“Let’s talk about the Cloud,” says Darwin Cope to the courtroom. Squinting his eyes and shaking his head at the prospect of trying to explain, to even understand, this concept of the Cloud. “Anyone on the jury want to try to explain it to us?” A rhetorical question of course but he pauses. “Anyone at the prosecution table care to take a stab at it?” Another pause, while looking at each of the assistant DAs, as if inviting them. “Want to call your own technology expert to explain it to us? You’re welcome to, of course. But I’m going to save us all the trouble. I’m going to try explaining the Cloud in the simplest, clearest terms I can.”

Setting down his expensive fountain pen. Taking off and setting down his eyeglasses, as if preparing for a schoolyard fight.

“The Cloud, as we all know, is where information is stored. What is it exactly? No one in this courtroom knows. But that’s okay, because we know it works, right? Okay, so where is it exactly? In a field in Kansas? Under a mountain in Colorado? Satellites in space?” A few nervous laughs. “Different places? All one place? Most people think of it as just…everywhere. Which it sort of is, since we can all download from it and access it from anywhere. But can it really be everywhere? And, if it’s everywhere, is it anywhere?” A few more laughs.

He looks around. “I’m guessing no one in this courtroom is all that clear on any of that. And again, that’s okay with us, because we know it works. That’s the important thing, right?”

He pauses, frowns a little. “Or at least, it works as far as we know.” He pauses again. Taps two fingers to his chin, a pose of inquiry, of philosophical exploration. “In fact, sometimes it doesn’t work. That’s no surprise, right? Technology. It works mostly, works amazingly, but sometimes it suddenly and unexpectedly stops working. We’ve all experienced that plenty of times, right? But we tend to forgive and forget because it generally works for us, because we, or someone, eventually gets it working for us again.”

Darwin Cope shrugs. Smiles a little. It sounds, for a moment, like his little discourse on technology has come to an end. Like his problem is solved. It’s not.