Vincent G. Rinn Law Library

Local Access to Million Plus " Hathi Trust" Records -- How Useful To Us ?

CARLI is the  state-wide library consortium that  provides  maintenance and development of its integrated library management system, and the provision of meaningful electronic resources for 154  member libraries in Illinois. It recently announced the availability of  over a million bibliographic records for the massive holdings of digitized content, controlled by an organization called the Hathi Trust (Hathi (pronounced hah-tee) is the Hindi word for elephant, an animal noted for its memory, wisdom, and strength—that’s the origin of the elephant on their logo. )     [ Announced in  April 9, 2012 email ]

How did this  this interestingly named organization come about ? The Hathi Trust is basically a huge digital library whose initial content came form the mass Google digitization of the print collections of   thirteen universities of the Committee on Institutional Cooperation, the University of California system, and the University of Virginia. 

At present it has the membership of 60+  libraries and 3 consortia. More recently the Trust has also added  digitized  book and journal content from the Internet Archive, as well as other local content digitized by partner institutions. The Trust is also exploring the possibility of also providing digital audio and image files (such as maps).

The basic aims of this organization are to preserve this content in perpetuity, to index and provide meta-data for it's holdings and to provide for access to it's collections for it's partner libraries and beyond. The availability of the records through CARLI is one example. However, the level of access does vary for different users.

Users affiliated with HathiTrust partner institutions are able to download full-PDFs of all public domain works, and works made available  under Creative Commons licenses. These are the libraries formally affiliated  with the Hathi Trust. For users in libraries not so affiliated, the degree of access is rather limited. Most, if not all, the original Google scanned materials are controlled by a third party agreement.  Libraries' agreements with Google require  Hathi Trust to  take steps to prevent bulk download of materials they have digitized. 

So for DePaul users and many other non-partner libraries, the access and download option, is one page at a time. ( with the exception of materials that are not subject to the contract with Google or were provided under a Creative Commons Licence).  Since huge collections of federal government documents were part of the mass digitizations projects undertaken by GOOGLE, these public domain materials, also fall under these restrictions.

GOOGLE  claims that "Google’s mission is to organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful.". It seems more than a bit incongruous that it would enforce an agreement that makes scanned public domain materials, only available  in a manner that effectively limits useful access. Unlike commercialy published works with copyright claims by authors and publishers, federal government information is generally in the public domain and should be provided without the encumbrances placed on commercially published works.

The availability of theHathi Trust records through our own local library catalog, is a very useful tool for discoverying content that has been housed in some of our largest research libraries. But being able to conveniently read, copy and download public domain materials for research purposes, still eludes those users and  libraries that are not in the club.

Law Library Computer Techie Moving on to Internet Startup

The  Rinn law library is losing the services of the very able computer technical assistant and Depaul student, Neil Dahlke. But our loss will be a gain both for Neil and for the very recently launched internet startup called. MentorMob He will be joining a current staff of a dozen and will be working on the look and  feel and accessibility of the startup's website.

Founded in 2010, MentorMob was launched as a startup two months ago. Using the wikipedia social sourcing model, MentorMob seeks to organize and curate the great wealth of learning and how-to content available on the open internet.Some of the curation will be directed at breaking down instruction into a step-by-step sequence that can be tailored to users with different learning styles. Shane Greenstein, a professor at Northwestern’s Kellogg School of Management, finds that  MentorMob recognizes “different roles for the same contributor, in some contexts as a mentor and in another as learner."

"MentorMob’s learning modules are called Learning Playlists that users can view at their own pace without registering for an account. Any registered user can create new playlists or add to, comment on, or re-order the steps in existing Playlists. Presently, content in each Playlist comes from the web in the form of articles, videos, slides and other media forms. "These Playlists are created by you !

MentorMob has been Beta tested by faculty at Columbia College in Chicago for a course and student organizations. Beyond users on the internet the MentorMob developers hope that their platform can  provide "collaborative learning (for students) and creating lesson plans (for teachers)". They are also currently partnered with organizations, like Wilton Brands, a billion dollar arts & crafts company,  who use MentorMob’s platform to organize their training content (videos, text, etc). 

MentorMob has been working off of  bootstrap funding and is is seeking additional funding. The plan is to support the site with targeted advertising and in the future to get customers to use MentorMob for corporate training programs and universities. Getting there is going to require a lot of marketing at this stage. Neil our former techie will have his work cut out for him.

However, as, Vince Leung, MentorMob co-founder,  says "But if MentorMob can grab the attention of the curating masses and find loyal users like Wikipedia diehards, we think they have a very promising business model."

Best of luck to Neil and to MentorMob !

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Sources :

"We Want To Be The Pandora Of Learning"

Startup MentorMob Co-Founder Talks About Its Place in Education

Featured Startup Pitch: MentorMob—Crowdsourcing online education and learning through ‘Learning Playlists’

 

Post AALL Conference Interviews Speak to Value of Conferences & Law Librarians

  The American Association of Law Libraries (AALL) Annual Meeting and Conference was held July 23- 26, with Philadelphia. It is a sizable conference featuring Approximately 100 different educational sessions planned over the four-day period. Several of the librarians from our Rinn Law Library, including our director, attended.

In these times of dereriorating economic conditions and budgetary constraints on the parent bodies of law libraries, the question of "What are you bringing back?". What benefit is my employer getting out of my attendance at a conference?

A short article in a recent Law Library Journal, "Back and Forth...THe Role of Conferences", argues that it may be difficult to provide a neat ROI answer to this question. As the authors state, "...that the benefit is sometimes intangible and hard to quantify. It doesn’t line up in numbers on a spreadsheet."

To get a soft reading of what some particiapants at the 2011 AALL conference thought were valuable learning opportunities, Richard Leiter from the University of Nebraska College of Law, conducted short interviews, on the "Law Librarian Conversations" podcast program, with about twenty attendees, that included our Director,Allen Moye.

The questions posed were about top learning opportunities encountered at the conferece and more broadly, what were the main threats and opportunities that the respondent saw for law ibrarianship.

For most folks, the greatest value in attending was the networking that exposes particiapants to how other librarians in differnt places and setting are handling their jobs. What challenges that one library has, might be addressed by the experiences of another.

People mentioned the willingness to share & collaborate among different types of law libraries. They praised the honest "give & take" that can provide attendees with new insights to take back home and apply in thier own settings. The work of the faculty teaching rountable and helping law students and attorneys use new technology and the different approaches by states  to authenticate online legal documents, were cited as examples of such areas.

Perhaps of greater interest, were the responses to what were perceived as the threats and opportunites confronting the field of law librarianship. While clearly more intangible that the "nut & bolts" information mentioned above, these issues may be even more important in shaping  the vision of both law librarians and their employing organizations, as to what law librarianship may become.

Some of the respondents saw deficits in poor marketing of what librarians can do or that they were surrendering functions to other fields like Information Technology. Others perceived threats in some of the attitudes such as fear of or ignoring changes in the environment. Not recognizing changed user needs and not being flexible and adaptable enought to fulfill these. Complacency & not looking beyond traditional roles were identified as threats to missing out on new opportunities that are arising.

Several respondent made the point that in a period of rapid change, challenges and opportunities can be sides of the same coin. While older practices may be declining, new methods and areas of practice are emerging. Pushing out of the existing bounderies can provide the chance to provide value in areas that had not previously been considered. Re-inventing  ourselves may not only be possible but it may become necessary to succeed in the changing technological, economic and organizational arenas.

While these insight and perceptions may not immediately show up on "that sreadsheet", they do have the capability to enhance the value of law librarians themselves  and to add new value to the employers' bottom lines in the new marketplace.

Link to podcast of the interviews discussed.

Rinn Law Library Staff Member Contributes Article on Google Book Settlement

Mark Giangrande, one of the reference librarians at the Rinn Law Library, has contributed an article to the Volume 6 Number 2 Issue of the online journal The CPI Antitrust Chronicle (Competition Policy International) . This issue features articles addressing the Amended Google Book Settlement Agreement recently rejected by Judge Chin of the U.S. District Court Southern District Of New York.

His article is entitled : "The Rejection of the Amended Google Book Settlement Agreement: A Librarian’s Perspective".

 

American Association Of Law libraries Hall of Fame 2011 Awardees

The Marian Gould Gallagher Distinguished Service Award is the American Association of Law Libraries' (AALL) highest honor. Created in 1990, it is usually given to only one or two awardees per year.

But in order to  recognize a broader group of  association members who have also carried out exemplary work for the association and  who are nearing the end of their careers, the AALL Hall of Fame Award was created. The AALL Hall of Fame Award was established in 2009 with a group of inaugural inductees.

Those selected for  inclusion should have provided years of distinguished service to the Association and have  made significant contributions to the profession through participating in leadership positions,authoring publications, working with outside organizations, and being superior role models for their colleagues.

Mary Lu Linnane, Associate Director for Technical Services, of our own Rinn Law library staff is a member of the committee charged with selecting this year's Hall of Fame awardees. This involved receiving nominations and thoroughly researching the work of the nominees, to inform the final selections.

This year marks the first year that nominations for the AALL Hall of Fame were submitted by the general AALL membership, with up to four individuals eligible to be selected each year.

Mary Lu has written a short article in the June 2011 AALL Spectrum Magazine describing the valuable contributions of the four nominees selected as part of this new process.

The four include : Timothy Coggins, director of the law library, University of Richmond College of Law, Anne W. Grande, past director of the Hennepin County Law Library,Minneapolis, Nancy P. Johnson, associate dean for library and information services and professor of law, Georgia State University, Jacquelyn (Jacque) Jurkins, library director, Multnomah County Law Library, Portland, Oregon.

Check out Mary Lu's article for the work and achievements that merited their inclusion in this year's Hall of Fame.

Allen Moye, Director of Rinn Law Library, Writes Article for "CLEO Edge Magazine"

 Allen Moye, Director of the DePaul Rinn Law Library and member of the law faculty, has had an article published in the Council on Legal Education Opportunity's  (CLEO) Edge Magazine - Broadening the Vision edition. The article is entitled, "Strategies for Success: Using Your Time Wisely to Succeed in Law School" .

( Citation for print copy :16 CLEO-Edge Magazine-Broadening the Vision -No. 1 Winter/Spring p. 51 (2011), no online version available )

CLEO Edge magazine is designed for pre-law students and contains a preview of the information needed to succeed in the law school application process.  The Council on Legal Education Opportunity was founded  in 1968 as a non-profit project of the ABA Fund for Justice and Education to expand opportunities for minority and low-income students to attend law school.

State Deficit Watch - Illinois Can't Mail Out "Legislative Synopsis And Digest" Volumes !

The DePaul Rinn Law Library has received a post card from the State Legislative Reference Bureau advising us that the subscription that we have with the State for the print publication known as the "LEGISLATIVE SYNOPSIS AND DIGEST", cannot be fulfilled at this time due to the inability of the Comptroller to pay for the postage to mail out the volumes! One can assume that many other law library subscribers have also received this unusual notification. Our head of technical services says she can't remember this ever happening before.

So while the news is reporting on the State's lack of funds to pay teachers and reimburse doctors for Medicare, its inability to mail out a standard legislative publication to law libraries and other users, is certainly an indication of how deep the funding crisis has become. It is  also probably an indicator of how little there may still be left to squeeze out of existing operations.

The postcard states that the subscription will resume when the postal service is paid! Let's hope that this will occur in the near future when the budgetary hemorrhaging of the state budget is stopped by the infusion of more resources. No business would continue on such a path without increasing income. Taxes are the prices we pay for the services that government provides to support its citizens and businesses.

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(Until the print subscriptions resume, users are directed to an online version of current & recent vols. of the Illinois Synopsis & Digest at : http://www.ilga.gov/commission/lrb/lrb_digest_indices.asp )

DePaul Law Librarian Speaks At Wayne State Seminar

A previous posting on this blog reported that one of our reference Librarians and legal research instructors, Mark Giangrande, was invited to participate in a seminar at Wayne State University Law School, entitled “Getting Started – Switching Gears: Practical Advice for Attorneys in Transition.”

The seminar was well received and was a front page story In the Detroit Legal News,  "Switching gears - Seminar coaches lawyers on how to find jobs in tight economy"  by Cynthia Price . The focus of the program on providing advice for  finding employment in the very tough legal market , brought out over 50 attendees. In addition to the informative presentations by several speakers  and responses to questions,  each participant left with a CD with tips for establishing  an effective Web site quickly and a multi-page handout, “Career Transition Strategies and Resources,” which included 19 pages of internet resources.

Mark said he enjoyed being part of the seminar and would be willing to participate in future programs of this type. Given the depth of the economic crisis out there, they probably will be needed.

Library Catalog System Upgrade

DePaul's library catalog and the statewide I-Share catalog will be undergoing a system upgrade beginning 3AM on Sunday, 6/14, scheduled to be completed on or before Wednesday, 6/17.

During the upgrade:

Renewals/My Account: It will not be possible to access the My Account section of the catalog. Patrons needing to renew a book should call the circulation desk at 312.362.8121.

Book Requests: It will not be possible to place requests for books from Lincoln Park or from other I-Share libraries via the catalog. To request a book or article from another library during the upgrade period, please use the forms on the Interlibrary Loan page.

Book Status: Catalog records will be "frozen", and may not accurately reflect whether a book has been checked out or returned.

Staff Member Mark Giangrande on Panel at Wayne State Law School

Mark Giangrande, one of our reference librarians and legal research instructors, has been invited to the Wayne State University Law School, to be part of a panel on "Practical Advice for Attorneys in Transition", on June 20, 2009.

The presenters will address such issues as the significant changes in the legal job market, needed skills in applying for jobs, using search engine marketing for one's legal practice, research at the Wayne State Law Library. Mark will be addressing the use of technology for firm management and litigation support. These are applications that usually do not get much attention in the law school curriculum where the emphasis is on Lexis & Westlaw  for legal research and writing.

The importance of trying to provide law students and graduates with an awareness of these non-academic technological applications, is addressed in a 2008 article from the Albany Law Review     ( 71 Alb. L. Rev. 201 ). It is entitled, "Teaching law office management: why law students need to know the business of being a lawyer", by Debra Moss Curtis, an Associate Professor of Law at Shepard Broad Law Center, Nova Southeastern University. Professor Curtis makes the point that the practice of law is a business and not just the application of academic skills learned in school. In the introduction to her article she says:

"The practice of law is a business. But while focusing on teaching law students to "think like a lawyer," law schools often omit to tell students about the economic realities of surviving in practice. Lawyers are not necessarily interested in or trained as business people and thus comes the harsh reality--if most lawyers had wanted to be business people, they might have gone to business school instead. So for many law students, the realization that to earn a living as a lawyer, they also have to learn a business, can be very challenging."

Given the difficult economic environment that new law school  graduates are encountering, familiarity with such technologies should provide a competetive advantage in this tough market.