INTERNET LEGAL RESEARCH WEEKLY
April 27, 2003
Tom Mighell

Welcome to Issue #109 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 fill out the subscription form -- it's free!

And away we go…..

News Update

Build a better password
ZDNet offers tips on how to pick a better password.

Speaking of RSS...
RSS stands for Really Simple Syndication, or Rich Site Summary, and it's a way that websites push information to you -- it's a terrific way of surfing through a lot of websites quickly. If this whole RSS thing confuses you (because it still confuses me sometimes), check out this Explanation of RSS, How You Can Use It, and Finding RSS Feeds. Very useful and (mostly) non-technical.

A new design for Social Security
Beginning this week, the Social Security Administration has a new look and a new address, www.socialsecurity.gov. There's also a page that tells more about the site's additions and improvements.

Makeover for another search engine
Ask Jeeves introduced several new features this week, and Chris Sherman advises us to take a look.

UseNet searches delivered to your inbox
For those of you who don't know, Usenet is a world-wide distributed discussion system on virtually any topic imaginable. Google Groups has over 700 million messages from the UseNet archives, and hundreds more are added daily. NetNews Tracker searches Usenet newsgroups twice each day for any phrases that you choose, then delivers any new hits to you via e-mail. This is a terrific way to monitor UseNet postings, which are a valuable but often untapped research source.

Keeping information AWAY from the public
The state of Ohio is trying to limit the availability of free online information. A proposed bill would prohibit state agencies from placing information online, if that information is also available from two or more vendors also providing those services. So if WestLaw and Lexis provide certain Ohio government information, researchers will have to utilize those pay services to get access to the data. If passed, this law will clearly have effects outside Ohio's borders. Scary, huh?

Blawgs of the Week(s)
Here are some of the law-related weblogs I have come across in the past two weeks:

Taxing Thoughts, a blog with "thoughts by a tax lawyer on the law, technology, politics, economics, and taxes," has been around awhile, but I'm just getting around to seeing it. Life, Law, and Libido comes from a D.C. law student. The Noel Humphreys IP Blog is "dedicated to commentary on copyrights, trademarks, trade secrets and patents, and legal issues centered on software, knowledge management, outsourcing, virtual organizations, ASP's and contracts." Whew. LegalGuy is actually three guys with (mostly) legal thoughts.

Constructive Notice is a group blog for members of the Yale Law School Republicans. FlaLaw is the first weblog devoted to Florida law students and legal issues. Martina Anders' Radio Weblog comes from the Library Electronic Services Administrator at Thompson, Hine. And MixTape Marathon is from law student Bekah.

A Taxing Blog, offered by a current research fellow and lecturer at Columbia Law School and two tax professors at Santa Clara University School of Law, is a law related weblog for "tax profs, policy wonks, and other shameless tax nerds." The University of Baltimore Law School has a weblog, providing news and links of interest to that law school's community. Finally, Rita Vine, a professional librarian and web search trainer, offers SiteLines, to help web searchers stay up to date on key search tools and developments.

Finally, in an update from my article on Hawaiian legal research last month, here are some additional sites suggested by Hawaiian attorney (and new acquaintance) Nancy Grekin:

  • Hawaiian Business Registrations -- from this site you can check good standing, order a good standing certificate, check availability of names and learn the names of officers, directors, LLC Managers, addresses, etc., for registered entities. You can also obtain virtually all entity registration forms, and file them electronically.
  • The Real Property and Financial Services Section of the Hawaii State Bar Association -- the only section of the HSBA that is regularly updated and maintained.
  • The Hawaii Department of Taxation site is useful because you can download all Hawaii tax forms from this site.

qbSearch Brings it All Together

Every now and then I like to take a look at one of the many meta-search tools out on the Internet. As you know, a meta-search tool is not really a search "engine" like Google or AllTheWeb; rather, meta-search tools send your query to multiple search engines and display the results all at once. They are unquestionably convenient for those who visit several search engines with the same search terms. This week I want to examine qbSearch, a meta-search tool that won honorable mention in Search Engine Watch's Awards in 2000, and was a site to consider in 2002.

qbSearch is brought to you by the folks at QuickBrowse, a service that wants to make it easier for you to browse websites. The QuickBrowse technology allows you to select the web pages you visit each day and combine them onto a single page for convenient and time-saving reading. You can even have the pages e-mailed to you each morning. qbSearch incorporates the QuickBrowse technology into its site in a number of interesting ways.

Let's start with the meta-search tool itself. qbSearch allows you to query the following sites:

It is a little disconcerting that qbSearch hasn't updated its listing of search engines to either change the names of new search engines or remove search engines that no longer exist. It is also interesting that several of the sites queried by qbSearch are in themselves meta-search tools (HotBot, MetaCrawler, among others). Even more interesting is the absence of Google from this list; apparently Google has banned qbSearch from its servers, and qbSearch is not willing to pay the cost associated with obtaining access to Google's huge index. It may not need to; AOL Search and Yahoo! rely on Google's index, so qbSearch has a virtual back door into the web's best search engine.

When you prepare for your search, you may select one or all of the above search tools, then enter your query. You may also select the number of pages returned by each search engine, from 1 to 20. For my search, I tried "weapons of mass destruction." I had problems connecting to several of the sites; the service could not return results from Overture (I just got the search page), AltaVista, Yahoo, AllTheWeb (which was forbidden, probably similar to Google), and NorthernLight (which is no longer working). The rest of the sites returned two pages of results, all combined on the same page.

If you have Internet Explorer 5 or higher, you can take advantage of the QuickBrowse feature from the page of results. Just scroll down the page and drag all the links you're interested in viewing to the "Quickbrowse This" button which appears on your screen. When you're done, click on "View Collected Links," and QuickBrowse will display each of those sites in a single web page -- a good way of getting through your results quickly.

Other nifty features of qbSearch include access to My Quickbrowse, qbStocks, qbNewsstand, and qbPortals. Each of these allows you to select various web sites on selected subjects, then view the current home page for each site, all on one web page. You can also save your collection of pages, so you can easily retrieve them for daily viewing. My main complaint about these offerings is the staleness of some of the links; QuickBrowse needs to run through its index and clean up outdated and non-existent sites.

Have any of you used qbSearch? Drop me a line at tom(at)inter-alia(dot)net and share your experience!

Help Desk

I am often asked, "what's the difference between Microsoft Outlook and Outlook Express?" Good question. Outlook Express only handles e-mail and newsgroups -- it's free and usually comes included with Windows and Internet Explorer. Microsoft Outlook, on the other hand, is a full-fledged personal information manager that is part of Microsoft Office. In addition to e-mail, Outlook also handles your calendar, contacts, tasks, and memos.

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

AgricultureLaw.com
This site is brought to you by the Washington, D.C. law firm of McLeod, Watkinson, and Miller, and it's a great example of a firm showing off its knowledge in a particular area of law. The site is "dedicated to providing farmers and ranchers with the most complete source of timely information and ideas on agricultural policy," but legal researchers will find it useful as well. The left-hand menu provides access to agricultural statutes, regulations, legislation, an agricultural dictionary, and more. Agricultural headlines and news summaries are updated on a regular basis. Use the pull-down menus at the top of the page to locate even more information, including links to agricultural education, finance, publications, and other helpful sites.

California Bankruptcy Info
Got a question about California bankruptcy law? California Bankruptcy Info may be for you. This site is primarily designed for consumers and individuals faced with the bankruptcy process in California, but it does provide a useful overview of the filing process, including exemptions, court information, and alternatives to bankruptcy. One thing that bothers me about this site is the lack of ownership information -- the site's sponsors/owners never identify themselves.

ChoiceTrust($$)
ChoiceTrust offers background research services in a number of different areas. Check out disciplinary actions on doctors, dentists, and chiropractors, learn your homeowner or auto insurance score, conduct background and business checks, and more. Prices range from $9.95 to $30. I haven't tried the services (I'm a big fan of Accurint), but they look promising.

Environment News Service
The Environment News Service "exists to present late-breaking environmental news in a fair and balanced manner." That's pretty much what you get here -- current news headlines on environmental subjects, with links to American and World environmental news. You can also sign up for free e-mail or mobile text alerts.

Documentation of Internet Filtering Worldwide
More and more, national, state and local governments are seeking to restrict Internet access to those within its control. Here in the U.S., this is most apparent in public libraries, where the federal government wants to tie funding to those libraries to the use of Internet filters that ostensibly protect children from harmful information. Jonathan Zittrain and Benjamin Edelman at Harvard's Berkman Center for Internet and Society present this page documenting the types of filtering going on worldwide, the goal being to assemble a picture not of a single hypothetical World Wide Web comprising all pages currently served upon it, but rather a mosaic of webs as viewed from respective locations, each bearing its own limitations on access." The site is no more than a simple set of links, but it's updated regularly.

Finally, some fun and useful sites for you to explore this week:

Check out this ad for the new Honda Accord. (Note: You'll need Flash 6 to view
the video)

Woe is me...that's apparently the oldest phrase in English -- did you know that? Well, the folks at The Phrase Finder think so, anyway. Explore this site for the meaning of euphemisms, quotes, phrases, Shakespearean phrases, and more.

Try the Mondrian Machine, and you'll be painting like a neoplasticist in no time.

Want your morning to fly by faster? Use lunchclock.com, and extend your lunchtime by up to 30 minutes.

Well, that’s it for Issue #109 – 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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