The American Library Association’s Office of Intellectual Freedom designated this past Friday, January 28, 2011 as Data Privacy Day. The second annual Choose Privacy Week is scheduled for May 1-7, 2011. This website developed a resource for libraries called Data Privacy Day: Our Shared Responsibility — What Libraries Can Do, a tip sheet developed by Data Privacy Day and the National Cyber Security Alliance’s Stay Safe Online. This 23 minute film on privacy issues has “man on the street” interviews and features Neil Gaiman, Cory Doctorow, Geoffrey Stone, and ALA President Camila Alire discussing privacy.

News from the Congress and law enforcement raises concerns about data privacy as the Department of Justice has renewed calls for legislation mandating that Internet Service Providers (ISPs) retain certain customer usage data for up to two years. On Tuesday, January 25, the House Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security’s hearing on Data Retention as a Tool for Investigating Internet Child Pornography and Other Internet Crimes chaired by Rep. James Sensenbrenner (R. WI) had testimony from Deputy Assistant Attorney General Jason Weinstein that data retention was crucial to fighting Internet crimes especially online child pornography. Current policies that only require ISPs to preserve usage data at the specific request of law enforcement authorities are just not sufficient, Weinstein said.

It is unclear if the hearing is a sign that a data retention bill is imminent, said John Morris, the general counsel for the Center for Democracy and Technology, who also testified. It is also uncertain whether only ISPs will be required to retain data, or whether services such as e-mail providers might be included, said Morris. Regardless of the scope, mandatory data retention laws raise important privacy and free speech concerns. “In the privacy realm, the bottom line is that law enforcement is talking about having a massive amount of information on 230 million presumably innocent Americans using the Internet, being tracked and retained,” he said.

Episode 061 – Conversation with Serge Krimnus, Class of 2010.mp3

In this podcast, Serge Krimnus, Brooklyn Law School Class of 2010, talks about his career in patent law. He also discusses his article, The Doctrine of Foreign Equivalents at Death’s Door, 12 N.C. J.L. & Tech. 159 (2010), which he wrote with guidance from BLS Professor of Law Derek Bambauer. This semester, Brooklyn Law School offers a course in Patent Prosecution which Adjunct Assistant Professor of Law Serge Krimnus teaches. Serge talks about his work as a Patent Agent for The Farrell Law Firm located in Melville, New York. He also offers suggestions for students considering a career in patent prosecution.

This week, Jaime Lathrop, Brooklyn Law School Class of 2002, was the featured speaker at the New York State Bar Association’s General Practice Section’s Annual Meeting at the Hilton New York. Lathrop, who was was a Notes & Comments Editor of the Brooklyn Law School Law Review, is the director of the Pro Bono Foreclosure Intervention Program of the Brooklyn Bar Association Volunteer Lawyers Project. The program assists poor and low-income families facing foreclosures in Brooklyn’s neighborhoods. He also works on behalf of VLP in partnership with the South Brooklyn Legal Services Foreclosure Prevention Project, which staffs a walk-in foreclosure clinic at Kings County Supreme Court. Since March 2009, Lathrop has worked with a team of 80 lawyers doing pro bono work for homeowners facing foreclosure. “I recruit, train and assign volunteer lawyers who represent homeowners in settlement conferences, negotiate workouts and help with mortgage modifications for Brooklyn homeowners in foreclosure.” Lathrop feels for homeowners who face dire financial situations as a result of the subprime mortgage crisis. “We have a system of law in the United States that left unchecked will always favor the interests of the few over the interests of many,” says Lathrop. “It is important for attorneys to see that everyone gets equal protection under the law.”

Last year, aHuffington Post story called America Fights Foreclosure: Lifelines for People Fighting to Keep Their Homes featured the Brooklyn Volunteer Lawyers Project calling it a “lifeline for people trying to avoid foreclosure”. It matches up volunteer attorneys from private practice with people in need of critical legal services. Its mission is to “help people regain dignity and control over their lives”. VLP receives funding from the New York Bar Association as well as private donors.

An article in the Brooklyn Barrister, the publication of the Brooklyn Bar Association, reported that last October, the “Volunteer Lawyers Project was honored as one of the premiere pro bono programs of New York State. To celebrate National Pro Bono Week, the New York State Bar Association, the New York State Courts and the Office of the Mayor of the City of New York presented the VLP with a 2010 Pro Bono Service Award for its innovative programming to assist Brooklyn residents facing overwhelming legal issues related to consumer debt. CLARO, the weekly consumer debt clinic in Kings County Civil Court, which originated with the VLP in 2006 in partnership with a pro bono student action group at Brooklyn Law School, has now been replicated city-wide.”

The boilers that provide heat for Brooklyn Law School’s main building at 250 Joralemon Street will be shut down. This will allow contractors to upgrade the heating system for this building.

“We expect there will be a loss of heat for approximately 3 to 4 hours. We apologize for the inconvenience.” Beryl Woodin-Jones said in a campus wide email.

This cold shoulder will affect our library users. So bundle up and drink hot liquids.

BLS Library provides many resources to research the World Trade Organization.

For information about upcoming WTO conferences and summaries of recently issued WTO panel/appellate body reports, subscription BNA-ALL database provides the WTO Reporter.  Link “Recent Topics” categorizes articles in WTO Reporter by subject.  One can also search for articles in WTO Reporter by keywords.  Articles in WTO Reporter sometimes link to the text of WTO reports, agreements or jurisprudence.

Trade law experts also discuss WTO developments in International Economic Law and Policy Blog.  Justia Blawg Search links to many other international trade blogs.

The WTO’s website provides a free Trade Topics Gateway which contains overviews of subject areas ranging from anti-dumping to TRIPS and public health.  These overviews frequently link to full-text documents.  The WTO’s website also is useful if a researcher has a cite to a specific WTO document symbol.  One can search the Documents Online Gateway by WTO document symbol.  TIP:  Because the WTO uses “cookies,” one might need to click twice on my links to either Trade Topics Gateway or Documents Online Gateway.

The subscription component of WorldTradeLaw.net website offers helpful commentaries about WTO panel decisions, appellate body decisions and arbitrations.  WorldTradeLaw.net also provides a status table about ongoing WTO dispute proceedings and a subject index to WTO dispute proceedings.  The free component of WorldTradeLaw.net website provides the text of WTO panel decisions, appellate body decisions and arbitrations.

Subscription TradeLawGuide database is an excellent source of GATT and WTO agreements, as well as WTO jurisprudence.

Tab: “Documents” > subtab: “WTO Agreements & Instruments” includes the text of GATT 1994, WTO-era agreements and Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties.

Tab: “Article Citator” identifies the paragraphs or footnotes in WTO jurisprudence that discuss specific articles of WTO agreements.

Tab: “Jurisprudence Citator” accepts a citation to a specific WTO panel report (example: DS114) or appellate body report and identifies WTO jurisprudence that has cited to DS114.

The Bluebook (19th ed.) rule pertaining to the World Trade Organization is rule 21.11.  This semester, there are three copies of the Dictionary of International Trade Law in the Course Reserve bookcase behind the BLS Library’s Circulation Desk.

Jean Davis, Librarian and Adjunct Professor of Law

At the start of the year, the Bureau of National Affairs (BNA) the Telecommunications Law Resource Center (TLRC). The service provides information on all aspects of communications law, including broadcasting, cable, telephone and wireless. The content is invaluable for communications professionals such as attorneys, planners and managers. In addition, as featured in all Resource Centers, the Telecommunications Law Resource Center provides a 15-day free trial that allows access to BNA Insights, cutting-edge articles by thought leaders in the telecommunications field.

The new product is part of several online Resource Centers (RCs) that BNA has introduced beginning in the summer of 2010. These RCs are online hubs that bring the breadth and depth of news, research, and analysis to one place. As of today, there are three RCs, covering labor & employment law, intellectual property law and, now, telecommunications law, with more launches planned for the future. For information about BNA Labor & Employment Law Resource Center, see last year’s article on the AALL Spectrum blog from.

All the RCs are designed to be easy-to-use and searchable, similar to popular search engines, to save time. A researcher can do a quick search, advanced search, or use search operators similar to Boolean operators. In addition, cases and legislative updates have their own search areas for easy access. The RCs help legal and business professionals access not just the latest news in their field, but to do so in a way that is user-friendly and time-saving.

On Friday, January 28 at 6PM, the Brooklyn Law School Environmental Law Society (ELS) and the Street Vendor Project (SVP) will host a meeting to discuss ways that law students can represent street vendors at the Environmental Control Board when vendors receive tickets, and how students can get involved in helping to pass the newly introduced bill which will dramatically lower the civil penalties which vendors face. New York City Councilman Stephen Levin from Brooklyn has sponsored two bills that would reduce the vending fines to pre-2005 levels. Intro 434 and Intro 435, which now each have 17 co-sponsors at City Council, would provide relief to street vendors during difficult times. When the bills come to a hearing, BLS probono students will testify and submit written testimony.

According to Lee Miller, co-chair of land use programs for ELS, the event to be held on Friday in Room 605 will have food from Kwik Meal (the best street meat in NYC!). Lee says that the Street Vendor Pro-Bono Project is a new public interest opportunity for BLS students that started last semester. The ELS is sponsoring and funding the pro-bono project in its first year. The groups cross-promote and work collaboratively to tie vending and sidewalk culture issues to environmental programs. Their objectives include lifting the cap on vending permits and licenses and reducing the fines associated with vending violations.

Students who participate in this pro-bono project have the opportunity to advocate on behalf of New York City-based street vendors. They analyze violations by the Department of Health, the Parks Department and the Police Department, and defend the vendor before the Environmental Control Board (ECB), the administrative tribunal that handles civil violations issued by City agencies. Preparation for these cases involves direct interaction with street vendors, site visits, evidence gathering, and an analysis of Administrative Code provisions and the Rules of the City of New York. Students will refine their legal research and oral argument skills as they present their defenses before administrative law judges at the ECB.

A recent case involves a street vendor operating for the past three years at the corner of 86th and Lexington, Paty’s Taco Truck. Last summer, New York City Councilwoman Jessica Lappin from the Upper East Side introduced a bill to revoke permits of food trucks if they receive three parking tickets. Although the bill is stalled, the street vendor has been targeted for enforcement of a traffic law which prohibits the selling of “merchandise” (not food) from a metered parking spot. The vendor’s truck has been towed three times and all three tickets were dismissed by the traffic court. It is not clear if the law applies to food vendors as the vending laws in New York City consistently distinguish between “food” vendors and “general merchandise vendors”.

The White House website has posted this video on how the President Obama is approaching tonight’s State of the Union address. The video discusses the history of the State of the Union address with comments from U.S. House of Representatives Historian Matthew Wasniewski. It also has archival footage of Addresses from decades past.

Article 2, Section 3 of the U.S. Constitution requires that the president “shall from time to time give to the Congress Information of the State of the Union, and recommend to their Consideration such Measures as he shall judge necessary and expedient”. Prior to 1913, Presidents delivered the State of the Union in writing. That year, Woodrow Wilson delivered the State of the Union orally.

Since then, the themes of the past century of State of the Union addresses offer a historical kaleidoscope of our nation’s themes and buzzwords. Today’s Daily Beast has created a Media Gallery of word clouds—using Wordle—to provide a way to explore those themes. Word clouds take a chunk of text—in this case State of the Union addresses—and magnify the most-used words while minimizing the least used, providing a new way to look at the State of the Union address. Here is the word cloud from last year’s State of the Union address:

The Library will again host a series of Lunch & Learn presentations during the month of February.  These sessions are open to all students and will be held in Library Room 113M from 1:00pm to 1:50pm on the dates below:

Wednesday, February 2, 2011:  Zotero to Organize and Cite Research Sources

Wednesday, February 9, 2011:  Using the CCH Intelliconnect Database

Wednesday, February 16, 2011:  Federal Legislative History

Wednesday, Februrary 23, 2011:  New York Legislative History

Sign-up for these sessions at the first floor Reference Desk or e-mail to linda.holmes@brooklaw.edu

Lunch will be provided.  We look forward to seeing you in February!