Daily Archives: May 14, 2009

Where Have All Our Cowboys Gone? Authentication of Online Legal Resources

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John Joergensen, a reference librarian at Rutgers-Camden, writes about the on-going issue of authentication of digital legal resources on Cornell’s VoxPopuLII.  His discussion touches on several different issues entwined in the authentication bundle, including the idea of reputation and “perceived trustworthiness” that the all too few commercial vendors enjoy and how to gain similar ground for free resources.  His post reminded me of a lecture that Bob Berring gave to our Advanced Legal Research in which he likened these veteran vendors to Tinkerbell.  The legal community believes in their veracity and authenticity and so they continue to dominate the digital landscape.  It’s high time we created room for more Tinkerbells to spread their online legal resource dust.

At present, AALL’s Electronic Legal Information Access and Citation Committee (ELIACC) is working on an update to their 2007 State-by-State Report on Authentication of Online Legal Resources.  As a participant in the update, I was asked to re-evaluate that state of West Virginia’s online primary legal materials.  In their case, while the courts and legislature provide free access to their decisions and bills/laws, they also explicitly state these versions are unofficial and no overt steps toward authentication are apparent.  I am interested to see how the terrain may have changed for other states.  Stay tuned…..

Global Legal Education and Comparative Visa Regulations

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Global Legal Education and Comparative Visa Regulations

 Luca C.M. Melchionna, St. John’s School of Law, Columbia Univ. – Italian Academy for Advanced Studies in America

available on SSRN: http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1392944

Legal education is slowly but steadily becoming global. U.S. law schools are adapting to the need to educate jurists who can work on cross border issues. Within the next 100 years, U.S. law schools will face the challenges of educating an increasing number of international students, while dealing with diverse legal systems.

In the next 100 years, U.S. law schools will expand overseas with several branches (at least one in every country or group of countries with legal and economic relevancy) and will embrace corporate form and a business approach. Faculty and administrators should carefully plan today for the future placement (in terms of ranking) and development (in terms of scientific breakthrough) of their academia if they seriously consider obtaining global presence, recognition and intellectual credibility. Those who do not have plans to globalize today will struggle tomorrow locally.

Only those law schools that are investing today in a solid globalization of their curricula and hiring faculty with diverse skills will be the primary actors in the field of global legal education in the 22nd Century.

This article has three main objectives:
(a) To define the issues currently influencing the movement global movement in legal education and their effect on its future development.
(b) To analyze the visa (or entry) regulations of the countries where U..S. students currently have the privilege of travelling for study or research purposes.
(c) To analyze the host regulations that U.S. universities have to face when they plan to offer educational services in a foreign jurisdiction through a physical presence in that jurisdiction.

An analysis and comparison of the entry regulations of 16 jurisdictions will be offered, with special attention to the French, Italian, E.U. and U..S. visa situations. The paper will analyze how E.U. regulations are not completely and uniformly followed by some member states and how U.S. regulations could be improved for at least short term study programs. The legal and economic consequences of these regulations will be addressed as well.

Report on UK Civil Litigation Costs

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Yesterday’s Times of London reported on the release of the Preliminary Report on Civil Litigation Costs by Lord Justice Jackson.

The civil justice system has priced itself out of the reach of ordinary people; they face financial ruin if they venture into court and lose. That was the stark conclusion last week in the mammoth report on civil litigation from Lord Justice Jackson, the Court of Appeal judge — a conclusion perhaps predictable, if depressing.

Let’s be civil and stop ‘loser pays’ by Frances Gibb. TimesOnline. May 13, 2009

http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/law/article6281621.ece

Full-text of Lord Justice Jackson’s Preliminary Report available at http://www.judiciary.gov.uk/about_judiciary/cost-review/preliminary-report.htm

Outsource your research?

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The Business Standard features a story: Indian LPO Firm Scores Hollywood Victory.  The victory revolves around one of the first television ‘libel-in-fiction’ actions.  The details about the case, involving ”Da Ali G Show,” are in the article and here.  But what is really fascinating is that the entire case was researched by outsourced help.  As the article states: 

“This case is said to be historic…because it is the first high-profile, US media litigation in which the legal research and first drafts of the motion papers for the defence were completed entirely offshore, by Indian attorneys at a legal process outsourcing (LPO) firm.”

I wonder what research tools these folks are using…and at what prices.