Category Archives: Winter 2015

Issue 234

CALL Executive Board Meeting, September 2014

Note: To access complete Minutes from this meeting, visit the Board Minutes page on the CALL website.

AALL Headquarters
105 W. Adams St., Suite 3300 (enter on Clark St.)
September 9, 2014 9:00 a.m.

Board Members Present:

  • Maribel Nash
  • Robert Martin
  • Stephanie Crawford
  • Clare Willis
  • Jamie Sommer
  • Julie Pabarja
  • Margaret Schilt

Board Members Absent: none

Guests:

  • Kevin McClure and Lyonette Louis-Jacques, co-chairs Bulletin Committee
  • Debbie Ginsberg and Kara Young, co-chairs Public Relations Committee
  • Jessie Lemar and Valerie Kropf, co-chairs Community Service Committee

Summary:

Treasurer’s report (Section IV):

  1. Harris Bank balance as of August 31, 2014: $28,273
  2. Net Income, August 31, 2014: ($2.073.92)
  3. Membership numbers as of August 31, 2014: 242 (8 new members, 234 renewals)

Significant Actions:

The Board approved the CALL budget for 2014-2015. VII. New business, a. (See also the Addendum to these minutes).

Policy: The CALL Bulletin will be henceforth published in an online, WordPress format.

CALL Executive Board Meeting, October 2014

Note: To access complete Minutes from this meeting, visit the Board Minutes page on the CALL website.

AALL Headquarters
105 W. Adams St., Suite 3300 (enter on Clark St.)
October 11, 2014 9:00 a.m.

Board Members Present:

  • Maribel Nash (via conference call)
  • Robert Martin
  • Stephanie Crawford
  • Clare Willis
  • Jamie Sommer
  • Julie Pabarja
  • Margaret Schil

Board Members Absent: none

Guests:

  • Frank Drake, chair Bylaws Committee (via conference call)
  • Betty Roeske, chair Corporate Memory Committee
  • Annette Cade and JoAnne Kiley, co-chairs Placement and Recruitment Committee

Summary:

Treasurer’s report (Section IV):

  1.           Harris Bank Balance as of September 30, 2014: $29,988.36
  2.           Net Income, September 30, 2014: $1,854.95
  3.           Membership numbers as of September 30, 2014: 245 (9 new members, 236 renewals)

Significant Actions:

The Board amended the CALL budget for 2014-2015.  VII. Old Business, b. and VIII. New Business, c.  (See also the Addendum to these minutes).

November 2014 Business Meeting Round-Up

CALL held its second Business Meeting of the year at Tortoise Club, 350 N. State St. on November 20, 2014.  President Margaret Schilt called the meeting to order at noon and praised the Meetings Committee for finding a great new venue.  Margaret then welcomed several new members.

Continue reading November 2014 Business Meeting Round-Up

CALL 2015-16 Slate of Candidates

The Bulletin is pleased to present your 2015-16 slate of candidates. The candidates’ names are linked to PDF copies of their biographies and statements, which can also be viewed in the members’ area of the CALL website.

The election will begin on February 13, 2015 and end at midnight March 15, 2015.

To see the bios and statements, login to the CALL website first.

Candidates for Vice President / President-Elect:

Todd_Ito Joe_Mitzenmacher
Todd Ito 
University of Chicago
Joe Mitzenmacher
Loyola University Chicago

Continue reading CALL 2015-16 Slate of Candidates

Digital Voices: Devices that Speak & Listen

mikeDid you know that you can have your computer read text out loud to you? Or that you can read to your computer and it will type what you say? You can, and neither of these features require special programs. Both are built into features that you already have on your computer (they are also built into your phones, too – see the linked instructions on enabling these features on iOS devices).

Continue reading Digital Voices: Devices that Speak & Listen

Empirical Legal Studies: A Brief Overview

Over the past two decades, empirical legal studies (ELS) has become an increasingly hot research and teaching field in law schools. ELS involves the use of data and statistics to analyze and understand the law, predict judicial behavior, and explore the interactions of law and economics. With its deep connection to the social sciences, ELS thus requires a very different set of skills and competencies from the strongly humanistic orientation of traditional legal studies.

But as empirical analysis becomes increasingly relevant to the study and practice of law, legal information professionals in all settings can benefit from a basic familiarity with the field and with the types of questions to which it applies.

This short piece is designed to provide law librarians who have no previous experience with ELS with a lay of the land and some of the basic resources for newcomers to the field. It is based on my work as a practicum student at the University of Chicago’s D’Angelo Law Library, where I worked on creating finding aids and research guides for ELS research. Continue reading Empirical Legal Studies: A Brief Overview

International Law Researchers Gather in Chicago

World Globe (with flags)The American Society of International Law (ASIL) held its 2014 Midyear Meeting and Research Forum in Chicago on November 6-8 at three venues: John Marshall Law School, Baker & McKenzie LLP, and Northwestern University School of Law. ASIL has “nearly 4,000 members from more than 100 nations include attorneys, academics, corporate counsel, judges, representatives of governments and nongovernmental organizations, international civil servants, students, and others interested in international law”. The Midyear Meeting was very representative, involving participants from the U.S., Canada, Colombia, Denmark, Germany, Ireland, Japan, the Netherlands, Norway, Singapore, Switzerland, and the UK.

Continue reading International Law Researchers Gather in Chicago

What’s Rotten About Legal Scholarship, and How to Cure It: A Georgetown Symposium

When Supreme Court justices cite Internet sources in their opinions, how do they ensure the integrity of those sources for future legal scholars? The answer, unfortunately, is not very well, as illustrated by this dose of digital schadenfreude visited upon Justice Alito.

404This was the central problem explored by a one-day conference at Georgetown University on October 24, “404/File Not Found: Link Rot, Legal Citation and Projects to Preserve Precedent.”

Over six sessions, the program identified and addressed the risks of citing to ephemeral online sources in court opinions and legal scholarship, frequently highlighting a key distinction between “link rot,” or the disappearance of a cited link, and “reference rot,” which occurs when the cited reference is no longer the same as it was when the author cited it. Archived recordings of each of the day’s sessions are available at the conference website. Continue reading What’s Rotten About Legal Scholarship, and How to Cure It: A Georgetown Symposium

Facebook: Who’s in Control?

facebook icon designed by dan leechAs librarians, we’re well aware of the impact relevancy algorithms have in search results. This year Facebook’s relevancy ranking – otherwise known as the “Top Stories”  in your news feed  – has come under a lot of public scrutiny. Facebook uses your actions – clicks, likes, comments – to choose what content you see, along with other factors that you have less control over.

What do they prioritize? How do we know what we’re missing? Can we push back and get more personal control? What can this tell us about larger issues like net neutrality? If you’re using Facebook for current awareness, you may not be seeing all the information you want to see.

Knowing how Facebook shows or hides what you see may change how you want to use it, so I’ll also demonstrate where you can find tools to customize your personal settings. Continue reading Facebook: Who’s in Control?

Law Firm v. Academic Librarians

I recently graduated from library school and started my law librarianship career. Although I had previously set out to become an academic law school reference librarian, I was presented with a wonderful opportunity to begin my law librarianship career at a top law firm. I am often asked how being an academic reference librarian is different than a law firm librarian. Continue reading Law Firm v. Academic Librarians