Monday Mourn

So the Hogwarts’ Headmaster was. So much for innocence. In a pre-wired, pre-web connected world, would it have mattered? Will this effect sales? Will there be be some re-enactments of Fahrenheit 451? Celsius 232.78 doesn’t quite have the same ring. Or class actions commenced by entrepreneurial legalists seeing the return of their clients’ ill-obtained shekels? Or alleging intentional or reckless or at least negligent infliction of mental suffering on the sensitive souls nurtured in the gentility of NASCAR ?

Off to more important matters. I think I can add to the discussion that Barbara Johnson has started in her Slaw column Legal Research Unplugged, though not quite as an answer to her question: “I would be interested to know if other research lawyers’ experiences are similar to mine, in relation to keeping current with technological innovations.” None of my comments are intended as criticisms. Her article is simply a convenient launching-pad.

I’m going to invert her title because my point is Plugged-In Legal Research; however, plugged in doesn’t necessarily mean being on the leading edge of legal technology in the sense of understanding it or even using it. Rather, it means that the researcher needs to know how to find out if there are new areas, opened up by new technology, where the might be relevant knowledge. It seems to me that that much is as easy as asking acquaintances who would know, or keeping current with on or two sources (paper or pixel) that hit the highlights. That way new techniques are acquired if and when needed. But, more importantly, the researcher has an adequate enough grasp on the parameters of both what is out there for use and what could be out there.

Where is this leading us? To “data mining” of law firm web sites where useful resources are posted. One eventually learns who is reliable. One type of resource is, of course, the article examining some subject which is the electronic equivalent of an article, or lecture, or speech, printed in a paper journal. Such pieces, even if they’re accurate, are snapshots of the law as it used to be. The pieces are current only through the time the author finished them.

However, there’s now another type. It’s a type which I’m sure we’ll see more of sooner rather than later. We’re seeing real-time efforts (whether one person or collaborative) to post substantive pieces which not only set out the author(s) views about the current state of the law but are also updated on a regular basis. I expect we’ll soon enough see citations to these pieces in facta and reasons for judgment

That’s what the good researcher needs to watch for. It’ll make his or her job easier.

Technology, however, no matter how advanced, will never replace the first tool of any good researcher: the network of contacts. The ability to access somebody else’s brain. That tool should always be considered very early on, in the form of this question. Who do I know that I can ask who already should know the answer? In other words, being plugged-in to a network. 

If that means telling the client that somebody else should be asked to answer the question, because he or she already knows the answer, or is more expert, that’s also the role and obligation of the good researcher.

DC