Libertas et natale solum

While some say that “nothing is said which has not been said before” (Terence)
or “about the most originality that any writer can hope to achieve honestly is to steal with good judgment” (Josh Billings) or even that “it’s not exactly plagiarism, it’s falling in love with good language and trying to imitate it” (Charles Kuralt), your professors may stand to disagree…

Keeping that in mind as you begin your fall semester, whether newbie 1L or a 3L on the final push, take a gander at this video – created by the University of Bergen Library in Norway – and learn exactly what happens when you choose to plagiarize.

Be sure to click the “cc” button to turn the English subtitles on – unless you happen to be fluent in Norwegian…  Video quality is astounding, including plagiarism SWAT teams, giant robots destroying the city and a massive song and dance number staged in the library with a full marching band and cheer squad, so take a few minutes and enjoy this foreign film break – with or without popcorn.

And many thanks to Lyn Batty, one of our Reference Librarians, for passing along this video to me.  Yes, I just avoided plagiarizing my plagiarism blog post idea.

~Ashley Moye~

A Constitution is Born

Constitutions aren’t born every day, and getting a glimpse into the inner workings of the process of crafting a nation’s governing document is even more rare.  The U.S. Constitution wasn’t drafted in a complete vacuum, but the details of the Constitutional Convention of 1787 weren’t exactly publicly available at the time. For more details about the drafting of our Constitution from the Library of Congress webpage, click here.

But today in Iceland, a small country with a population of about 330,000, a brand new Constitution is being drafted in front of the watchful eyes of the worldwith the help of crowdsourcing advice through social media sites like Facebook, Twitter and YouTube.

“The country’s 25-member constitutional council is posting draft clauses on its website and inviting the public to comment on them there or on its Facebook page. And their comments are actually being incorporated into the document. The council also has Twitter, YouTube, and Flickr accounts and is streaming all of its meetings live.”  Full story here.

Citizens of Iceland can register with their name and address to be able to make public comments and suggestions on the draft through the Constitution’s webpage. To see Iceland’s new draft Constitution, it is available online in Icelandic and in English (through Google translate). The Google translate can be a bit muddled, but you’ll get the general idea of the draft language.

For more about comparative Constitutional Law in the CSL library, try HeinOnline’s new World Constitutions Illustrated database here, or browse the library’s online catalog for the subject Comparative Government or Constitutions.

~ Lyn Batty~

LexisNexis & Westlaw Summer Access

Just as a reminder, LexisNexis and Westlaw provide only limited access to students during the summer between late June and August 1st. However, students wishing to use their LexisNexis and Westlaw student accounts for a qualifying academic purpose may register to extend their access through the summer. If you did not request an extension from Westlaw or LexisNexis, your access will be denied.  Full access for continuing, non-graduating students will be restored on August 1st. LexisNexis and Westlaw strictly prohibit the use of student accounts for commercial purposes.

LexisNexis Summer Access

Lexis passwords can be extended for academic purposes over the summer at the Law School welcome screen.  Choose Account Help > Manage My Account > Summer Access Registration.

You must certify one of the following academic purposes to be granted full summer access:

• Class preparation and assignments;
• Research associated with moot court or law review/law journal;
• Research associated with pursuing a grant or scholarship;
• Service as a research assistant to a professor (either paid or unpaid);
• An unpaid internship, externship or clinic position for school credit;
• Clerkship for credit; or
• Bar review.

If you do not register for summer access, your LexisNexis student ID will be limited to career materials as of June 30th. Graduating students may extend their accounts to August 1st.  Graduating students whose employment has been deferred or who are pursuing public interest employment should considering applying for access through the LexisNexis ASPIRE program.

If you have any questions about LexisNexis summer access, please contact LexisNexis Technical Support at 800 45 LEXIS (53947)

Westlaw Summer Access

Summer access to Westlaw can be requested online at: http://lawschool.westlaw.com/registration/SummerExtension.aspx.

You may extend your Westlaw student password for summer use for the following academic purposes:

• Summer law school classes (use for law review competition, written work requirement, LLM paper or SJD dissertation);
• Law review or journal work;
• Project for a law school professor;
• Moot Court
• Unpaid non-profit public interest internship/externship or pro bono work required for graduation (does not include courts and government agencies).

If you have any questions about Westlaw summer access, please contact Westlaw Technical Support at 1-800-Westlaw.

- Lyn Batty -

Say Hi to Lyn

Lyn Batty is a new reference librarian who joined the library team in late February.

“I’m a Charlotte native, but I have also lived in Washington, D.C., New York, and Chapel Hill.  I went to law school at Georgetown in D.C. and then practiced law for several years in Charlotte in the areas of family law, children’s advocacy, bankruptcy and real estate.  I also worked in development for a non-profit organization in Charlotte.

After taking some time off from practicing law, I returned to school to study library and information science at UNC.  While at UNC, I was a faculty research assistant with the UNC Law Library, and also worked in acquisitions at the Duke University Libraries.  I am interested generally in research and scholarly publishing, but I especially like interdisciplinary topics and empirical legal research.  When I’m not working or doing research, I like spending time in the mountains of North Carolina with my family, listening to music, or watching obscure TV series on Hulu.”

-Lyn Batty-