Category Archives: Computer Assisted Legal Research

Bloomberg Law’s discounts challenge information suppliers

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“Bloomberg Law’s discounts challenge information suppliers” is the headline to a story in today’s Financial Times (p. 19) by Andrew Edgecliffe-Johnson.

The story quotes Lou Andreozzi, the new head of Bloomberg Law, on the company’s efforts to persuade attorneys to consider at least replacing one of their “Wexis” accounts with Bloomberg Law, since Bloomberg’s flat rate pricing (quoted at $ 450 per attorney) is preferable to the “more expensive and unpredictable sums” charged by the competition.

The story also reports how “Bloomberg has recruited ‘hundreds’ of lawyers to create a citation system, which advises users whether cases are still in use, to rival those owned by Westlaw and Lexisnexis.”

The story quotes analyst David Curie who says that “Bloomberg looked unlikely to make big inroads in the short term, but its ‘deep pockets’ made it a long-term challenger.  ‘The pricing definitely is the most challenging and disruptive thing about it,’ he said, predicting that others may follow its flat fees . . .

The story  includes a sidebar, “Legal services industry continues to expand” which includes this information:

Law firms and corporate legal departments once looked to legal research services for basic case law, newspaper articles and public records.

As such information has become more freely available, companies such as Thomson Reuters’ Westlaw division and Reed Elsevier’s LexisNexis have concentrated to turning their databases into online tools to enhance clients’ productivity.

The sidebar goes on to use Thomson’s acquisition of Pangea3 as an example.

Bloomberg Lays Down the Law

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From Crain’s New York Business, “Bloomberg LP lays down the law: Financial data giant storms legal research in its typically big way.”

Hilary Potkewitz writes: “The financial data and news juggernaut has quietly hired nearly 500 lawyers over the past year, making it the largest source of new legal jobs in New York.”

What do Westlaw and Lexis make of Bloomberg‘s ambitions in the legal research arena?

““We’re not seeing much of a change in the marketplace [because of Bloomberg]. We’re feeling very strong and comfortable,” says Mike Dahn, chief U.S. marketing and product development officer for Eagan, Minn.-based Westlaw….

LexisNexis Vice President Clemens Ceipek is more blunt. “Bloomberg has a lot of money, and that’s why we can’t ignore them,” he says, “but it’s going to be really hard for them, just like it would be really hard for us to compete in the financial markets.””

The article continues that “cost-conscious law librarians” are taking notice of Bloomberg’s less expensive flat fees and extended free trials.

“The 200 largest law firms spend an average of $2.7 million per year on Lexis and Westlaw combined, according to The American Lawyer.”  How much of that will go to Bloomberg over time?  Other contenders?  Watch and wait….

Thomson Reuters: Westlaw sales up, but print declines dragging down profits

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From today’s Financial Times (p. 16), “Thomson Reuters raises revenue outlook”

“The professional division . . . saw strong subscription revenues in its large legal business, WestLaw, but further declines in its high-margin print products, dragging operating profits in legal down 6 per cent.

The new WestLawNext product . . . had been sold to more than 9,000 customers, double its initial expectations,” according to Tom Glocer, chief executive of the financial and professional information group.

WestlawNext for Legal Research Game 1: 2 home runs and 1 strike out

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We used WestlawNext for the 1L first Legal Research and Writing research assignment this fall.  It is the same exercise that was used last year, so all six instructors knew exactly what the good cases are.  The problem involves a delinquent child and whether she should be tried as a juvenile or as an adult.  Since our legal research mantra is “secondary first” we started by looking at legal encyclopedias and found a nice summary at 27A Cal. Jur. 3d, Section 215, ” . . . At a fitness hearing, the minor who is presumed to be unfit under the juvenile court law has the burden of rebutting the presumption by a preponderance of the evidence . . . “

So we just cut ‘n’ pasted that sentence into the WestlawNext search box, limited our results to California, and pressed search.   Some WestlawNext magic then occurred.

The results screen presented one statute, Cal. Welfare & Inst. 707.  And that is the statute the instructors want the students to find.  Bingo!

The search also brought back 44 cases, which is a really nice number for a 1L assignment —  not too many to sift through and not too few to get started.  And not only was the quantity of cases  ideal, all of the instructors said, “ooh, those are really  good cases” when we demonstrated the system for them.  Everyone was suitably impressed with WestlawNext’s ability to ferret out the very best cases for the assignment.

Those are the two home runs.

The system appears to break down at the administrative level.  There is a regulation the instructors want the students to find, but it did not appear on the first page of the results list.  Instead all sorts of extremely unrelated regulations appeared, such as:

Section 1593. Aircraft and Aircraft Parts.
18 CCR Section 1593 Title 18. Public Revenues

We didn’t look through all the regulations since none of the first ten presented appeared to have anything at all to do with juvenile law.

We did play around with several searches using different words and phrases, but in no instance did relevant regulations appear, at least not high on the results list.

So while the students were very impressed with WestlawNext’s ease and ability to hone in on highly relevant statutes and cases, the administrative law limitation does help with  librarians’ job security.

Bloomberg Law’s New Leadership Team

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Here’s the press release:
Leading Executives in the Legal Research Industry Join Bloomberg Law

Lou Andreozzi and Larry D. Thompson to Lead Expansion of Bloomberg’s Web-Based Legal Platform

New York, October 18, 2010 - Bloomberg today announced that Lou Andreozzi has joined the Company as chairman of Bloomberg Law and Larry D. Thompson, PhD, has joined as chief operating officer.  Andreozzi and Thompson will play key leadership roles in the growth of Bloomberg Law, the innovative real-time legal research system from the world leader in data and information services.

In his new role, Andreozzi will provide strategic leadership for Bloomberg Law aimed at driving the platform’s expansion in the legal research industry.  He is widely recognized as a leader in the field of legal research, most recently serving as CEO of IQNavigator, Inc., and is a former CEO of LexisNexis North American Legal Markets.

Thompson will be responsible for the day-to-day operations of Bloomberg Law including go-to-market, sales, content, data and relationships.  He most recently was Senior Partner with The Sterling Group 925 LLC, and formerly served as Senior Vice President at LexisNexis.

“Lou Andreozzi and Larry Thompson are among the top executives in the field of legal research and together they bring extraordinary strategic expertise and deep market knowledge to Bloomberg Law,” said Beth Mazzeo, head of Data Products for Bloomberg.   “With the recent completion of our successful pilot phase, we are excited to move forward with Lou and Larry at the helm.  It is a pleasure to welcome them to Bloomberg Law.”

“Bloomberg Law is breaking new ground in the world of legal research by bringing to lawyers, through the Web, the same innovative technology and analytics that set Bloomberg apart in the financial world,” said Andreozzi. “I am delighted to be part of the team that will take Bloomberg Law to the next level.”

“Bloomberg Law is a formidable product, and I am confident it will change the legal research playing field with its expertise in data, technology and its extraordinary financial news and business analysis,” said Thompson. “Bloomberg Law has the flexibility of a stand-alone product with access to Bloomberg’s world-class resources and delivered to the legal profession in an intuitive interface.”

Constantin Cotzias, who oversaw the successful launch of Bloomberg Law, is returning to London to be part of the senior leadership team in Bloomberg Europe, where he will head Government and Regulatory Affairs and government business development and strategy in Europe. Cotzias played a critical role in shaping Bloomberg Law’s development and the introduction of the platform to over 90 percent of the top 100 U.S. law firms.

In the newly created role, Cotzias will take advantage of Bloomberg�s presence in Europe to expand Bloomberg’s Government Affairs division.  He will help coordinate the Company’s government affairs efforts around the globe, and will help broaden Bloomberg’s product offerings for government.  Cotzias’ team will monitor government initiatives and public policy development globally, assisting the business team and Bloomberg customers in assessing impact.

Andreozzi spent over 10 years at LexisNexis.  As CEO of North American Legal Markets, his portfolio included some of the most prominent legal products and brands including the Lexis online service, Shepard’s, Matthew Bender, Martindale-Hubbell and lawyers.com.  Prior to becoming CEO, Andreozzi was General Counsel of LexisNexis.

Most recently, Andreozzi has been serving as president and chief executive officer of IQNavigator, Inc., a leading provider of services spend management software and managed services, and will continue to play a leadership role in the company.  He also served as CEO of Inference Data, a leading software-as-a-service provider of solutions for legal data analysis and review. He has been a strategic advisor for ValueAct Capital, The Carlyle Group and Bain Capital on large media and technology deals.  Andreozzi is a graduate of Rutgers University and received his JD from the Seton Hall School of Law.

Thompson has more than 25 years of experience as an executive in the legal publishing field, 12 of them with LexisNexis where he rose to the position of Senior Vice President, Business Development, Strategy & Marketing and Global Chief Marketing Officer.  Prior to that, Thompson was Vice President for Sales and Marketing at Shepard’s/McGraw-Hill. Most recently, Thompson was Senior Partner with The Sterling Group 925 LLC, a boutique consulting firm that works within legal and professional markets assisting with strategy, sales, marketing, and business development efforts. He received a PhD in Mass Media and an MA in Telecommunications from Michigan State University and a BA from Montana State University.

Bloomberg Law

Bloomberg Law is the first real-time legal research system that integrates innovative search technology, comprehensive legal content, company and client information, and proprietary news all in one place.  This collaborative workspace also includes a suite of new tools for more effective legal analysis and more productive client development. Bloomberg Law provides:

�         Fast, accurate search results

�         Seamless integration of news, legal content and business information

�         Proprietary legal analysis that interprets key issues

�         Analytical tools that provide greater context to research

�         Unlimited searching, sharing and collaboration

�         Unique information for client development

About Bloomberg

Bloomberg is the world�s most trusted source of information for financial professionals and businesses.  Bloomberg combines innovative technology with unmatched analytic, data, news, display and distribution capabilities, to deliver critical information via the Bloomberg Professional service and multimedia platforms.  Bloomberg’s media properties span television, radio, digital and print, making up one of the world�s largest news organizations with more than 2,300 news and multimedia professionals at 146 bureaus in 72 countries.

Bloomberg Law’s selling point

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According to this story in today’s Wall Street Journal (p. B8):

Bloomberg Hangs New Shingle

Financial-Data Firm Enters Legal Research, Challening Westlaw, LexisNexis

By Russell Adams

From the story:

Bloomberg Law says its selling point is the news and company information and financial data it has pulled from the core terminal product and woven into the legal-research materials. For example, if company X sues company Y for copyright infringement, lawyers representing company X can get more than a copy of the complaint and relevant legal history. They get stock charts, patent histories and corporate filings. In addition, the name of every judge and attorney links to a database that pulls up that person’s school, his or her holdings and boards they served onpotential conflicts and case histories.

“We think we can help both the rainmaker and the junior associate with one, eat-all-you-can, elegant, easy-to-use platform,” said Constantin Cotzias, a 42-year-old former mergers-and-acquisitions attorney from the U.K. tapped by Bloomberg five years ago to build Bloomberg Law.

Westlaw’s Lexus

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I just ran across the best review so far that I have seen of WestlawNext.  It’s in Plaintiff magazine (“the magazine for Northern California plaintiffs’ attorneys”):

Westlaw’s new upgrade — WestlawNext

Report of an early adopter

By Jeffrey Isaac Ehrlich

Plaintiff, May 2010, p. 30

Between a Rock and a Free Site

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We are big fans of free and low-cost legal research alternatives here at LRP.  And, we share our enthusiasm with our students in Advanced Legal Research.

But what do you do when there are apparent discrepancies in the free sites that you steer your students to time and time again?

Here is the story:

A professor stopped by the library one day and started off by saying how great Cornell’s LII site is but was wondering about a potential error on their site.

What was the error?

In the Federal Rules of Appellate Practice, Rule 4: Appeal as of Right — When Taken, there is a section dealing with appeals in criminal cases.

In 2009, that rule was modified: defendant’s notice of appeal needs to be filed within 14 days of certain events.  The prior version of the rule required that this notice needed to be filed within 10 days.

The big change: 14 days now; before, 10 days.

As of May 13th, the version of FRAP Rule 4 on LII’s site still shows the text of the old rule.  The top of that page states that it is current through 2007.  (And, not 2009.)

I decided to look around at other important research sites and see what was online.

The Office of the Law Revision Counsel prepares and publishes the United States Code, and on their site (uscode.house.gov) they have the text of the code and the rules.  They also have the wrong version of FRAP Rule 4.  The LII folks work off of the House site, so it isn’t that surprising.  This House version has a currency date as of 1/2009 — the rule was changed in March, taking effect in December 2009.

However, another site at the US House of Representatives has it right.  On the House Judiciary Committee site, they have the correct version of the rule posted on their Procedural Documents page.

The Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts has the correct version posted on their Rules page.   I also checked a number of Federal Court websites and all had the current version.

The GPO Access site directs you to the most recent printed, official version of the US Code (2006), so this is out of date.  And, worth noting: “The information contained in the U.S. Code on GPO Access has been provided to GPO by the Office of the Law Revision Counsel of the U.S. House of Representatives.”   But, of course.   Also, FDSys has such a great interface and so much useful information, but it is only current through the last official supplement — missing the current version of this rule.

As to various commercial versions: Westlaw and Lexis have the correct version.  And, FastCase and CaseMaker also have the current version.

However, newcomer on the block, Bloomberg’s BLAW has a 1998 version — very out of date (and still with the 10 days instead of 14 days mistake, among others).

So, what is the right thing to say to your class?  Do we feed the research paranoia, as Bob Berring describes it, where students feel the need to double or triple check everything online on multiple sources?  Or do we frustrate the students with the caveat that sometimes even the best resources aren’t going to do the trick?

This is truly a teachable moment, but not the type of lesson I had in mind.

Judge says: Keep this opinion out of Westlaw and LEXIS

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 Judges make decisions and write opinions.  Some opinions get published and some do not.  Unpublished opinions get unofficially published in West’s Federal Appendix and very often show up online.   And on infrequent occasions some opinions find their way into LexisNexis but not Westlaw; others are found in Westlaw but not LexisNexis.

Here’s a case that caught my eye while doing some docket searching (I drink POM Wonderful, so that’s why it stood out).

On December 21, 2009 Judge A. Howard Matz, of the United States District Court for the Central District of California, issued an 7-page order in the case of POM Wonderful LLC v. Welch Foods, Inc..   This opinion includes, among other things, a discussion of standing under the California Unfair Competition Act and the California False Advertising Act.  At the end of the document, the judge writes:  “This Order is not intended for publication or for inclusion in the databases of Westlaw or LEXIS.” (emphasis mine)

A quick search of Bloomberg Law dockets produces at least a dozen other orders from this same judge with this same language.

So what about Bloomberg Law.com?  Or Google Scholar?  Or Fastcase?  Justia?  May any/all of them include the order?

Or is it just the strength of the Wexis duopoly and the judge really means he does not want the order published online anywhere.

LexisNexis and Westlaw have been the big players for decades.  But Google really could be a game-changer.  As a review article in the March 8, 2010 issue of The Recorder (“Worthy Adversary”) by Oliver Benn of Google Scholar points out:

If Google wants to devote its resources to addressing its current limitations, the future of legal research could become very different.  Many courts accept briefs electronically.  Why not hyperlink cited cases in the brief to the cases’ free Google pages?

And getting back to POM Wonderful, apparently it is available in LexisNexis and Westlaw, despite the judge’s request that it not be (please see comment from Bev Butula).

Legal Research as a Fundamental Skill: A Lifeboat for Students and Law Schools

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“Legal Research as a Fundamental Skill: A Lifeboat for Students and Law Schools”

University of Baltimore Law Review, Vol. 39, pp. 175-227, Winter 2009

SARAH VALENTINE, City University of New York – CUNY School of Law

This article argues that current legal research education is dangerously deficient and demonstrates how it can be reconceptualized to become a synergistic first year course that supports the learning of doctrine and legal analysis, as well as necessary research skills in accordance with recent suggestions by the ABA, the authors of the Carnegie Report, and other legal commentators.

Most law schools provide legal research instruction that is not only ineffective in teaching basic research skills but is potentially hazardous to students attempting to learn legal analysis. The ability to electronically search and access law has created a paradigm shift that has affected the very framework of the law as it has been understood and taught for the past one hundred and thirty years. The very act of accessing the law electronically restructures the law itself. It erodes the idea that one can learn the law from the scientific study of readily agreed upon precedent. As the historical understanding of law shifts, the ability to teach students to “think like lawyers” using the structured concepts of the legal system developed in the 1880s, but still relied on by law professors today, begins to collapse.

Creating an excellent legal research course is not necessarily difficult. It requires that legal research be taught as both a fundamental legal skill, requiring analysis and doctrinal knowledge and as a fundamental lawyering skill, integrated into the entire first year curriculum, not merely linked to legal writing. In addition, it must teach information literacy skills and the teaching should be informed with adult learning methodologies. Such a course provides students not only with the necessary research skills for law practice, but assists them in building the conceptual framework necessary for legal analysis.

 

Source:  LSN Legal Writing Vol. 5 No. 3,  02/02/2010