INTERNET LEGAL RESEARCH WEEKLY
December 8, 2002
Tom MighellWelcome to Issue #91 of the Internet Legal Research Weekly, a newsletter that delivers relevant and timely legal research information, and other fun stuff, to your inbox every Sunday. If you like what you read, please forward this newsletter to anyone you think might be interested, and encourage him or her to do the same! To subscribe, all you have to do is visit Inter Alia and filling out the subscription form -- it's free!
If you didn't visit Inter Alia this week, you missed out on NINE stories (that's 9, people) you aren't reading in this issue. That's nine potentially very helpful research and computer tips (or fun stuff) for you to use! What are you waiting for?
I always find the month of December to be incredibly busy, what with the holidays and all. For the rest of the year, I'll be sending you ILRW-Lite, with a ton of information and only half the calories...
And away we go…..
News Update
Have your flight status delivered to you
Check out the New York Times' review of flight status notification systems. Just go to the airline website, find your flight, and you can get a voice or textmessage sent to you just prior to the flight, letting you know the arrival/departure gate as well as its status. I have used the American Airlinesservice on several occasions, and it's pretty nifty.Better IP practice through extranets
Law.com discusses how intellectual property lawyers successfully manage the patent prosecution process through the use of extranets.Better than sitting on his lap
I'm talking about Santa Claus, of course. Now that the holiday season has begun in earnest, attention turns to new ways to get that wish list to the man with the bag. Wired reports on services that allow children to e-mail Santa -- some of these sites receive up to 500,000 e-mails a day. I wonder if anyone has tried to spam Santa.Who Owns the Alphabet?
This interesting page features a listing of the websites that rank #1 when you go to Google and type in a particular letter of the alphabet. For example, type in "I" and you'll get Disney Online, while "Q" brings up Q4Music, an online music magazine.Opinion on Posting of Model Codes
In the October 20 issue of the Newsletter, I mentioned a site that dealt with model codes, including building, electrical, fire, and other codes -- I also mentioned that a lot of these codes are not online, due to publishing restrictions. Well, it seems somebody wasn't happy with that particular publishing monopoly, and decided to post a certain model building code online verbatim. The Fifth Circuit recently held that such a posting does not violate copyright laws because "the law...is in the public domain and thus not amenable to copyright." It seems the Supreme Court has asked for briefing on the case. LawMeme has a nice summary of the issue.The electronic tide keeps a'comin
The online activity of the federal courts is huge compared to that of state courts, and the Southern District of New York has taken the next big step: the court will begin electronic case filing in February, 2003. Lawyers will be able to file documents electronically 24 hours a day, or file their pleadings on a CD-ROM or floppy.Those *other* research services, Westlaw and Lexis
Let's face it -- although you can find a wealth of free legal research resources on the Internet, for completeness and currency nothing beats Westlaw and Lexis. SearchDay recognizes this reality, and shows you ways (to paraphrase the title) to conduct champagne research on a ginger ale budget.Two new blawgs hit the blogosphere
Two new law blogs came to my attention this week -- first is LawSites, presenting "new and intriguing websites for the legal profession." The site is hosted by Bob Ambrogi, who has long been prominent in Internet legal research circles, but is new to the blogging community. He's the author of The Essential Guide to the Best (and Worst) Legal Sites on the Web, a book that is, well, essential. Check the blog (and the book) out. Also new to the scene is kfsource.com, hosted by Boston law librarian David Goldman. The blog "focuses primarily on law, research and technology," and "also reports on search engine news, online free speech issues, decisions of note, as well as conducting interviews with notable personalities." Worth a look!
Help Desk
This week I received an e-mail from M.T., who asked me to "please give a step-by-step guide on how you download songs and burn a CD...And what exactly is an MP3, or, at least, what does MP3 stand for?" For the next two weeks, I'll discuss (very briefly)the basics of downloading music and recording your own CDs.
I used to be a Napster-aholic; whenever I heard a song I liked, I ran to Napster and downloaded it for free. Those heady days of non-stop music downloads are over for me, and many of the services have gone out of business due to pressure or lawsuits by the recording industry. But several services, like Kazaa and Morpheus, are still available for your music file sharing needs. To use one of these services, you'll have to download a program to your computer that helps you connect with others on the Internet who are also sharing files. There are many other services online that allow you to download music -- you'll have to pay a fee for the songs, however. If you just want to put together a compilation of your favorite songs that you already have on CD, you can use those too, without having to worry about downloading the music from the Internet.
After you have found a place to download your tunes, you need to learn the difference between the major music file formats. Essentially, there are two: WAV and MP3. A .wav file is a sound format developed by Microsoft and used extensively in Windows -- most of the sounds your computer makes are .wav files playing. Because of the way the .wav files are composed, they are generally very large.
MP3 files, on the other hand, are much smaller. MP3, which stands for mpeg-1 audio layer 3 (clears that right up,doesn't it?), is a music file that has been compressed by a factor of about 12, without losing sound quality. To appreciate the difference, an average-length song would take up about 60 megabytes in a .wav file, but only 6 megabytes in an .mp3 file. This distinction does not make much difference when you're burning a CD, except when you want to achieve CD-quality sound; a .wav file just can't get the same level of quality available to an .mp3 file. The size difference mostly comes into play if you have one of the new MP3 players, like the iPod. They are essentially small computers, and a computer can hold a lot more .mp3 files than .wav files.
Next week, we'll talk about the tools of the trade -- blank CDs, a CD burner, and CD burning software.
Do you have a question about searching the Internet or your computer in general? Drop me an e-mail at tom(at)inter-alia(dot)net – I’ll post your question (don’t worry, I won’t use your real name) and try to get an answer for you!
Legally Relevant – Sites on the Internet
National Council Against Health Fraud
The NCAHF is a non-profit organization focusing on health misinformation, fraud, and quackery as public health concerns. The page itself is nothing special -- just a list of links in various categories. You can learn more about the organization itself, read publications like the Consumer Health Digest, and review positions papers, policy and consumer information statements, and links to other sites on health care fraud.Planenews
This site could be extremely useful, but it either hasn't been active for long or doesn't get much traffic. The main page lists daily news headlines from the aviation world, and it's updated frequently. There's also an area where you can download aviation information, including aircraft plans, pictures, databases and other related information -- the only problem is it doesn't have many documents available for download. There's a forum to post messages, but you have to register (it's free) to comment.SearchMil
This is a search engine that doesn't get much press, but it's a good resource if you're looking for military information. SearchMil searches and indexes over one million military pages, and it's nice to have a website with such a limited scope. I wonder, though, how often the database at this site is refreshed; the press release announcing the passing of the one million page mark is dated February 2000 -- is it still being updated?United States Game Law
This site is another of those quirky pages devoted to a limited area of law -- in this case, fish and game law. Actually, that's a bit misleading; this site is basically a listing of the Fish and Game Departments for all fifty states. So if you happen to need information on wildlife laws in another state, this might be a good page to keep handy.Workplace Substance Abuse
SAID stands for Substance Abuse Information Database, and it's chock full of great information. You can search the database in three ways -- by keyword, browseable directory, or a listing of state and territory laws relating to drug-free workplace legislation. You may scan the database by title, topic, author, language, and format. Topics include drug and alcohol testing, educating employees, parents in the workplace, surveys and studies, tobacco, training supervisors, and more. There's also a nice glossary of substance abuse terms. This is a terrific site!
Finally, some fun sites to explore:
Who has time to do this? The Human Clock is pretty cool -- just select your time zone and get a photo of a random person holding a piece of paper with the current time. A minute passes, and you get a picture of a different person. Apparently, people all over the world are submitting photos for this project. Again -- who has time to do this?
Remember Pong? If the game is too easy for you, check out Radial Pong --you'll have to move over the whole screen to get the ball!
Well, that’s it for Issue #91 – I hope you liked it! If you did, pass this along to anyone you think might be interested, and encourage him or her to subscribe. Also, feel free to drop me an e-mail any time if you have questions, or if you have websites or other topics you want included in a future issue.
Tom Mighell
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