring a deposition and I want to capture as much as possible, almost as if I am transcribing. But I’ve often found that my notes are more helpful to me when I take them by hand. I have far fewer words on the page, but my handwritten notes capture what is most important. It turns out that I’m not alone in thinking this way. This week, Minneapolis attorney Sam Glover of Lawyerist.com wrote about new research confirming that taking notes by hand is often better than typing. It’s a fascinating article and worth reading. And now, the rest of the news of note from the past week:
- Speaking of Lawyerist.com, this week the site produced a list of every iOS app created for lawyers. The site explains that some apps are purposely excluded (such as apps not updated in the last few years and apps that simply republish free content such as statutes), and once you take those out, I couldn’t find any apps missing from the list. Of course, there are also lots of incredibly useful apps for lawyers that are not created specifically for lawyers, such as Microsoft Word for iPad, Fantastical, 1Password, etc.
- Attorney Andrew Weber, the Legislative Information Systems Manager for the Law Library of Congress, tells me that Congress.gov was updated this week with new information and the ability to save your searches. As I noted when I reviewed the site in 2012, the website works well on a mobile device. You can get more information on the updates in this post by Weber.
- If you find that your iPhone or iPad is clinging to a weak Wi-Fi signal when it should instead be using 4G LTE, you can always turn off Wi-Fi to force your device to get off of Wi-Fi, but California attorney David Sparks explains why it may be better to toggle Wi-Fi off and then on again.
- Erika Aguilar of KPCC (Southern California Public Radio) discusses a Los Angeles trial court that is giving jurors iPads to us to view evidence.
- New Orleans attorney Ernest Svenson explains how his iPhone has allowed him to use meditation to improve his life.
- One of my favorite Apple Stores is the one inside of Grand Central Terminal in New York. What I like most about it is that this high-tech store greatly respects the traditional architecture of the building. Kevin Baker wrote an interesting article this week about how Grand Central Terminal was almost demolished. It’s an good read. (via Daring Fireball)
- Joshua Ho of AnandTech describes the sophisticated manual camera controls in the upcoming iOS 8.
- Serenity Caldwell of Macworld describes five great iOS 8 features.
- Harish Jonnalagadda of iMore writes that EA has cut the price of many popular games by up to 90%. For example, Battleship (normally $4.99), Monopoly (normally $9.99), Trivial Pursuit (normally $4.99) and Mirror’s Edge (normally $9.99) are each just $0.99 for a limited time. Click here to see all of EA’s games in the App Store.
- Apple has done a lot to make it harder for a thief to steal your iPhone. For example, you can use Find My iPhone to locate and remotely erase your device. Brian Chen of the New York Times reports that, according to New York Attorney General Eric Schneidermn, these changes have resulted in a huge decrease in iPhone thefts.
- Jason Gilbert of Yahoo Tech shows off some of the best photos of the year taken by an iPhone. These pictures may happen to have been taken by an iPhone, but they are just great photos, period.
- This week, Matt Richtel and Brian Chen of the New York Times wrote a profile of Tim Cook’s tenure as Apple CEO. The analysis in the article suffers from many flaws, but the article does includes some interesting information including statements from Jonathan Ive, the head of design at Apple. I actually preferred reading the edited transcript of the interview with Jonathan Ive.
- And finally, here is a short video of a woman wearing x.pose, which purports to be a “wearable data-driven sculpture that exposes a person’s skin as a real-time reflection of the data that the wearer is producing.” In other words, the more that you use your iPhone to share information about yourself, the more that this corset makes you naked. Mariella Moon of Engadget has some details, you can get more information on the x.pose website, or you can just click here or below for the video.