One of the following brochures from Lexis has already been mentioned on this
BB. I have looked at it and one other and want to bring them to your
attention. You may well want to look at them.
Both of these brochures were at the end of the packet of educational
materials sent by Mead to be distributed to new law students.
One brochure has the title "ADVANTAGE why you should choose the lexis/nexis
service. This brochre knocks headnotes, talks about the superiority of
ALR annotations, and implies that headnotes and ALR annotations serve the
same purpose. The brochure also has quotes from judicial opinions about
such things as "sloppily relying on headnote...". WE all know legal
research teachers always teach students to never rely on headnotes when
citing a case -- headnotes serve another purpose. In my opinion the
brochure contains misleading half truths. I showed it to my Dean and he was
surprised and thought the brochure unprofessional.
The other brochure has the title "The Quality/Economy Equation" "Four
reasons why computer-assisted legal research exceeds manual research alone".
Again, this brochure is a sales tool rather than the usual educational info
in the packet from Lexis. One would think book research plays no unique
role anymore in the law firms or the academic world. There is no overt
distinction between manual research for primary material and manual research
in secondary material.
At USC we are pulling the two brochures from the packet. The other
materials in the packet are the usual appropriate educational brochures about
how to conduct various types of searchs on Lexis/Nexis, etc. We can't keep,
to our knowledge, Mead from joining the Bar reviews in front of our law
school and handing the students these two brochures. However, I do not want
any implication that we endorse these brochures that might come if we
distribute them with the other packet of materials during our research
classes.
Albert Brecht, USC.
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