application of internet computer in legal research

8/8/2019 Application of Internet Computer in Legal Research

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Dr. Tabrez Ahmad

Associate Professor of Lawwww.site.technolexindia.com

[email protected]

technolexindia.blogspot.com


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Sunday, December 19, 2010

2www.site.technolexindia.com,http://technolexindia.blopot.com


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Agenda

Sunday, December 19, 2010 3

1. Identify Web sources of value for conducting

legal research ( Open Source)2. Identify subscription databases for

conducting legal research

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Digital Revolution Internet Infra in INDIA

4

4.8 Mil. HighSpeed Internet

65 Mil.Internet Users

248 Mil.Mobile Phones

8 Mil. Mobile Phones beingadded per month

Internet

BSNL

Bharti

TATACommunicatio

ns

Reliance

ERNET

MailServers

1Mil. Domains(0.5 Mil. .in)

DNS

130+IDCs

134 Major

ISPs

134 Major

ISPs

VOIP,

IPTV

NIC

INDIA Internet

Infrastructure:2008.5

G

ovt.

Academia

Enterpris

eHome

Tele Density 24 per 1000person

IT /

ITESBPO

Targetted Broadband connection = 10

Mil. (2010)4


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The Research Process

y Develop a research strategy

y Identify appropriate information sources

y Keep organized records

y Critically evaluate resources

y Analyze legal issues

y

Put it all together

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Select a Legal Topic

y Select an area of the law: define the problem oridentify the legal issue

y Determine jurisdiction,



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Primary Authority =

The Law Itself

y Statutes(Legislation)

y Case Law(court decisions)y Constitutions

y Administrative regulations and decisions

y Rules of procedure and ethics



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Secondary sources =

Everything else/Not the lawy Database articles (scholarly & popular)

y Nonfiction books (Print or electronic)

y Blogsy Treatises

y Encyclopedia articles

y Law Review Articles



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Where to

Start

y Secondary authorities help explain and

interpret primary sources of the law

y Secondary authorities provide the foundationfor finding, analyzing, and applying the law

y Secondary authorities point you to significant

sources of primary authority



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Legal Research on the Web

GOOD FOR:

y Current and recent documents

y Significant or recent cases; SC cases

y Central & state codes, statutes and regulations

y Government publications

y Foreign and international materials



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Legal Research on the WebNOTGOOD FOR:

y Older cases; historical materials

y Full-text journal articles

yTreatises

y Complete overview of the law

y In-depth, thorough legal research

y Most of the Indian Law Journals are not in e-forms

y Most of the Law Books by Indian authors are notavailable in e-form



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What to do if you are unfamiliar

with the Internet

y In short, what do you do if you know little or nothing

about the Internet and computers? The prominenteducational philosopher,John Dewey, long agoestablished that the best way to learn anything was bydoing it

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Where to Start Your Internet

Research and Studyy Thankfully, there are numerous overviews and guides

available for inexperienced users of the Internet.

y The Internet Society's "Guide to InternetLaw," (www.isoc.org/internet/law) offers links to andbrief discussions of the more useful legal research sites

on the Internet.



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y The "Virtual Chase," a mega site sponsored by a major

law firm, is strong on research articles and Internetstrategies. It has an excellent section called "OtherLegal InformationGuides"(www.virtualchase.com/resources/otherguides.shtml)that has numerous links to international legal

websites.y "Guide to European Legal

Databases." (www.llrx.com/features/europenew.htm)Authored by Mirela Roznovschi, Reference Librarianof theNew York University School of Law Library. Itincludes search engines for international and foreignlaw; search tips; indices; guides; journals; dictionaries;European legal databases; constitutions; andtransnational/international organizations.



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y "University of Minnesota Human RightsLibrary"(www.umn.edu/humanrts). More than a research

guide, this is a collection of over 6,500 human rightsdocuments and materials including bibliographies andguides; refugee and asylum resources; human rights searchengines; treaties and international instruments; with over

2,500 links to other sites.y "Law on the

Web" (http://lawlib.slu.edu/library/LawOnTheWeb.html).Compiled by James Milles, the Law Librarian at St. LouisUniversity, this is a well-organized list of legal resources on

the Internet including general guides; selected subject-areaguides (including Comparative and International Law);search engines; statutes and cases. Milles uses a star systemto recommend sites.



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y "Guide to LawOnline" (http://lcweb2.loc.gov/glin/worldlaw.html) prepar

ed by the U.S. Law Library ofCongress is an annotatedhypertext guide to sources of information worldwide ongovernment and law. Strong U.S. and international linksincluding area guides, international organization links(UN, OAS, and so on), worldwide reports on human rights,

international and comparative law reviews, political systemand economic guides for many of the world's nations.

y "InSite" (http://128.253.118.14:8080/insite/insitetp.html) The law librarians at Cornell University evaluate usefulwebsites, select the most valuable ones, and provide

commentary and subject access to them. "InSite" highlightsselected law-related websites in two ways: first, as anannotated publication issued electronically and in print;and second, as a keyword-searchable database.



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Comprehensive or "Mega" Legal

Websites

Comprehensive or "mega" sites are those that include a wide array ofservices, functions, resources, and subject areas. Because of theirextensive nature, each of the following websites provides anexcellent starting point for legal study and research:

y

"Findlaw" (www.findlaw.com) has often been billed as the best site tofind other legal resources. It is designed in easy-to-view sections forlegal professionals, students, businessmen, and the public. Itsfeatures include: current news, community boards (on legal issuessuch as immigration and cyberspace law), newsletters, a lawyerfinder function, and the noted search engine, "LawCrawler." This

search engine includes an international option for searchingindividual country domains. Some 38 legal subjects are indexed at"Findlaw" including Communications Law, Cyberspace Law, DisputeResolution and Arbitration, Family Law, Intellectual Property,International Law, International Trade, Law and Economics.



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"Global Legal InformationNetwork" (Library of Congress)

(http://lcweb2.loc.gov/law/GLINv1/GLIN.html).

y TheGlobal Legal InformationNetwork (GLIN) maintainsand provides a database of laws, regulations, and othercomplementary legal sources. The site can be viewed in

English,C

hinese, French, Korean, Portuguese, andSpanish. The documents included in the database arecontributed by the governments of the member nationsfrom the original official texts that are deposited, byagreement of the members, at the Library ofCongress ofthe United States. This database contains: (1) full texts of

the documents in the official language of the country oforigin, (2) summaries or abstracts in English, and (3)thesauri in English and in as many official languages as arerepresented in the database. Information can be searchedin English.



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"Hieros

Gamos

"(www.hg.org)

y touts itself as the "#1 Global Law Site With 2+ MillionLinks." Global it is: it can be read in most of the world'smajor languages, and has extensive international links and

information. HG

's content--divided into business,consumers, attorneys, and students--is somewhat similarto "Findlaw." Its object was to be the comprehensivestarting-point for all law and law-related information. Ithas a search engine to search 11,000 law and governmentsites. HG, incidentally, is Greek for the harmonization of

seeming opposites (such as earth and sky) and in this case,electronic and written information. Recently, its contentand layout has become so large and extended beyond thelaw, that the site has begun to lose focus of its originalpurpose.



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"Jurist" (www.jurist.law.pitt.edu)

y it has parallel sites in Australia, Canada, the UnitedKingdom, the EU, and Portugal, so it is a superb global

source.

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"LawGuru" (www.lawguru.com)

y is a cornucopia of legal materials including a "QA"section with frequently asked questions (FAQs) and

their answers; a database of thousands of free formswith a search engine for forms; law news; chat rooms;discussion lists; and more. Its key feature is its legalresearch section that allows you to do extensive legalresearch with access to over 500 legal search engines,tools, and databases. For a listing of its resources bytopic, use the pull-down menu on the "Legal Resource"page.



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Legal Information Institute (LII)"

Cornell (www.law.cornell.edu

)y This site is one of the oldest and still one of the best legal

information sources on the Internet. It is maintained byCornell University. The site offers an encyclopedia called

"Law About" where you can initiate your topical research.There are also vast amounts of materials (core materials formajor law school courses; the UCC; Introduction to LegalCitation, and so forth that can be downloaded, some for afee. It has a very strong collection--under "Law from

Around theGlobe"--which breaks down internationalmaterials country-by-country for each continent. The"Spotlight" section on the home page features law events inthe news from around the world.



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"MegaLaw" (www.megalaw.com).

y This site is geared toward the practicing lawyer (withsections, for example, on "Expert Witnesses" "Process

Service", and finding court reporters). It also features"LawBot", a search engine. Unfortunately, its"International" section focuses mostly on countriesoutside Asia. From the Far East region, onlyChina and

Australia are listed)



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"Student Law Centre"

(www.studentlaw.com)y Sponsored by Britain's BPP Law School, this site is not

as vast as others in this section; yet, it presents good

information for students and from the Europeanperspective. Features include a search engine, manylinks, and a "Studentlaw Wire" with site newsdelivered free to your e-mail address.



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Virtualchase

(www.virtu

alchase.com).y Sponsored by a law firm and with over 500 pages of

information pertaining to Internet legal resources, this

site is especially good for research strategies. It isdesigned for lawyers and other experienced legalresearchers and has a good search engine andhundreds of links.



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"The World Wide Web Virtual

Library-Law"

at(http://www.law.indiana.edu/v-lib/)y is presented by the Indiana University School of Law

at Bloomington. You can search with its search engineor browse the library by subject matter (all of the usualacademic subjects of law) or by information source(such as law firms, law journals, or the U.S.Government. As befits its name, it has an enormous

collection of links to other legal websites.



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WashLawWeb" (www.washlaw.edu)

y is maintained by the Washburn University School of LawLibrary. WashLaw's goal is "to provide users with links to allknown law-related materials on the Internet."(13) Informationon the home page is arranged alphabetically, by subject, and bygeographic location. WashLaw also hosts a large number oflaw-related Listserv discussion groups. Discussion groups areintended to provide scholarly forums for the exchange of ideas,opinions, and information relevant to law professionals. Whenyou join a discussion group, you receive e-mail from otherswho have already joined. Other highlights of WashLaw includeconnections to more than 50 legal directories(14) and, access toforeign, international and United Nation's materials.(15)Youcan even subscribe free to a list of new law-related websitesthat will be e-mailed to you.



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Yahoo!" (http://dir.yahoo.com/law/)

y "Yahoo!" is one of the Web's favorite portals and amajor directory. Its law section is simple and easy to

use. It starts with a search engine and then a vast arrayof subject categories including many unusual oneslike: Booksellers, Attorneys, Self-help, and IndigenousPeoples. It also contains an annotated list of helpfullegal links. This directory section is not as large asmany other comprehensive sites but it serves as anexcellent starting-point for legal research.



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Two Favorite Websites: "Jurist" and

Cybertimes (New YorkTimes)y A. "Jurist"y Both of the websites in this section are ones that I have found

particularly useful and well suited for legal research and study. If Ihad to pick just one out of all the websites available worldwide, it

would be "Jurist" (www.jurist.law.pitt.edu). "Jurist" rightly describes

itself as the "Internet's legal education portal," a "university-basedacademic gateway to authoritative legal information, instruction,and scholarship online."(16) It is hosted by the University ofPittsburgh School of Law under the guidance of Professor BernardHibbitts, and edited by a team of law professors from law schoolsacross the United States and around the world. It is especially

designed for individuals learning, teaching, or researching law --thatis, legal scholars, law students, law librarians, lawyers and judges,journalists, and interested citizens. It is advertisement-free, non-commercial, and provided to the public at no charge.

y "Jurist" is updated many times daily and is chock full of information.



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Cyber Times at The New York Times

Website.y TheNew York Times has long been a mainstay of the world press.Now, you can register and access the electronic version of The Timesat(www.nytimes.com). Registration is free, fast and easily done onthe site's homepage. Having registered, you can now read the online

version of this authoritative newspaper including a first-rate sectiondevoted to high technology--that is appropriately called "CyberTimes", (www.nytimes.com/pages-technology/index.html). OnMondays, Cyber Times is devoted to E-commerce and the NewEconomy; on Wednesdays, Education; on Thursdays, "State of the

Art"; and best of all, on Fridays, to Cyber Law. TheCyber Law

Journal reports on the legal issues raised by the Internet, includingcopyrights and trademarks, privacy, freedom of expression, andrestrictions on pornography and other content. Each electronicissue contains about twenty articles.



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BAILII

y British and Irish Legal Information InstituteAccess to Freely Available British and Irish Public Legal

Information.Where you can find British and Irish case law &legislation, European Union case law, Law Commissionreports, and other law-related British and Irish material.



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SSRNy Social Science ResearchNetwork



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The "Searching the Net" section, for example,

gives you links to 33 different search engines

including "Yahoo!" and "Google."

y Some links listed on "Navigator" there that areparticularly helpful in legal study and research include

the following:y "Oyez, Oyez, Oyez" (oyez.at.nwu.edu), a multimedia

site with digital tapes of U.S. Supreme Court oralarguments and case digests.

y "Thomas" (thomas.loc.gov), a site (named for PresidentThomas Jefferson) operated by the U.S. government,this is a one-stop site for federal legislation andinformation.



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y "National Law Journal" (www.ljx.com) by the same

publishers of the popular print journal, with legalnews and policy discussions.

y "Cyberspace Law Institute" (www.cli.org) a think tankwithout walls that has many good policy papers on

cyberlaw topics.y "Harvard Journal of Law and

Technology" (jolt.law.harvard.edu) a cutting-edgelegal periodical.

y "Lawyers.com" (www.lawyers.com) a free, onlineconsumer version of the Martindale-Hubbell LawDictionary. Tells you how and where to find lawyers,includes message boards.



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Search Engines and Directories

y "All-inOne Search Page" (www.allonesearch.com) is notso much a single search engine as a site with over 500 ofthe Internet's best search engines, databases, anddirectories

y "AltaVista" (altavista.digital.com)

y "Excite" (www.excite.com)

y "HotBot" (www.hotbot.com)

y "Lycos" (www.lycos.com)



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y Metacrawler" (www.metacrawler.com) uses manydifferent search engines.

y "Northern Light" (www.nlsearch.com)y "WebCrawler" (www.webcrawler.com)

y "Yahoo!" (www.yahoo.com)Although "Yahoo!" is listedgenerically here as a "search engine", it is moreaccurately described as a "directory." A "directory"differs from a search engine in that it is manuallycreated. Live human being submit their websites to

Yahoo for listing, and if Yahoo accepts them, they are

assigned to an appropriate category or categories by aneditor (who is alive as an editor can be).



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y

Here are some "legal specific" search engines:y "CataLaw" (www.catalaw.com) a catalog of catalogs of

worldwide law on the Internet

y "Derecho" (http://derecho.org) a Spanish-language

law search enginey "FindLaw

LawCrawler" (http://lawcrawler.lp.findlaw.com)

y "LawGuru" (www.lawguru.com/search/lawsearch.html

)



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y "Meta-Index for U.S. LegalResearch" (http://gsulaw.gsu.edu/metaindex)

y "LawSearch" (www.2mediate.com/search/lawsearc.html) alegal search engine sponsored by the FloridaMediationGroup.

y "TheLawEngine!" (www.thelawengine.com) alsodesigned as a comprehensive law site

y "Zimmerman's ResearchGuide" (www.llrx.com) an

online encyclopedia for legal research.



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Technolexindia

yTechnolexIndia (www.site.technolexindia.com) is the content

aggregator dedicated to law exclusively tothe IP Law and Cyberlaw. It is committed tothe cause of creating and promoting massawareness about the need to have detailed

national & international legal framework ofcyberspace and IPR.



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y http://technolexindia.blogspot.com

y http://Iplexindia.blogspot.com

y http://conferencelex.blogspot.com



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y Search engines have different strengths and weaknesses,and even the more efficient ones never search the entire

Web. Indeed, it has been estimated that all search enginesindex only roughly 47% of all sites on the World Wide Web,with the largest single search engine only indexing about16% of the WWW's content.(18)A reasonably prudent

researcher should, therefore, use several search engines forthe same query. Because the competition among searchengines is fierce, each is constantly adding new features."Check back on search sites to see what is new," advises oneauthority, to see "if the new features will help you on your

search."(19) To keep tabs on search engines, and for usefultips on how to conduct a search, look at"Searchenginewatch"(www.searchenginewatch.com).(20)



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Subscription-based databases

GREAT FOR:

y Locating full-text articles, law reviews, some treatises

y Locating retrospective and current articles and casesy Florida case law not in West Law/Lexis-Nexis



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Secondary Sourcesy Treatises

y Law reviews and articles

y Encyclopedias and dictionaries



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Locating treatisesyAleph, online catalog

y NetLibrary

yWorldCaty Index Master

All are subscription databases.



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Locating law reviewsy LexisNexis Academic

y Index to Legal Periodicals (ILP), 1980-

y ILP Retrospective, -1980

yLegalTrac

y Hein Online

yJSTOR; Project Muse

y E-journals page

All of these are subscription databasesSunday, December 19, 2010 46



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Locating law reviewsy Emorys list of legal journals

y Findlaws list

y Google Scholary Law Library ofCongress

y University Law Review Project

All of these are free Internet sitesSunday, December 19, 2010 47



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Encyclopedias and Dictionaries

y Pathfinders/ResearchGuides

y LLRX(Law Library Resource Exchange)

y LexNotes.com Pathfinders

y Online encyclopediasy Zimmermans Online Encyclopedia

y Cornell LIIsWex

y Online dictionaries

y Law.com dictionary

y Lectric Law Lexicon



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Case Lawy Court Web sites

y Florida Supreme Court

y Portal Web sites

y Florida State Courtsy Findlaw.com

y National Law Journal

y Subscription databases

y Lexis-Nexis Academic

y Hein Online



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Case law Portal sites

y Findlaw: Cases and Codes

y LexisOne.comy Cornell LII

yAmerican Law Sources Online (ALSO)

y N

ational Law Journaly Federal Court Locator

y Florida State Courts

Text of Opinions



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Case law USSupreme Court

OpinionsFREE

y SupremeCourt 1991 to present

y Findlaw 1893 to present

y Lexisone.com 1790 to presentSUBSCRIPTION DATABASES

y Hein Online 1754 to present

y BNA U.S. Law Week, 1997 to presenty LexisNexis Academic



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Case law USSupreme Courty Oral Arguments

y Supreme Court site (transcript)

y Oyez Project (audio)

y Records and Briefs

y Findlaw 1999 to present



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Case law Federal courts

y PACER(Public Access to Court ElectronicRecords)www.pacer.psc.uscourts.gov

y Electronic public access to service that allowsusers to obtain:

y Case information

y Docket information

y Documents

y From Federal Courts

y Courts of Appeal

y District & Bankruptcy courts



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Case law Federal courts

y Searching PACERy U.S. Party/Case Index

y PACER District Look-Up

y Subscription database:

y agencies or individuals must register

yVery inexpensive

y $.08/page (applies to number of pages that results inany search), OR

y $.60/minute charge

y $2.40 maximum per document



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Case law Federal courtsy

Other sites for federal cases:y www.uscourts.govfree Internet

y LexisNexis Academic subscription



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Case law Floriday

Free, Internety Florida Law Online portal site

y ALSO: Florida (portal site)

y Florida Supreme Court 1999+

y

Fla. SC

Records and BriefsApr 1998+y FSU Briefs and opinions Nov 1989+

y WFSU Oral Arguments Online 1997+

y Opinions from other Florida courts

y Subscriptiony Florida Law Weekly1995+

y LexisNexis Academic State search



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Court Rulesy LLRXs Court Rules

y U.S. Supreme Court, Cornell LII

y

Federal Judiciary



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Constitutionsy U.S. Constitution (GPO Access)

y U.S. Constitution (Library ofCongress)

y Florida Constitution



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Statutes - Federaly Portal sites

y Law Library ofCongress

y Federal

y GPOAccess, Cornell LII, US House ofRepresentatives site, Thomas


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Statutes - Statesy Florida

y Online Sunshine constitution, statutes

y Department of State public laws

y Digest ofGeneral Laws only electronicy Law Library ofCongress portal site

y Other States

y Findlaw, Cornell LII, Law Library ofCongress

y Municipal Codes -- municode.com



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How the Internet helps in legal research & teaching-

Always keeps you in touch with students- A model

for teaching IP Law

y GoogleGroup- ipr.kls

y Ibibo MessageGroup-Technolex

y Free Blogger Blog- IPLexy See syllabus of different universities in India and the

world

y Syllabus uploaded on group- IPLex

y Research on Manupatra, WestLaw and Lexis Nexis

y Relevant cases and articles uploaded on group ipr.klsbefore every lecture-



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y PPT slides are uploaded on internet authorstream.com

and shared on the groupy Sharing of question and answer on the group-ipr.kls

y Recent developments written on blog IPLex and linkedto the group

y Feed back on class test, examinations, andpresentation shared on the group-ipr.kls

y Students are asked to follow good blogs,

For eg. Michael Geist Blog, Ipkat, IPLex, SpicyIP,IPCanvas, WIPO website.





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Conclusion.

y The advent of the Internet has begun to transformcommerce and academia alike. Legal research on theInternet presents a low-cost, efficient supplement to

traditional means of scholarship, and in Asia, as inother developing areas, is particularly useful sincethere are no great libraries. It is hoped that thispresentation will give the participating law teachers

some ideas on the possibilities of integrating this newtechnology into their legal research and teaching.





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