Monthly archives: May, 2011

“Link Rot” and Legal Resources on the Web: A 2011 Analysis by the Chesapeake Digital Preservation Group

Sarah Rhodes describes and documents the work of the Chesapeake Digital Preservation Group’s fourth annual investigation of link rot among the original URLs for online law and policy-related materials archived though the group’s efforts. Link rot” is used to describe a URL that no longer provides direct access to files matching the content originally harvested from the URL. The Chesapeake Group focuses primarily on the preservation of Web-published legal materials, which often disappear as Web site content is rearranged or deleted over time. In the four years since the program began, the Chesapeake Group has built a digital archive collection comprising more than 7,400 digital items and 3,200 titles, all of which were originally posted to the Web.

Subjects: Features, Internet Resources - Web Links, Internet Trends, Legal Research, Legal Technology, Search Engines, Technology Trends

Postcard from Vienna: The Vis Moot and the Triumph of Foreign and International Law

Nicholas Pengelley vibrantly documents, with accompanying photos, his latest experiences as evaluator of written memoranda, arbitrator at oral arguments, and sometime team coach at the Vis Moot, in which he has participated for a decade. The moot, which always takes place in the week leading up to Easter, is held in Vienna because of its associations with the Vienna Convention on Contracts for the International Sale of Goods (“CISG”). This is the law of the contract for all of the moot problems, which always involve a contractual sale of goods dispute between parties from two different countries.

Subjects: Communication Skills, Comparative/Foreign Law, Features, International Legal Research, Legal Profession, Legal Research

Commentary: Why we need two separate digital library systems – One for academics and another for the rest of America

In Mending Wall, a 1914 poem blessedly in the public domain, Robert Frost gives us a classic dictum for literature and life, and maybe for inter-organizational politics in particular: “Good fences make good neighbors.” On the whole Frost is anti-fence. But he understands his neighbor’s side; what’s more, “Mending Wall” resonates even in this era of global networks and sharable digital files. Frost died at 88 on January 29, 1963, just a little over two years after his poetry recital in the chilly Washington air at John Fitzgerald Kennedy’s inauguration; but on the Web you can still hear him reading Mending Wall and more.

Subjects: Libraries & Librarians, Library Software & Technology, Virtual Library

The Age of Innocence: Actual, Legal and Presumed

Ken Strutin reasons that any accounting of the justice system would put the presumption of innocence at the top of the ledger. The premise underlying this evidentiary rule is that no one should be found guilty of a crime unless the state has convinced a jury with proof beyond a reasonable doubt. The materials Ken has researched and documented for this guide focus on the drift from unitary innocence, which encompasses all possible claims to a wrongful conviction, to factual innocence rooted in exoneration jurisprudence. According to some scholars, factual exonerations may have confounded the wisdom behind the Blackstone Ratio and its overarching message, i.e., criminal law and procedure ought to be weighted in favor of innocence to avoid wrongful conviction, even if there is a chance that the guilty will benefit as well. In other words, a system of justice that is fair to all and seeks to protect the innocent from wrongful prosecutions must apply safeguards that will be over inclusive. The calculations of truth and fairness are rooted in a system of justice based on due process (or a presumption of due process). The scholarship collected here attempts to address questions of whether the concept of innocence is selective or categorical.

Subjects: Criminal Law, Features, Legal Research