Guide To Free Legal Research Online

The Law Student Guide to Free Legal Research on the Internet is now available. We cannot improve upon the brief self-description that appears on the home page, so it is, verbatim:

"First off, you should know that this guide won’t make legal research fun or fast or easy. Legal research is boring and tedious and nothing can change that. The best you can hope for is to plug along long enough that you eventually can get an unfortunate law student such as yourself to do your research for you.

What this guide can do is make legal research cheap. Free, as a matter of fact."

Ernster, the Virtual Library Cat

Case Reporters, RIP?

A Canadian law blog has put up an interesting post cheering what it sees as the impending death of the printed case reporter, since these are often full of public information but sold by private publishers for profit. Of course, the author doesn't mention the things that private publishers often add to cases that are a major convenience (at least for American attorneys), like headnotes. And saying that "Westlaw, Canada Law Book, Carswell - are on the precipice of corporate death" is a real overstatement. But it is true that there is a trend for law firms and law schools to cancel their subscriptions to printed case reporters. For about a decade, U.S. law librarian email lists have had regular postings of entire 100+ volume sets of case reporters, as "free to a good home" because they are being discarded.


Ernster, the Virtual Library Cat

Copyright Issues Hit a Sour Note With Jazz Fans

The National Jazz Museum in Harlem recently acquired the Savory Collection. An audio engineer named William Savory created this treasure trove of never before released recordings. It boasts 100 hours of music recorded on 1000 aluminum and vinyl discs--a pretty impressive format at the time.

Recorded from radio broadcasts in the late 1930s, this historic collection includes performances by Count Basie, Louis Armstrong, Billy Holiday, Lester Young, Lionel Hampton, Fats Waller, Artie Shaw, Benny Goodman, and more. Take it from me, they were pretty cool cats!

However, the recordings were tucked away for decades. After Savory's death, his son sold the collection to NJM. Unfortunately, copyright issues may delay the release of these treasures. Hopefully, museum and record label officials will work through these issues and jazz lovers can leave feeling kind of blue to Miles.

Click the links to read more about William Savory, the Savory Collection, copyright issues concerning the collection, and a possible remedy.
Ernster, the Virtual Library Cat

Beloit College Mindset List

Since 1998 Beloit College has released the Mindset List to provide a culture touchstone for students entering college this Fall. It is fun to read the lists for different years for an overview of cultural references have changed.
Ernster, the Virtual Library Cat

NowRelevant.com

There is a new search engine out there that promises to find "everything about your subject for the past two weeks." NowRelevant.com offers a super-simple search interface, and a listing of new, original, and unspammed internet material from exactly 14 days back from the time of your search. The default for results is five days, extendable by the searcher. This is not a search meant to find authoritative results or even the most popular general summary of a topic, such as a Wikipedia article, but only the most recent original internet material on your subject.

Of course, relevancy depends upon what the searcher views as relevant. While NowRelevant.com may be ideal for marketers looking for topics and words with the heaviest current internet traffic, it could also be a quick way to see a wide variety of views on a current "hot topic" in the news media, or helpful postings about something time-sensitive in its relevancy, like "new law students" at this time of the year. Much more about NowRelevant.com, including a comparison with Google's new advanced search limit-by-date feature, can be found in an article by Avi Rappoport, published this week at Information Today.
Ernster, the Virtual Library Cat

24/7

So much for cat naps!! I will now be prowling the Library - along with some of you all night long. In other words, the Library has heard your requests and you can now access the Library 24 hours per day, 7 days per week.

You must have your Hofstra ID to enter the 24/7 access door once the main doors are locked for the night. Also, in order to best ensure everyone's safety, you will be asked to leave at closing time and then you can swipe back in , should you wish to remain.

And if you do see me with my eyes closed - I am NOT NAPPING!!! I am meditating on Life, the Universe and Everything.

Have a great weekend - and make sure to go home and get some sleep!

Ernster, the Virtual Library Cat

Sports Law: Laws Governing Agents Seldom Enforced

Or so claims this article, which states that there appears to be little enforcement of laws designed to keep agents out of collegiate athletics. The article makes timely reading as the sports seasons begin to overlap in earnest.

Ernster, the Virtual Library Cat

McKinney's Practice Commentaries

We previously blogged about the ease of using the McKinney's Practice Commentary for criminal law research, however there are valuable Practice Commentaries throughout the entire set of McKinney's statutes. If you are researching New York law and you know where a relevant statute should be in McKinney's, you often just have to open up that volume of statutes to find a very helpful Practice Commentary that explains, in English, how the statutes in that volume are interpreted.


Ernster, the Virtual Library Cat

The Library of Congress Acquires Twitter Archive

"Every public tweet, ever, since Twitter’s inception in March 2006, will be archived digitally at the Library of Congress." Click here to read more about the Library of Congress' acquisition of Twitter's archive.
Ernster, the Virtual Library Cat

Tumblr: the next big thing?

Tumblr has been called a cross between twitter and Facebook. You can share anything and customize everything. If you haven't come across it yet, this New York Time's article provides an overview of what it is and how it is being used.
Ernster, the Virtual Library Cat