Professor Rosa Brooks has written an "unofficial" guide to getting a political job in the Obama administration in the latest issue of Foreign Policy. Of course, her tips on networking are important for obtaining a great job, whether you dream of working on 16th and Pennsylvania or 16th and K Street.

For more job-searching resources available in the Library, please consult the Library's Job-Searching Research Guide.

If you weren't able to make it over to Gewirz this week for the symposium, Swimming in the Ocean of Big Data: National Security in an Age of Unlimited Information, hosted by the Journal of National Security Law & Policy and the Georgetown Center on National Security, you can now watch video of the event online (view below or here). See the schedule and brief program notes for reference — the video is in one nearly 7-hour chunk, so this may be helpful.

The three diverse expert panels and lunchtime keynote address were enlightening and thought-provoking, and complemented the Georgetown Law Library's own symposium, Big Data and Big Challenges for Law and Legal Information, just last month (video of that event is available here).

Scholars researching the history of the law consider law books and related works from the period covered vital sources of information.The value of these sources increases when they contain contemporaneous annotations that can provide vital clues to the mental world of lawyers of the day. If those annotations were made by a significant historical figure, such clues are priceless. Georgetown Law Library’s Special Collections holds several annotated imprints, including:

Sir Edward Coke's (1552-1634) copy of the 1569 imprint of De Legibus et Consuetudinibus Angliae [On the Laws and Customs of England] (ca. 1230-50) by Henri de Bracton (1210-1268), the first treatise of English law now commonly known simply as Bracton; and,

Sir Matthew Hale's (1609-1676) copy of the 1640 imprint of one of the most significant medieval chronicle histories of England, Monachi Albanensis Angli Historia Major by Matthew Paris (1200-1259), the 13th century scholar, polymath, and member of the court of Henry III.

Annotated Imprints features selected facsimile images from these two unique books. The exhibit is currently on view in the Special Collections exhibit case outside Rm. 210 in the Williams Library.

To view these and other rare books and historical materials, contact Erin Kidwell - kidwelle@law.georgetown.edu or Special Collections - specl@law.georgetown.edu, or visit us in Williams 210 M-F from 9am to 5pm.

The library hosted its 125th anniversary symposium, Big Data and Big Challenges for Law and Legal Information, this past Wednesday. We were delighted to welcome dozens of participants from law schools, libraries, news organizations, government agencies, and law firms to discuss data-driven initiatives in many disciplines at the Law Center. Thanks to all who presented, attended, and tuned in online – we hope you enjoyed the day as much as we did!

Video from the event, speakers’ slides, and the conference program including an extensive bibliography are now available on the symposium’s website.

Also, if you have feedback or ideas to share about the symposium and the topics it addressed, we’d love to hear from you. Please take a brief survey to share with Georgetown Law Library your thoughts on moving forward in our ever-growing world of big data.

Speaking at the Law Library’s 125th anniversary symposium, Big Data and Big Challenges for Law and Legal Information, on Wednesday, January 30th is Dr. Spiros Dimolitsas, Georgetown University’s Senior Vice President for Research and Chief Technology Officer.

He will be delivering the lunchtime keynote address Leveraging Georgetown University’s Strengths to Create Opportunities in Big Data.

Dr. Dimolitsas’ expertise in large-scale science and technology, high-tech/high-risk project management and technology commercialization has formed the basis for advice that has been provided on innovation and on complex-systems risk management to the U.S. Government and others. He also represents Georgetown University in a variety of fora on climate issues, including the World Economic Forum’s Global University Leadership Forum on Sustainability.

Dr. Dimolitsas has authored 60 papers and holds multiple patents. He holds a B.S. in Theoretical Physics, an M.S. in Nuclear Engineering, and a Ph.D. in Electrical and Computer Engineering.

Georgetown Law Center graduate Nathaniel Burney (L '97) recently published The Illustrated Guide to Criminal Law, which is available from Jones McClure Publishing.  Started as as a series of online comics to debunk popular myths about criminal law, the collection of writings and illustrations now covers seventeen chapters across more than 300 pages.

The five parts in the book cover an introduction, purposes of punishment, guilt, inchoate crimes, defenses and a summary of related topics.

Here's an example illustration from a series of comics relating to questions of police entrapment: 

Stop by the library to check out a copy, read the Tumblr site where this all began, or pick up a copy online.

The Georgetown Law Library's 125th anniversary symposium, Big Data and Big Challenges for Law and Legal Information, will explore a range of topics related to the applications of big data in legal scholarship, practice, and policy.

One of our panelists, Professor Paul Ohm, with academic credentials both in computer science and in law, will provide a fascinating introduction to his interdisciplinary approach to internet privacy issues. Companies soon will be able to collect personal information about us, but without ever receiving that information directly from us. Can and should privacy law respond to this challenge?

To learn more about Professor Ohm’s research and scholarship in this area, see his investigation of inadequate privacy protections revealed in Broken Promises of Privacy: Responding to the Surprising Failure of Anonymization, 57 UCLA Law Review 1701 (2010) and his work on the potential intersection of internet privacy practices with trademark law in a forthcoming article, Branding Privacy, 97 Minnesota Law Review ___ (forthcoming 2013). Visit http://paulohm.com/ or look for his posts at the blog Freedom to Tinker. You may watch the symposium live online on Wednesday, January 30.

On January 30, the Georgetown Law Library's 125th anniversary symposium, Big Data and Big Challenges for Law and Legal Information, will explore a range of topics related to the applications of big data in legal scholarship, practice, and policy.

Vicki Arroyo, executive director of the Georgetown Climate Center, is among numerous panelists from academia, government service, and private practice set to speak at the conference. Professor Arroyo will present on how the Georgetown Law-based organization is using data and data platforms to strategically position itself as a “go to” resource for policy makers, consumers, and reporters on climate, energy, and transportation issues.

Professor Arroyo recently gained national attention with a high-profile TED Talk (watch below) on preparing for climate change in June 2012, which continues to draw views and spread ideas online. She teaches experiential environmental law courses to both law and public policy students at Georgetown, and has previously served as a vice president at the Pew Center on Global Climate Change and in positions with several federal and state government organizations dealing with the research, policy, and economics of environmental issues.

Professor Arroyo will participate in the third panel of the symposium, Big Data Applications in Scholarship and Policy II, from 1:00 to 2:15 in Gewirz 12th floor. To find out more about the day’s events and watch the symposium live online, visit the symposium homepage.

The Georgetown Law Library's symposium, Big Data and Big Challenges for Law and Legal Information, will explore a range of topics related to the applications of big data in legal scholarship, practice, and policy.

One of our panelists, Professor Joshua Teitelbaum, will provide a fascinating introduction to risk preferences, and how data sets can illuminate why people choose certain insurance policies or 401(k) investment strategies over others. 

To learn more about Professor Teitelbaum's research and scholarship in this area, see Joshua C. Teitelbaum, et al., The Nature of Risk Preferences: Evidence from Insurance Choices, American Economic Review (forthcoming), and Joshua C. Teitelbaum, et al., Unlucky or Risky? Unobserved Heterogeneity and Experience Rating in Insurance Markets  (working paper),  and watch the symposium live online on Wednesday, January 30.

During the law library's Jan. 30 conference on Big Data, Professor Kathy Zeiler of the Georgetown law faculty will be presenting on issues connected to the use of big data. One of her topics has been in the news this month.

A recent Johns Hopkins study used government data sets to evaluate the number of medical malpractice claims that have resulted from egregious surgical negligence.  This work could only have been done because of a controversial collection of nearly 10,000 malpractice claims housed in the National Practitioners Data Bank (NPBD).  

Created by the U.S. Health Resources and Services Administration, the NPDB is a confidential system that compiles malpractice payouts, hospital discipline and regulatory sanctions against doctors and other health professionals. Prof. Zeiler will discuss why the government temporarily restricted public access to the NPBD in order to protect the privacy interest of the malpractice defendants.  

This is just one way in which the library's conference will examine the legal and information-policy factors which society should consider when using data to further the public good.  

Please join us on January 30 for the conference Big Data and Big Challenges for Law and Legal Information.