{"id":2666,"date":"2008-12-16T10:43:51","date_gmt":"2008-12-16T15:43:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/?p=2666"},"modified":"2008-12-16T10:46:05","modified_gmt":"2008-12-16T15:46:05","slug":"whats-new-in-the-classroom-fastcase","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/2008\/12\/whats-new-in-the-classroom-fastcase\/","title":{"rendered":"What’s New in the Classroom: Fastcase"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

What’s new in the legal research classroom?\u00a0\u00a0 As was mentioned in previous posts, there is a new database, Fastcase<\/a>, available to all Wisconsin bar members.\u00a0 \u00a0In the Advanced Legal Research classrooms this past semester students were introduced to Fastcase.\u00a0 Now that it is available to all members of the Wisconsin bar, we plan to expand training on this cost-effective legal research tool.\u00a0 The Fastcase database has already been reviewed by Leslie Behroozi and Elana Olson in a joint post<\/a>.\u00a0 \u00a0I’d like to focus my comments on the Interactive Timeline feature of Fastcase.\u00a0 This new feature will prove useful for spotting trends in the law, not only to practicing lawyers, but also to academics, including those interested in writing papers for publication.\u00a0 \u00a0<\/p>\n

Below is an example of the Interactive Timeline for a search for “open records” limited to Wisconsin cases.\u00a0\u00a0 Each case is represented by a bubble.\u00a0 The size of the bubble indicates how often other cases in the Fastcase database have cited to that particular case.\u00a0 The x-axis represents time and the y-axis represents relevancy (you have the option to select relevancy or court level).\u00a0 This visual format allows the researcher to process more information more rapidly than would be possible by using the traditional list format.\u00a0 For instance, in the visual format, the researcher is able to “view” all 233 relevant cases on one page, whereas in the traditional list format, the researcher would have to either click “next” page or scroll down.\u00a0<\/p>\n

More importantly, it allows the researcher to spot trends in the law.\u00a0 For instance, below, we see an increasing number of cases returned on a search for “open records” since 1979.\u00a0 Is this due to an increased amount of information available to requesters?\u00a0 A change in language in the Wisconsin statute?\u00a0 A move toward transparency and access to public information?\u00a0\u00a0 Taking note of any trends we see while researching may provide fodder for law review articles or other scholarly publications.\u00a0 For the practitioner, it allows a 30,000-foot view of the case law on a particular topic (at least as demonstrated by the Fastcase database algorithm).\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

This new tool, the Interactive Timeline, is worth your while to explore.\u00a0\u00a0 It is probable that we’ll see increased use of visual display of query results in legal research.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

What’s new in the legal research classroom?\u00a0\u00a0 As was mentioned in previous posts, there is a new database, Fastcase, available to all Wisconsin bar members.\u00a0 \u00a0In the Advanced Legal Research classrooms this past semester students were introduced to Fastcase.\u00a0 Now that it is available to all members of the Wisconsin bar, we plan to expand […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":42,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ocean_post_layout":"","ocean_both_sidebars_style":"","ocean_both_sidebars_content_width":0,"ocean_both_sidebars_sidebars_width":0,"ocean_sidebar":"","ocean_second_sidebar":"","ocean_disable_margins":"enable","ocean_add_body_class":"","ocean_shortcode_before_top_bar":"","ocean_shortcode_after_top_bar":"","ocean_shortcode_before_header":"","ocean_shortcode_after_header":"","ocean_has_shortcode":"","ocean_shortcode_after_title":"","ocean_shortcode_before_footer_widgets":"","ocean_shortcode_after_footer_widgets":"","ocean_shortcode_before_footer_bottom":"","ocean_shortcode_after_footer_bottom":"","ocean_display_top_bar":"default","ocean_display_header":"default","ocean_header_style":"","ocean_center_header_left_menu":"","ocean_custom_header_template":"","ocean_custom_logo":0,"ocean_custom_retina_logo":0,"ocean_custom_logo_max_width":0,"ocean_custom_logo_tablet_max_width":0,"ocean_custom_logo_mobile_max_width":0,"ocean_custom_logo_max_height":0,"ocean_custom_logo_tablet_max_height":0,"ocean_custom_logo_mobile_max_height":0,"ocean_header_custom_menu":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_family":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_subset":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_size":0,"ocean_menu_typo_font_size_tablet":0,"ocean_menu_typo_font_size_mobile":0,"ocean_menu_typo_font_size_unit":"px","ocean_menu_typo_font_weight":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_weight_tablet":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_weight_mobile":"","ocean_menu_typo_transform":"","ocean_menu_typo_transform_tablet":"","ocean_menu_typo_transform_mobile":"","ocean_menu_typo_line_height":0,"ocean_menu_typo_line_height_tablet":0,"ocean_menu_typo_line_height_mobile":0,"ocean_menu_typo_line_height_unit":"","ocean_menu_typo_spacing":0,"ocean_menu_typo_spacing_tablet":0,"ocean_menu_typo_spacing_mobile":0,"ocean_menu_typo_spacing_unit":"","ocean_menu_link_color":"","ocean_menu_link_color_hover":"","ocean_menu_link_color_active":"","ocean_menu_link_background":"","ocean_menu_link_hover_background":"","ocean_menu_link_active_background":"","ocean_menu_social_links_bg":"","ocean_menu_social_hover_links_bg":"","ocean_menu_social_links_color":"","ocean_menu_social_hover_links_color":"","ocean_disable_title":"default","ocean_disable_heading":"default","ocean_post_title":"","ocean_post_subheading":"","ocean_post_title_style":"","ocean_post_title_background_color":"","ocean_post_title_background":0,"ocean_post_title_bg_image_position":"","ocean_post_title_bg_image_attachment":"","ocean_post_title_bg_image_repeat":"","ocean_post_title_bg_image_size":"","ocean_post_title_height":0,"ocean_post_title_bg_overlay":0.5,"ocean_post_title_bg_overlay_color":"","ocean_disable_breadcrumbs":"default","ocean_breadcrumbs_color":"","ocean_breadcrumbs_separator_color":"","ocean_breadcrumbs_links_color":"","ocean_breadcrumbs_links_hover_color":"","ocean_display_footer_widgets":"default","ocean_display_footer_bottom":"default","ocean_custom_footer_template":"","ocean_post_oembed":"","ocean_post_self_hosted_media":"","ocean_post_video_embed":"","ocean_link_format":"","ocean_link_format_target":"self","ocean_quote_format":"","ocean_quote_format_link":"post","ocean_gallery_link_images":"on","ocean_gallery_id":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[34,59],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2666","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-legal-education","category-legal-research","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2666","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/42"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2666"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2666\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2666"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2666"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2666"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}