Some law professors (those at Mason shall go unnamed) ban the use of laptops in class, contending that they are a distraction. For a discussion of banning laptops in class, see here and here. I think this approach is overly paternalistic. But what about bringing a typewriter to class? LOL. H/T Gizmodo.

I bought my first Pocket PC Laptop, a Jornada 820 in 2000 and used it throughout Junior and Senior year of High School to take notes in class. Yeah, even back then I was playing solitaire in class. Sadly, though, like any 17 year old, I kept my Jornada in my backpack and I sat on it in gym class once. That cracked the screen.

But that wasn’t the only PDA I broke. When I was a Sophomore in 1999 I also had a Palm Pilot IIIe I won in a web design competition. I kept it in my pocket. When I sat down, I cracked the screen. But wait there’s more.

After I destroyed the Palm, I ordered a Compaq iPaq off ebay. This PDA didn’t even make it to my pocket. As I was taking it out of the box, I dropped it, and cracked the screen.

Most recently, while I was doing a JoshCast with Tim Sandefur, I dropped an actual phone onto my blackberry, thus cracking its screen. If you listen closely, you can hear the thud. If you watched the video, you could see the pissed off look on my face.

Yet, I still refuse to use a case for my Blackberry. lol.