Law Librarian Blog

CRS on Presidential Libraries

Everything anyone would want to know about the law of presidential libraries is contained in the recent CRS report: The Presidential Libraries Act and the Establishment of Presidential Libraries (R41513, December 1, 2010).  [MG]

12/10/2010: Human Rights Day Promotes Defenders Who Act to End Discrimination

The UN's annual Human Rights Day honors the General Assembly of the United Nations adoption and proclamation of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights on December 10, 1948. The theme for Human Rights Day 2010 is human rights defenders who act to end discrimination. From the announcement:

Human Rights Day 2010 will highlight and promote the achievements of human rights defenders and it will again emphasize the primary responsibility Governments have to enable and protect their role. The Day is also intended to inspire a new generation of defenders to speak up and take action to end discrimination in all of its forms whenever and wherever it is manifested.

[JH]

'Tis the Season

This is the time of year when vendors send us cards (print or the e version), cookies, candy, and other sorts of goodies.  This week, I received a very appropos card from one of my vendors.  It actually was a box of candy accompanied by a card --  a card that you had to put together yourself.  It was a cut out and came with instructions.  If you followed the itty bitty instructions, your card would turn into a Christmas tree! 

Now, who in the world would send a card that you had to put together?

I just sort of found it funny that the culpret was Innovative Interfaces.  I guess if I wanted a card already put together, I would have to pay for the add on.  (No, I am not a scrooge, but I couldn't resist.)

On a more serious note, I was surprised that they sent me a Christmas tree without knowing if I even celebrated Christmas.  I did think the sentiment should have been a bit more generic - like: Happy 2011!  In honor of the new year, we are going to give you a 15% customer loyalty discount!  (Whoops!  There I go again.)

Really?  You sent me a card that I had to put together? (VS)

Time for LAW.GOV and AALL to Better Coordinate National Inventory of Legal Materials Efforts: LAW.GOV Launches Legal Bug Tracker

The purpose of LAW.GOV's Legal Bug Tracker is to alert the Project when someone finds primary legal materials that violate one of LAW.GOV's 10 core principles. One might say this is a crowdsourcing activity that complements AALL's National Inventory of Legal Materials work. Some may object but I think this is a great idea; the more folks working on the project the better. Let's call it fact-checking.

Let's also hope the resulting LAW.GOV communications based on bug reports, identified below, are coordinated. The same should be the case with AALL's NILM State Working Groups communications. A little closer liasioning between LAW.GOV and AALL's NILM project couldn't hurt.

From Carl Malamud's announcement:

We're now calling on the legal community to help us figure out which jurisdictions need help. Erika V. Wayne of Stanford Law School, who has led the National Inventory of Legal Materials effort and helped us test the initial software, has already entered in an initial set of bugs. The venerable American Association of Law Libraries has played a key role in the National Inventory and we're hoping their active and committed membership participate in this bug tracker.

Once bugs are entered, we're trying accomplish two followon actions:

• Provide reports on the bug tracker so the media and relevant officials can see how many bugs their in their area and neighboring areas. We think if we can demonstrate that one state does much better than another, that will be newsworthy and a motivator.
• As bugs get entered and developed, we're going to send letters to the relevant jurisdiction calling to their attention the violation of Best Current Practices and any Recommended Corrective Actions. If no response is received, Second Notices and then Third and Final Notices will be transmitted in the hope of providing motivation. Needless to say, we will followup with phone calls and offers to come in and chat and help the clerks and reporters understand how they can make their systems more relevant to the publics they serve.

[JH]

Friday Fun: The Legal Research Blunders Using Westlaw

This video was created by a student taking Sarah Gotschall and Shaun Esposito's ALR class at the Univ. of Arizona College of Law. Great class assignment! In case you missed it, last week's Friday Fun featured an animated cartoon from a student in Sarah Gotschall and Shaun Esposito's ALR class. [JH]

(FYI WEXIS) Reminder: LawLibCon's Topic This Afternoon is the Future of Legal Information Interface Design

Rich Leiter and the LawLibCon crew will talk about the future of interface design for legal information products with Jason Wilson, Vice President, Jones McClure Publishing, Ed Walters, CEO, Fastcase, and academic law librarian and electronic services specialist, Tom Boone, today from 2:00 PM - 3:00 PM CST.

Backgound Reading for LawLibCon's Program. Ahead of the today's episode, one might want to check out Jason Wilson's recent post:

We can talk all we want about the future of interface design, but until we decide a new definition of computer-assisted legal research is warranted, I’m not sure we’ll make much headway.

And Tom Boone's post, From interface to extinction: law school librarians beyond Thunderdome:

In preparation for the episode, I wanted to organize my thoughts with regard to a specific aspect of the subject matter. This post may best fit under the broad umbrella of the first topic variation, native apps vs. browser-based tools, but it branches out a bit in a tangential direction. What I want to consider is, what comes after web browsers, and how will law school libraries adapt in a post-browser world?

And Ed Walters' post which focuses on moving beyond filtering and sorting, to data visualization, contextual search, and network learning, Discovery Without Search.

And also Rich Leiter's Reflections on the End of the World Wide Web and the Future of the Internet as an Information/Service Resource, and Roger Skalbeck's Mobile Legal Research: Do we NEED an app for that?.

Hello, Thomson Reuters and LexisNexis. Your CI and product development teams might want to listen in! Just might learn a thing or two or three.

Everyone interested in this important topic can get ready to join what offers to be a very interesting LawLibCon program by registering now at: https://www2.gotomeeting.com/register/537047386 After registering you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the Webinar.

You can also follow the conversation in the chat room during the live broadcast at http://lawlibcon.classcaster.com/chat. Plus you can subscribe to LawLibCon on iTunes at http://u.cali.org/2jwf

[JH]

Former WikiLeaks Members Plan to Launch Their Own Whistleblowing Site

Dissatisfied with WikiLeaks concentrating on publishing material about the US while other information was neglected, a group of former WikiLeaks members intend to take a broader approach. Their site is expected to launch later this month. The effort is headed by Daniel Domscheit-Berg whose book, "Inside WikiLeaks" will be published in German by Econ Verlag in January 2011. Details here. [JH]

Book on Leaked Cables Pulled From Amazon by Author

Another bit of weird fallout from the WikiLeaks episode is that Amazon U.K. was hosting an ebook analyzing the leaked cables.  Some supporters of WikiLeaks called this hipocrisy on the part of Amazon, after that company booted WikiLeaks from its hosting service.  The book is no longer for sale.  Amazon didn't have a problem with it because it didn't actually reproduce any of the leaked documents.  It turns out that the author, Heinz Duthel, removed the book (WikiLeaks Documents Expose US Foreign Policy Conspiracies) from sale on Amazon. 

I'm guessing the real underside to all of this is trying to figure out how to make money out of the leak, aside from trying to sell newspapers.  I can see more books coming out, speaking opportunities by those in the know, and who knows, maybe Philip Glass can turn the cables into a boring opera.  What with the web site attacks back and forth, I suspect that Internet security companies will use this experience to develop and sell products that keep sites up and running.  I'll be looking as well for the first spam messages that promise explosive news from a leaked cable .  Just click on the link or open the attached PDF.  Yeah, right.  There's money to be made, just don't use PayPal, Visa, or MasterCard and everything will be fine.

More on the book and Amazon is at PC Magazine. [MG]

Political Philosophy of WikiLeak's Founder Examined

"Rethinking Conspiracy: The Political Philosophy of Julian Assange" by Northwestern Philosophy Prof Peter Ludlow is a short essay based on Ludlow's reading of Assange's writings. The text can be downloaded at Leiter Reports: A Philosophy Blog. [JH]

In re WikiLeaks: S. 4004, SHIELD Act, Goes After WikiLeaks; EFF Calls for Standing up Against Internet Censorship; CRS Tries to Provide Analysis without Access to Leaked Cables

Excerpts from EFF's Call to Action by Shari Steele, Join EFF in Standing up Against Internet Censorship:

The debate about the wisdom of releasing secret government documents has turned into a massive attack on the right of intermediaries to publish truthful information. Suddenly, WikiLeaks has become the Internet's scapegoat, with a Who's Who of American and foreign companies choosing to shun the site.

Let's be clear — in the United States, at least, WikiLeaks has a fundamental right to publish truthful political information. And equally important, Internet users have a fundamental right to read that information and voice their opinions about it. ...

On Friday, we wrote about Amazon's disappointing decision to yank hosting services from WikiLeaks after a phone call from a senator's office. Since then, a cascade of companies and organizations has backed away from WikiLeaks. A public figure called for the assassination of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange. PayPal, MasterCard, and Visa axed WikiLeaks’ accounts. EveryDNS.net pulled Wikileaks’ DNS services. Unknown sources continue to cripple WikiLeaks with repeated denial of service attacks. Even the Library of Congress, normally a bastion of public access to information, is blocking WikiLeaks.

There has been a tremendous backlash against WikiLeaks from governments around the world. In the United States, lawmakers have rashly proposed a law that threatens legitimate news reporting well beyond WikiLeaks. We expect to see similar efforts in other countries. Like it or not, WikiLeaks has become the emblem for one of the most important battles for our rights that is likely to come along in our lifetimes. We cannot sit this one out.

(Emphsis added.)

The bill Steele is referring to is S. 4004, SHIELD (Securing Human Intelligence and Enforcing Lawful Dissemination) Act [Open Congress link]. Introduced on Dec. 2, 2010, the bill would amend section 798 of title 18, United States Code, to provide penalties for disclosure of classified information. Quoting from one of the co-sponsor's press release, Bipartisan Ensign Legislation Goes After WikiLeaks by Amending Esponage Act (Dec. 2, 2010):

Senator John Ensign (R-NV) led with Senators Joe Lieberman (I-CT) and Scott Brown (R-MA) today in introducing legislation that will help derail the very real threat posed to human intelligence sources by WikiLeaks.  Their legislation, the SHIELD Act, would give the Administration increased flexibility to go after Wikileaks and its founder Julian Assange by making it illegal to publish the names of human intelligence informants (HUMINT) to the United States military and intelligence community.

...

United States Attorney General Eric Holder recently stated, “To the extent there are gaps in the laws, we will move to close those gaps.”  The SHIELD Act will help close these holes in the law.

Recently Updated On Topic CRS Report Crippled by Lack of Access to Leaked Cables. “There appears to be no statute that generally proscribes the acquisition or publication of diplomatic cables,” according to a newly updated [CRS Report, Criminal Prohibitions on the Publication of Classified Defense Information, Dec. 6, 2010] “although government employees who disclose such information without proper authority may be subject to prosecution,” writes Steven Aftergood on Secrecy News. Aftergood adds:

Incredibly, CRS was unable to meaningfully analyze for Congress the significance of the newest releases because of a self-defeating security policy that prohibits CRS access to the leaked documents.

The CRS report concludes that any prosecution of Wikileaks would be unprecedented and challenging, both legally and politically. “We are aware of no case in which a publisher of information obtained through unauthorized disclosure by a government employee has been prosecuted for publishing it. There may be First Amendment implications that would make such a prosecution difficult, not to mention political ramifications based on concerns about government censorship.”

(Emphasis added.)

See also Aftergood's CRS Seeks Guidance on Using Leaked Docs post ("After its access to the Wikileaks web site was blocked by the Library of Congress, the Congressional Research Service this week asked Congress for guidance on whether and how it should make use of the leaked records that are being published by Wikileaks, noting that they could 'shed important light' on topics.") 

Will AALL"Sit This One Out"? One has to wonder whether our professional association's leaders have given any thought to issuing an official statement about this open access issue. [JH]

Justice Kennedy: "I will look in Corpus Juris Secundum or ALR or something."

So said Justice Kennedy about "licensing" in yesterday's oral argument in Chamber of Commerce v. Whiting. Link to the compete transcript at SCOTUSblog. For details and analysis, see CUNY Law's Professor of Law & University Distinguished Professor Ruthann Robson's Constitutional Law Prof Blog post, Chamber of Commerce v. Whiting Oral Argument Analysis: An Arizona Immigration Statute Before the Supreme Court.

Justice Kennedy's statement prompts any number of questions:

• Does Justice Kennedy's law clerks know what "CJS or ALR or something" is? Will they run to the Court's library staff for help? Call a West reference attorney?
• Will West's editoral staffer(s) responsible for writing the CJS, ALR or "something," if it gets cited by SCOTUS, receive a cash bonus, a free lunch, a better parking spot, an employee of the day award, 10 shares of TRI stock, a five minute tour of the executive floor or a "good job" email from TRI CEO Tom Glocer? (Horrors, what if a LexisNexis print title is cited instead!)
• Will some law prof write up something quickly on the topic and post it on SSRN before grading final exams in the off chance that it might be cited by SCOTUS? Perhaps a blog post on The Volokh Conspiracy? Even better, a tweet because SCOTUS hasn't cited one yet.
• Will the issue be used in LRW class assignments across the legal academy next semester?
• Will a law librarian check out how many entries down the WestlawNext output display, a relevant "CJS or ALR or something" in the secondary literature is listed?

[JH]

Texting in Class: Survey Findings and Recommendations (Or Why Profs May Want to Start Paying Attention to Students in Class)

Deborah Tindell and Robert Bohlander, Wilkes University psychology professors, surveyed 269 students anonymously about students texting in class. Among their findings:

• 95 percent of students bring their phones to class every day.
• 91 percent have used their phones to text message during class time.
• Almost half of respondents said it was easy to text in class without instructors being aware.
• 99 percent said they should be permitted to retain their cell phones while in class.
• 62 percent said they should be allowed to text in class as long as they don’t disturb their classmates. (About a quarter of the students stated that texting creates a distraction to those sitting nearby.)
• 10 percent said that they have sent or received text messages during exams, and 3 percent admitted to transmitting exam information during a test.

(Emphasis added.)

The authors offered the following suggestions based on feedback on their survey:

Have a clear, written policy about cell phone use and enforce it consistently. State that phones must be out of sight and turned off during class. Make penalties clear, such as losing points or dropping a letter grade for unauthorized cell phone use. Penalties can be applied to attendance or participation credit by assuming that if a student is texting in class, they are not “present.”

Classroom design is an important component in curtailing cell phone use. The smaller and more intimate the classroom setting, the more difficult it is to text, students say.   Desks that do not permit hidden cell phone use are helpful as well. If the classroom contains columns or other visual obstructions, instructors may want to prevent students from sitting in seats that are obscured from the instructor’s view.

Instructors should circulate around the classroom, and spend some time in the back of the classroom. Teachers should avoid focusing their attention on the blackboard, lecture notes, or on projected images at the front of the room, and instead pay attention to the activities of the students, making frequent eye contact. Survey respondents indicated that it is easier to text in class when the instructor is not paying attention to the students in the class.

(Emphasis added.)

Hat tip to Inside Higher Ed. [JH]

Yet Another Possible New Law School

This one will be in Delaware, if the feasibility study works out.  The University of Delaware is considering the establishment of the state's first public law school.  The proposed school would be located on the UD Newark Campus.  That location is in the northern part of the state, not far from the Delaware campus of the Widener University Law School.

The University released a letter from  University President Patrick T. Harper  to the UD community describing the plan for a law school:

The board has not yet formally approved the formation of a new law school. The final Board decision is still several years away, and will await refined analysis, additional faculty input and the completion of a targeted fundraising campaign. Under the timetable we discussed with the trustees today, the board would be asked in the spring of 2013 to authorize the establishment of a new law school, with the objective of recruiting and hiring the founding law school dean during the 2013-2014 academic year and admitting our first law students for classes beginning in fall 2015.

***
Investing in a new law school is expensive. It would require subsidization of operating costs for the better part of a decade, retrofitting a campus building or leasing space for the law school's first decade of existence, and making a substantial one-time start-up investment in library resources. The need to pursue philanthropic gifts in support of a new law school is critical, particularly in a revenue-based-budgeting world.

It's easy to question why yet another law school is in the planning stage with the market for graduates in bad shape.  Various university officials have made positive statements about the potential success for the school and how it would enhance UD.  Widener President Jim Harris was a bit more circumspect about the idea.  He said this to Delaware Online:

Is there a need for what's being proposed? What would best serve the needs of higher education in the state of Delaware? That's the question. Maybe the answer is another law school. And maybe it's not.

A state institution, with proper funding, should be able to get accredited.  Let's hope the job market improves if and when the school gets up and running.  [MG]

A TSA Protest: Woman Arrives at Airport Security Wearing Nothing But... .

Just about every time I go through airport security -- shoes coming off, belt, coat, pants pockets being emptied, you know the drill -- I usually joke with others in line that one of these times I'm going to just show up in the airport in pajamas and a bathrobe. Well, recently at the Oklahoma City Airport, a woman reached security, took off her coat revealing she was only wearing a black bra and panties. According to a local news account, she was protesting TSA pat-downs. See also ATL's Slightly Crazy Blonde Disrobes for TSA where Elis Mystal writes "I’m surprised we’re not seeing more of this."

And yes, there is a YouTube video of the incident and here it is. [JH]

Columbia's School of International and Public Affairs Withdraws Its Warning to Students About Leaked Diplomatic Cables

Last week, Columbia University School of International and Public Affairs Office of Career Services sent an email to students saying that an alumnus who works at the State Department had recommended that current students not tweet or post links to WikiLeaks because doing so could hurt their career prospects in government service since many of the diplomatic cables disclosed by WikiLeaks are classified. That warning has filtered down to some law school career services professionals. Boston University School of Law's career services office, for example, issued a similar warning [text of email via ATL].

The Dean of Columbia University School of International and Public Affairs, John H. Coatsworth, has now withdrawn its warning to the School's students. Quoting from his email:

Freedom of information and expression is a core value of our institution. Thus, SIPA’s position is that students have a right to discuss and debate any information in the public arena that they deem relevant to their studies or to their roles as global citizens, and to do so without fear of adverse consequences. The WikiLeaks documents are accessible to SIPA students (and everyone else) from a wide variety of respected sources, as are multiple means of discussion and debate both in and outside of the classroom.

Should the U.S. Department of State issue any guidelines relating to the WikiLeaks documents for prospective employees, SIPA will make them available immediately

The Dean's email and the School's Career Services warning email are available on Wired. Official State Department guidance for prospective employees forthcoming?

A Snapshot of WikiLeaks Fallout in the Federal Sector. The Office of Management and Budget reportedly sent agencies a memo on Dec. 3 requiring agency general counsels to send a notice telling federal employees and contractors not to access any classified material unless they've been cleared for access and have a need to know the information.  The Commerce Department apparently sent a broadcast email to employees warning that "accessing the Wikileaks documents will lead to sanitization of your PC to remove any potentially classified information from the system and result in possible data loss."

The State Department reportedly has taken the ban a step farther. It has blocked all its employees from accessing the site and is warning all employees not to read the cables even at home, even if just to see if an employee's own cable has been leaked. The Education Department, Department of Energy and the Library of Congress have also blocked access to WikiLeaks (LLB post).

Do note that President Obama signed an Executive Order last year which stated that classified information shall not be declassified automatically as a result of any unauthorized disclosure. [JH]

What Students Interested in Pursuing Big Law Careers Really Need to Learn in Law School

"The Snark" offers "some curriculum suggestions to the law schools out there that are the focus of nasty hate mail from disgruntled alumni."

Big Law Boot Camp: "The Big Law Preparatory Curriculum should be offered as an elective seminar that lasts seven nights a week from 5 p.m. till 9 p.m. for an entire school year. Anyone who misses a single night -- for any reason -- receives no credit for the classes. The schedule will immediately thin the herd of weaklings who aren't serious about pursuing Big Law careers. I expect at least half of the participants will quit after a few weeks."

Advanced e-mail for Big Law Cogs: "This fast-paced class will give you the skills you need to read and comprehend 100 e-mails in less than two minutes."

Legal Assistant's Toolbox: "Taught by a 20-year legal secretary, this course will teach you all of the skills you thought were below you but are actually essential to your daily life at Big Law."

Math for Big Law Lawyers: Learn how to calculate if you are going to hit your annual billables target and what your personal budget needs to be while paying off your law school debt "before you get laid off or quit."

Much more at The Snark's What if Law Schools Offered a Big Law Boot Camp? Hat tip to John Edwards, Associate Dean for Information Resources and Technology and Professor of Law, Drake University Law School. [JH]

Business Models for Offshore Legal Outsourcing

Case Western Reserve Law prof Cassandra Burke Robertson has posted A Collaborative Model of Offshore Legal Outsourcing on SSRN. Here’s the abstract:

International outsourcing has come to the legal profession. The ABA and other bar associations have given it their stamp of approval, and an ailing economy has pushed both clients and firms to consider sending more legal work abroad. This article integrates research from the fields of organizational behavior, social psychology, and economic theory to analyze the effectiveness of the legal outsourcing relationship. It identifies organizational pressures in the practice of law that affect how legal work is performed in a transnational context, and it examines how individuals on both sides of the outsourcing process influence the success or failure of a globalized practice. Ultimately, the article recommends that parties involved in legal offshoring should move away from a model of disaggregation and toward a model of collaboration. Unlike a disaggregation model that assumes outsourcing vendors will autonomously complete discrete legal tasks, a collaborative model would explicitly focus on cooperation, communication, and renegotiation of status and resources.

Hat tip to ContractsProf Blog. [JH]

Research Aids and Tools to Assist Diplomacy Wonks Wanting to Study WikiLeak's Disclosure of US Diplomatic Cables

As previously noted on LLB, our friends north of the border, Slaw, called attention to the the National Security Archive's guide that explains how to decipher a US State Department cable. Might come in handy for wannbe diplomacy wonks for reading WikiLeaks publication of 251,287 US diplomatic cables. And thanks to Gary Price, Resource Shelf for (1) posting about CABLESEARCH, which is a full-text search engine of the many of the cables and (2) this set of tools for researching them.

End Note: the Council on Foreign Relations recently published this feature, Will WikiLeaks Hobble U.S. Diplomacy?: 

How will [the] release of more than 250,000 diplomatic cables obtained by WikiLeaks.org impact U.S. diplomatic efforts in the Middle East, Pakistan, and elsewhere? Six CFR experts are unanimous in cautioning that WikiLeaks' latest data dump could hurt sensitive relationships and make open exchanges more difficult.

[JH]

Library of Congress Blocks Wikileaks to CRS

Some of the fallout from the Wikileaks has taken the form of removing access to the site from government employees.  That, apparently, includes analysts working with the Congressional Research Service.  There seems to be some soul searching over this.  On one hand, the information was released illegally.  On the other, it is information that can be useful.  The Library of Congress released its own press release justifying the move:

The Library decided to block Wikileaks because applicable law obligates federal agencies to protect classified information.  Unauthorized disclosures of classified documents do not alter the documents’ classified status or automatically result in declassification of the documents.

Quotes from current and former CRS analysts at Nextgov suggest they disagree with the access removal:

I don't know that you can make a credible argument that CRS reports are the gold standard of analytical reporting, as is often claimed, when its analysts are denied access to information that historians and public policy types call a treasure trove of data," a former CRS employee said.

Let me see if I understand this.  Non-government individuals, foreign nationals, newspapers, and almost anyone in the world with access to the Internet can use this information for their analysis, but policy analysts in the United States cannot.  Nothing to see here, move along.  The U.S. should not handicap itself this way.  [MG]

Legal Tech Vendor Satisfaction: 2010 Winners of LTN Awards Announced -- Scorecard: LexisNexis 4, Thomson Reuters 2

Based on the LTN Technology Satisfaction Survey, this year's LTN Vendor Award results were compiled from a nationwide sample of more than 500 participating senior individuals involved in recommending or purchasing legal technology products at law firms. Gold, silver and bronze categories were derived from overall satisfaction scores by product. I think you can figure out the ranking of gold, silver and bronze. Think Olympics for customer satisfaction with legal tech products and services.

Among familar names, meaning the Big Two, LexisNexis' CaseMap and LAW Prediscovery products received recognition in the silver category and the Company's LexisNexis database service and Time Matters scored in the bronze category. Thomson Reuters' West km4.0 was recognized in the silver category and the Company's Westlaw database service scored in the bronze category.

No products from either vendor received the highest ranking gold category and do note where both vendors online legal search services placed. Remember this is a customer satisfaction survey. But of the 16 winning products receiving LTN recognition in all three categories, LexisNexis received more awards than any other vendor.

Details on methodology and the complete list of LTN's 2010 Vendor awards here.

End Note on LN's CaseMap. Speaking of one of LexisNexis' silver award winning products, CaseMap, the ABA published The Lawyer's Guide to LexisNexis CaseMap on Nov. 23, 2010. A couple of quotes from the work's introduction:

Lawyers who use CaseMap, and who learn the ins and outs of the product, swear by it. It is to many users a religion. Lawyers who have not used it wonder what the product can do, while lawyers who use it wonder how they lived without it. With CaseMap, you can analyze the entire case, one aspect of the case, or various issues with your case, simply with one click of a mouse. Reports appear with such ease that users tend to take them for granted, but they are veritable fountains of information.

...

CaseMap has been on the market for many years and has built a loyal following. The product is easy to use, although it does require some training, and continues to improve. The product links with a wide range of other tools, such as LexisNexis TimeMap, LexisNexis TextMap, LiveNote, Sanction, CT Summation, LexisNexis Concordance, and many others. These integrations allow CaseMap to be far more versatile than merely a case-analysis tool. They allow CaseMap to be the central dashboard around which litigation revolves.

I've seen recent ABA titles on how to use Microsoft products, Google, etc., but I, for one, don't recall any recent ABA how-to publications on Thomson Reuters products. Of course, my short term memory is shot so ... . But if it is unusually accurate this time, will we see the ABA's publishing activities pitching Thomson Reuters wares now that Thomson Reuters and the ABA has reached an agreement where TR is the primary publisher of the ABA’s book publications by provide printing and binding services for ABA titles?  

I'm thinking the ABA will retain its editorial independence and this agreement is just beneficial to TR Legal's printing facility's under-utilization of print production capacity in this Shed West Era. At the same time, I'm wondering whether someone at WK's CCH printing facility located in Chicago (as is the ABA's headquarters) is pounding his or her head on his or her desk right now. Then again, CCH may have lost the bid for the printing and binding contract. [JH]