Libraries are bridges to information and knowledge.

QUESTION:

“Good afternoon. …[our court] is trying to find a Quiche interpreter for a pending criminal case. Quiche or K’iche is a Mayan language spoken in the central highlands of Guatemala. We’ve tried courts in major metropolitan areas, NAJIT, major universities, Language Line, and even the Guatemalan embassy in Washington, DC. I noticed in a Google search that a court in Louisville, Kentucky tried to find a Quiche interpreter in 2000 — not sure if they ever found one. There are also a few appellate cases out there that talk about exhausting all efforts to find a Quiche interpreter, so I know we’re not the first court in this situation. We even tried my brother, who happens to be a theology professor at Biola University, who happens to know Bible translators in obscure South and Central American dialects, which led us to a possible translator at a university in Texas, but now that seems to be falling through. We even priced a plane ticket from Guatemala to Sioux Falls ($697, much less that I thought), but we have no contacts there and the embassy could not offer any.”

“If anyone has any leads or suggestions on a Quiche interpreter, we’d be very grateful. “

A paper prepared by Hillel L. Parness, Professor, Columbia University Law School and Of Counsel, Lovells (New York) for MessageLabs (http://www.messagelabs.com) ; it includes the following sections: Introduction, The Risks, Harassment, Child Pornography, Defamation, 3rd Party Intellectual Property Rights, Contract Formation, Confidentiality, Dealing With Risks, and a Summary.

Introduction “Email is critical to many businesses; its ease of use, combined with the speed and scale of distribution, make it an invaluable business tool. Today, many businesses could not function without consistent and unfettered access to the Internet.

However, these same attributes can also cause severe difficulties for employers if employees’ use of email and the Internet is not controlled adequately. This short summary considers some of the risks that employers face. It is not a comprehensive study of the topic; therefore, detailed legal advice should always be sought in specific situations.”

View Letter from the Working Group – November 30, 2007 [PDF, 41 KB]

Read Draft Final Report of the Working Group [PDF, 315 KB]

The period for public comment on the report is open until December 15, 2007. Comments can be submitted via the Web site at http://www.loc.gov/bibliographic-future/contact/. Electronic submission of comments is encouraged. Please note that public comments are a vital part of the Working Group’s deliberations and may be available for public access either online or in print.

The Legislative Resource Center of the Office of the Clerk, U.S. House of Representatives is looking for a Manager of Library Services. The individual will provide daily management, oversight and supervision of library operations and personnel. Applicants should have at least five (5) years of progressively responsible management and supervisory experience; an MLS from an accredited American Library Association (ALA)

school is preferred. Contact: Mr. Eddie Curry, Office of the Clerk,

Legislative Resource Center, B-106 Cannon House Office Building,

Fearing Class Action, Carrier Removes Lawyer’s Dental-Bill Suit to U.S. Court

“Given Eric Katz’s winning of a $45 million class action settlement last year from Horizon Blue Cross, including $6.5 million in legal fees, it’s not surprising the insurance company is making a mountain out of a molar”.

Death Penalty Repealer Heads For Governor’s Desk

The following is an excerpt from a December 7, 2007 article by Jacob Liebenluft posted on Slate

“When it does battle on the Web, Google rarely loses. Last year’s closure of Google Answers, however, marked a rare setback for the search giant. An even bigger shock is that Yahoo! succeeded where Google failed. Yahoo! Answers-a site where anyone can post a question in plain English, including queries that can’t be answered by a traditional search engine-now draws 120 million users worldwide, according to Yahoo!’s internal stats. The site has compiled 400 million answers, all searchable in its archives. According to the Web tracking company Hitwise, Yahoo! Answers is the second-most-visited education/reference site on the Internet after Wikipedia”

“The blockbuster success of Yahoo! Answers is all the more surprising once you spend a few days using the site. While Answers is a valuable window into how people look for information online, it looks like a complete disaster as a traditional reference tool. It encourages bad research habits, rewards people who post things that aren’t true, and frequently labels factual errors as correct information. It’s every middle-school teacher’s worst nightmare about the Web.”

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