The Argument for Content Not Containers: EBooks Get a Challenge

January 30, 2012

Sarah Glassmeyer continues to prove herself a thought leader in the world of librarianship. In a recent post from CALI.org we see her views on “The Enhanced Book”.

She takes the discussion about eBooks to a broader view with her move away from pros and cons and into the world of possibilities. I too taught content not container in the old days of my law firm service so her message resounded.  I do think that the methods taught within print created better researchers because the framework was defined.

Often today’s electronic researchers are limited because they think about keywords and miss methods that could open up new avenues of content discovery.  If publishers take up Glassmeyer’s challenge and “up their game” in production the possibilities will continue to grow.

And until most traditional publishers – both mass market and legal – up their game when it comes to producing ebooks, this debate isn’t going to end any time soon.

The eBook challenge is about ownership, sharing and consumption. The container offers broad scholarship and research opportunities. From an information management perspective, understanding restrictions, limits and abilities is most definitely a service that information professionals can use to add value to their institution.

Constance Ard, January 30, 2012

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Slow and Steady: The Smart Approach to Legal KM

October 27, 2011

The House of Butter alerted me an interesting tidbit in “WK Buys Online Legal KM Outfit “Legal Intelligence”.  It was a little unclear from HOB’s writeup exactly which unit had made the acquisition so I went to the direct source of the PR release and filled in the blanks just a bit more.

Kluwer Netherlands, a unit of the global information service provider Wolters Kluwer, has taken over Legal Intelligence.

In my experience Wolters Kluwer has been careful with their acquisitions and methodical about the changes to service in acquired properties.  This new venture takes WK into a the arena with the vendors in a space that seems to have lacking some significant investment in one particular area: basic customer service.

Chances are that customers seeking a reliable system will benefit from WK’s investment.  Some infusion of cash to push innovation and a pretty solid customer service reputation bodes well.

Constance Ard October 26, 2011

 

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Emerging from the Masses: Create Value by Standing Out

October 25, 2011

Last week I had the pleasure of meeting a law librarian who moved to the area from Washington D.C.  She contacted me to get an idea of the law library landscape in Louisville Ky.  Well, I’ve been out of the law firm world for over three yeas now, so I made sure I invited someone along that was in the field.  It was a fun lunch.

And an informative one. The questions our new friend asked, allowed me to reflect a bit on some of the good things I did in the land of law firm libraries.  My boss at the time was fantastic and encouraging when it came to finding new ways to demonstrate the value of the library.

So, I gave credit where it was due, and talked about a few of the simple things I did during my career that I think went a long ways toward not only demonstrating the value of library services but in actually adding value.

  • Hand deliver projects
  • Create Cover Sheets to Identify Your Product
  • Collaborate with Marketing

Simple steps that seemed revolutionary.  These additions allowed my service to emerge from the hidden library office to the hallways and conference rooms and the change was noticeable.

So if you are struggling to show why you are valuable, maybe you can reflect and see if something as simple as delivering a project in person can make a difference and allow you to emerge from the masses and be seen as a valuable asset.

Constance Ard October 24, 2011

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Cost Effective Is Often NOT Time Efficient: The Open Law Movement in Brief Review

March 17, 2010

Once I have a bit of time, I’m going to dive a little bit deeper into the Open Access movement stuff that is going on in the legal research world.

Sarah Glassmeyer, has a helpful new post titled Open Law? that gives a great run down of some sources.  I’ve mentioned how I feel about the PACER Petition in previous posts.  In , I hold true to my belief that PACER is a cost-effective tool.

The stuff that I stumbled through on the PublicResource.org site tonight made my eyes light up.  Unfortunately I was not able to ignore the fact that this was definitely a resource that would have to be carefully reviewed to find just the right thing.  This site has great depth in resources but it will not be a time efficient research tool.

I think the Open Law movement will continue to grow and develop, but the access will definitely require even more meaningful access as noted by Richard Leiter.

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Aiming for the Gold: Legal Research Training

February 23, 2010

In late March, I will be presenting to the Fayette County Bar Association on the topic of Online Research Tools with an emphasis on free sources.  Yesterday, during a stimulating lunch conversation a fellow law firm librarian and I discussed the disparity between legal research in law school and law firms.

These two things have caused me to wonder if there is one way to influence the behavior of future attorneys and get researchers to  concentrate on cost-effective research?  Now my initial idea was to show the actual retail costs of a search to law students. The sticker shock in context of what they actually did should open eyes to possibilities.  Of course it could also scare them into a whole where they refused to reach beyond the easy, cheap results to find the unearthed gem even when it was essential to their work.

Now granted, I know next to nothing to how various law schools teach legal research.  The methods are probably as varied as the schools themselves.  What I do know, is that as a former firm librarian, bills that were beyond control in retail costs were shown to young associates and even partners, as warranted.  This simple demonstration of the cost of information was an effective means to getting attorneys signed up for sessions with our vendor training and our own planned training in the firm.  Or getting the attorney to call the library for their in-depth research because we could provide the results cost-effectively and allow them to spend their time analyzing the essential information.

Cost-effectiveness and time are two critical factors in online research for attorneys.  Hunting and pecking for that “free” resource is often not the best method for saving time and money on a project.  So the balance of the two is extremely important.

Firms that complement the in-depth resources offered by LexisNexis and Westlaw with the easy to use and sufficient resources on FastCase are providing a cost-effective tool.

Attorneys may complain about the need to be able to use all these different systems.  The reality is that most providers are taking their cue from Google and making search as easy as filling-in the box.

I personally have mixed feelings about that fill-in-the-box mentality.  If that’s all that we teach our attorneys and legal professionals to do, there’s a danger of mixed data and the reliance on a subset of results that could be lacking.  I’m not saying that the box isn’t great, it is.  What I’m saying is that we need to teach the reality of what it is that is being pulled out when the box is filled.

I’m looking forward to glimpsing WestlawNext in person, beyond this tutorial.  It sounds intriguing with the ease of use and the fill-in-box and the “work like you” concept that West is selling.

Jurisdiction and primary vs. secondary have always, and will, remain key factors in choosing the universe of legal materials that should be searched.   I just wonder how well those universes are defined to young attorneys.  Early in my career, I had an attorney who told me “No more or less than 20 results.”  He defined the universe narrowly, but he expected me to pull from the entire universe the best of what was available.

Aiming for the Gold

The box makes it easy to accept the first 20 as the best 20.  Or if you take the other approach: “I want to see everything that could possibly be relevant’ you have a wealth of organisms within the universe that must be analysed while keeping in mind the costs of the analysis.  To win the Gold in legal research, training should address both costs and time as well as the universe of sources that are and should be used.

Constance Ard February 23, 2010

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Nothing is Free – PACER Costs and Investments

February 17, 2010

I read a nice explanation of PACER costs from a different view-point, one could even say an insider’s view last night while watching the UK v. Mississippi game; and what a game.

One point that I really like from this article is:

“Only those who use PACER pay for it.”

Now that’s an idea…paying for service that is used. Of course the alternate argument is that libraries who provide access to PACER for their customers are paying for what the customers use.  True, but then libraries used to/perhaps still do a charge a going rate for copies.

To this point Mr. Tunheim, provides a high level break down of the percentage of paying customer who access PACER.  BTW, anyone can sign up for a PACER account.

“Nearly 40 percent of PACER’s revenues are generated by less than 1 percent of its active accounts, and the vast majority of the remaining PACER accounts incur less than $500 in fees per year.”

And the funds collected for PACER documents, feed right back into the system to help enhance it – something long overdue for certain.

So I’m still not on board with the PACER should be completely free bandwagon that I discussed last year in my Poking the PACER Petition Part I and Part II posts.

Constance Ard Feb. 17, 2010 Read the rest of this entry »

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Research Gaps: Competitive Intelligence Tools not in the Blogosphere

October 15, 2009

I’ve been busy reading and writing lately, though not in this space.  The latest topic of my efforts is Competitive Intelligence, specifically in the law firm environment.

Color me surprised to see no relevant top hits when I searched Google Blogs for LexisNexis atVantage.  A search for Thomson Reuters Monitor Suite resulted in the first hit on the first page as relevant.  And a search for the newly released Bloomberg Law had a mixture of relevant results.

A specific search on the law Firm Competitive Intelligence Blog for each of these products resulted in a consistent zero.  Now I’m not sure, perhaps the philosophy behind this particular blog is that they don’t comment on the commercial offerings that are available to help automate the CI process.  If that’s the case, good for them.  If not, then a serious gap is present.

I neither use these tools nor care that the gap exists, I was just surprised by the gap itself.

Constance Ard October 15, 2009.

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Martindale Hubbell Listings An Endangered Species?

September 19, 2009

I follow law-lib, a long time listserv resource for those interested in Law Librarianship.  For the past several years a hot topic for discussion has been the renewals of Martdinale Hubbell Listings for Law Firms.

This week a summary of the latest summary was posted. I find it significant that even within this small set of responses more firms have decided to cancel or are negotiating for more benefits when renewing their listing.

Of the 34 librarians who responded for their firms, 15 have cancelled their listings, five are in the process of deciding whether or not to list, and 14 have retained their listings.

In the golden age of distinguished law firms, Martindale Hubbell listings were a given, the ratings were a powerful marketing tool and the directory was a great tool for finding local counsel.   Now the ratings don’t matter so much and there are many ways to find local counsel.  The given isn’t a given any longer and the cost-benefit analysis is proving that the cost just isn’t worth the investment for more firms each year.

This is not a new occurence but as more firms are giving up their listings, it makes it easier for those firms who benchmark against certain firms to justify the cancellation internally.

Law DigestLaw firms are slow to change business practices and sometimes publishers are slower to see the writing on the wall.  This writing is getting darker each year and alternatives outside of price negotiation might be considered.  Before I left the law firm world, the most useful part of the Martdinale Hubbell directories were the Law Digest.

It was surprising that the print was replaced with a stand-alone CD.  It seemed like we had gone back in legal research methods about 10 years.  Sure its available through LexisNexis but nothing is as handy as pulling the volume and checking the facts.

I don’t know if attorneys haven’t gotten more comfortable with the CD format but I thought that was a less than long-sighted solution.  In my opinion, libraries would purchase the Law Digest in print without the directories.  I hope that Lexis provides solutions that meet customer expectations and still makes them a modest profit.  I don’t think that profit center will be the Martindale-Hubbell lawyer listings but I think they could gain great traction from their Law Digest.

Constance Ard September 19, 2009

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Poking the Pacer Petition: Part II

September 9, 2009

Earlier this year I poked at the efforts in Academic libraries to petition for free PACER.  I think it is only fair to update my readers on the developments and analysis that Erika Wayne has done since that last post.

The report, based upon a survey conducted by Ms. Wayne, is available here.  I agree that the costs she reports seem high for information that should be “freely available.”  However, they are not excessive in my opinion.

I particularly was interested in this quote from the report release:

In the survey that we conducted just last year regarding Westlaw and Lexis preferences among law librarians, when respondents were asked which other online databases that they would like to have taught in law school, eighty percent of the law firm librarians wanted training provided on PACER.

I think that is a significant statement.  As a former law firm librarian, I often wanted my incoming associates to know better research methods and not be so dependent upon Westlaw and Lexis.  Teaching PACER in law school would be a great advantage.  Then again, so would teaching about CCH Wolters Kluwer and BNA based electronic libraries, and I’m not sure how many law schools have taken up that charge.

What I have difficulty understanding is a statement further down in the report release:

If we allowed all of our students full access, our spending could easily surpass our Westlaw and Lexis costs.

Would full access to PACER really surpass Westlaw and Lexis costs?  Is that because PACER would be a non-discounted cost?  It is my understanding that Westlaw and Lexis offer deep discounts to law schools. Are the discounts truly so deep that a capped usage of $2.40 on the majority of PACER documents would exceed these mega source research tools?

It makes me wonder, exactly what part of PACER is being used by academics.  In law firms, the filings and the opinions (which are free) are the heavily used portions of the resource.  Rarely are the transcripts (which are not capped) used.

So, it comes down to the need for cost-effective research training.  I wholeheartedly embrace the need for law schools to offer access to PACER.  I still stand by the fact that the 2008 average costs (as provided by Ms. Wayne) of $656.74 is not outrageous for law schools.  If PACER is being used more than the law school libraries feel is affordable, then perhaps, they are finally getting the message that law firm librarians have been preaching for years:  cost-effective research must begin in law school training.

I do appreciate the analysis provided by Ms. Wayne and I hope that improvements to the access and cost of PACER move forward in a positive manner but $2.40 or less for the majority of documents in the PACER database is not an excessive cost for the amount of information obtained.  Perhaps that is my bias because compared to commercial options, that is a true bargain for a wealth of information.

Constance Ard September 9, 2009

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Feeding the Hungry by Sacrificing the Sacred Cows of Legal Research

September 6, 2009

Thanks to the Law Librarian post that alerted me to the American Lawyer survey article that discusses in depth the effects of heavy budget cuts in law firm libraries.

  • 46% of  survey respondents said they had undergone budget cuts.
  • 57% have had staff/payroll reductions

These numbers lead me to assume that resources are examined first.  Cost recovery, judicious usage and possible other sources for the high priced information are being implemented and examined.

I wonder, is now the time for investment in cheaper alternatives, web resources, reliance on blogs and other web created content?  Will Fastcase and Loislaw experience an uptick in their big firm customer base because they provide affordable alternatives to case law and primary resources?

Will Westlaw and Lexis be relegated to the premium content that allows attorneys and librarians alike to efficiently search the TP-ALL and all of the news with one well constructed query?  How will the decisions be made and what exactly are large law firms willing to sacrifice.

These questions lead me to wonder, how will law librarians justify the retention of the sources they know are most critical to firm success?  Will training become even more important so that all attorneys search efficiently?  Are the days of allowing non-expert researchers to have all access passes over?

What will be the methods used to contain costs?  Will it just be slashing of sacred cows or will it be creative solutions that law librarians have dreamed of for years.  Should fall associates and summer associates truly be given free reign to search everything they want?

And how will the information providers respond?  More training, will they answer the call to “exclude” access to databases?  This has been a wish list item for many firm librarians for years and the answer alternates depending upon the year/time/customer. (Check the law-lib archives for discussions on this topic.)

It’s time for collaboration, creativity and reality checks.  In fact it may be past time for these items based upon the numbers quoted above.  We all now that at some point, depending upon environmental influences, nothing is sacred.  Law librarians are a loyal bunch but when survival is at stake the cows best realize that they can be sacrificed to feed the hungry.

Constance Ard September 6, 2009

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