Law Librarian Blog

Friday Fun: Seattle Public Library Sets New World Record for Book Domino Chain

From the YouTube description:

The Seattle Public Library launched the 2013 Summer Reading Program by setting a new world record for the longest book domino chain!

The books used to make this domino chain were either donated or are out of date and no longer in the library's collection. They are now being sold by the Friends of Seattle Public Library to help raise money for library programs and services.

No books were harmed during the filming of this video.

[JH]

NSA Spies On Cats

There’s plenty of controversy brewing over disclosures that the government is tracking metadata for ALL phone calls made in the United States, followed by even more controversy when further disclosures indicated that the NSA was surveilling Internet data from major web companies such as Google, Apple, Microsoft, Yahoo!, etc.  For those interested in the details, I suggest this FAQ on the affair provided by the Daily Beast.

Since it is Friday, I’m not going to comment on whether the government’s actions are either justified under the law or outrageous.  In the spirit of surveillance, however, I present Kitten Rescue Cam.  Watch homeless kittens and cats in the Los Angeles-based Kitten Rescue no-kill shelter frolic (if sleeping counts as frolicking) via the magic of the Internet.  I’ll bet the NSA is watching them as I write this.  There is no escaping the watchful eye of the governemnt.  Other cam subjects are available on the same page.  I would have embedded the video, but the site prevents me from doing that.  Just click on the link above.  Enjoy.  Hat tip to Dan and Valerie Ursini.

 [MG]

Friday Fun: Welcome to the Jell-O of Human Expression

Since Twitter is the Jell-O of human expression, President Clinton decided to launch his account, @BillClinton. He took some lessons from his Twitter guru, Stephen Colbert, back in April.

USA Today reported Clinton had more than 300,000 followers also immediately. Perhaps not one of them, but John McCain tweeted "Welcome to Twitter, President @BillClinton - you're a little late!" [JH]

Friday Fun: On A-T-L

UVA School of Law's "On A-T-L" only placed third in ATL's annual law revue video poll (voting results here). That poor showing doesn't mean it is undeserving of being an LLB Friday Fun feature.  

Here's ATL's editorial coments to the video:

ELIE: Bite me. ::lowers collar to half-mast::

LAT: We’re suckers for ATL shout-outs — yes, we plead guilty to vanity — and this whole video is one big ATL shout-out. But it’s also deeply insightful commentary on what it’s like to go to law school in the age of social media. What makes it my personal favorite of all the videos is how darn hilarious it is: I’ve watched it a half-dozen times, and every time it makes me start wheezing from laughter. (Also, props to the UVA kids for having a sense of humor: if you think we treat your law school or law firm unfairly in these pages, spare us the angry emails and make fun of us instead.)

STACI: For the love of God, please pause the video and read the fake ATL posts. This video had all of us laughing our asses off. It took a lot of work to create this audio/visual masterpiece, and I can assure you, the next time we “sh*t on UVA,” it’ll be out of love. Pop your collars with pride, you’ve earned it!

[JH]

Friday Fun: Really, IRS?

Hat tip to ATL's Non-Sequiturs: 05.20.13 for SNL's treatment of the IRS scandal. [JH]

Friday Fun: How Many Times Has Star Trek's Mister Spock Been Quoted in Court Opinions?

Don't know but this could make a good research project for those law librarians looking to write something for possible tenure-recognition publication during their summer break. For starting purposes, Jacob Gershman cites a couple of instances at From Sacrifice to Rhetorical Device, the Spirit of Spock Lives On (WSJ Law Blog). 

What the heck, not all law librarianship scholarly research has to be a grind. This one could be fun and might be publishable for CV purposes in The Green Bag. NB: I didn't check to see if/when the topic might have be covered in a publication.

On a related note, Ilya Somin reports on Matthew Yglesias' Slate article, I Boldly Went Where Every Star Trek Movie and TV Show Has Gone Before, observing in this The Volokh Conspiracy post that "Matthew Yglesias has an interesting article reviewing all of the Star Trek and many of the movies from the original 1960s series to the present. He especially focuses on the series’ ideology and politics, and its 'utopian' vision of the future." [JH]

Friday Fun: Time for the Class of 2013 to Dance

For job-seeking 2013 law school grads, here's The Beatles performing I'm Happy Just To Dance With You. [JH]

Friday Fun: Baby, just conform this way

From the 2012 Cardozo Law Revue. Good luck Class of 2013 grads. [JH]

Friday Fun: The Volokh Conspiracy

Since today's earlier Friday Fun post video now requires a login some may not have, here's another one. I believe this may be the very first law school follies to feature a law prof blog. From the Emory Law Follies 2013. [JH]

Friday Fun: Is Print Paper Dead?

Not yet! [JH]

Friday Fun: iHate Law School, Siri

From the 2012 SMU Follies. [JH]

Friday Fun: Futurama Ant-Piracy Warning

As a fan of Futurama, I was interested in the article In 'Futurama,' Robots Follow 'Bender's Law,' Not Asimov's.  As it turns out, co-executive producer Patric Verrone is a a Harvard- and Boston College-educated lawyer who sells hand-painted Supreme Court justice figurines as a hobby.  Who knew?  I’ll be picking up my Justice Scalia action figure any day now.  

It’s nice to know that Verrone has another source of income as the show (still in production) has been cancelled three times.  Since it’s Friday, enjoy Bender’s anti-piracy message.  Welcome to the world of tomorrow.  [MG]

Friday Fun: Instructional Video for 1-800-NAMELESS Customer Support Call Center Staff

Here's the "top secret" master class training video some of our vendors don't want you to see. [JH]

Friday Fun: Our Three Branches of Government

As explained by Schoolhouse Rock! [JH]

Friday Fun: I'm just a bill

How a bill becomes a law according to School House Rock! [JH]

Friday Fun: The Constitution's Preamble

By School House Rock! [JH]

Friday Fun: Preparing the Final Exam for Legal Research Skills

Getting ready to prepare the final exam for testing legal research skill sets? Typical, atypical, extreme (my favorite) and practical approaches are reviewed in this video. [JH]

Friday Fun: Beware Getting Hooked on Black Market Legal Research

One would think a fine midwestern city like Bloomington, Indiana wouldn't have much trouble with back alley purveyors of legal research results. Apparently that is not the case. Here's Indiana University Maurer School of Law Library's public service announcement for therapeutic law librarianship. [JH]

Friday Fun: The Celluloid Trial's Most Hackneyed Scenes

And the Oscar for curation goes to Bloomberg Law. [JH]

Ever notice how every movie trial has the very same tired elements? From "all rise" to the celebration after a "not guilty" verdict, every celluloid trial looks like every other one you've ever seen. Think we're exaggerating? Then take a look at these scenes from 29 of the "best" courtroom dramas and comedies ever filmed.

Friday Fun: "Customers Suck..."

... according to the wisdom of the burger-flipping retail staff known as Beavis and Butt-head. But who are the customers? The users of products and services (the vendor perspective) or the institutional providers of the products and service to the beneficiaries we know as our user population?

This divide in perspective leads to one hellva of a lot of costly consequences. For example, they include asinine end user focus groups and equally asinine look-over-the-shoulder ethnographic studies of practitioner practices. Both are based on the assumption that what practitioners say they want and what they currently do actually provides insight into what they need. Providing practitioners what they say they want based on this sort of expensive to gather evidence is how innovation is killed.

This "customer sucks" perspective when it refers to law librarians as representatives of the folks who write the big checks can also been seen in the conversion of B2B transactions to the retail model. Here the focus is on selling to the individual consumer. However, it will lead to acquiring and renewing print subscriptions as well selling boilerplate licenses to most institutional buyers. Sell a couple of burgers or sell a bunch of bags filled with burgers; want some extra packets of secret sauce, that will be a cost add-on.

So who really sucks? From my perspective, no one as long as the perspective divide can be bridged. (Excluding, of course, the tweakers known as corporate prophets and their market study crews -- perhaps one can deduct their labor costs and associated addiction costs from your negotiations.) There is a far better way to play the predictioneer's game. [JH]