The Goodson Blogson

It may be hard to believe now, but in just a few weeks your final exams and papers will be a distant memory as you begin your summer job. Starting in May, many commonly-used legal research resources restrict student access over the summer , to help avoid the use of nonprofit educational passwords at paid summer employment. However, each service treats summer access a little bit differently, and there may be further variations for continuing vs. graduating students. Here’s your guide to summer database access. Bloomberg Law accounts are valid between school terms and for 6 months after you graduate. Your Law School Bloomberg account may be used for both academic and employment-related purposes, including full access to federal court filings from PACER (see our research guide ). If you do not already have a Bloomberg Law account, you may Request A Law School Account with your Duke email address. LexisNexis will provide unlimited access this summer to Lexis Advance , its next-genera...

The Goodson Law Library is pleased to offer campus-wide access to The Deal Pipeline , a source for news about recent corporate deals and transactions around the world. Current University students, faculty and staff may access the site with a NetID and password. The Deal Pipeline provides valuable news and insight about private companies , which can be elusive compared to the more accessible information about publicly-traded companies in their required government filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission . The site includes data back to 1989; the latest news stories can be searched or browsed by topic of deal, date, industry, deal amount, and global region. Available topics include bankruptcy, initial public offerings, mergers & acquisitions, private equity, technology, and venture capital. There are also options to browse a Company Finder or a People Finder. For additional Duke resources containing corporate news and information about deals, visit the Databases by Sub...

March 14 is known in some circles as "Pi Day," for the correspondence of 3/14 to the first three digits of the mathematical constant π . The number π represents the ratio of a circle's circumference to its diameter. It is most commonly rounded to 3.14159, although its decimal string is technically infinite. (The Pi Day website has the first million calculated.) Most math within a legislature involves budget issues, but one day in 1897 the value of π came up for debate by Indiana lawmakers. Indiana House Bill 246 (1897) was introduced on January 18 by Rep. Taylor I. Record. The bill would have exempted Indiana schools from paying royalties on the use of a copyrighted "new mathematical truth" that, in part, recalculated the value of π as 3.2. The bill passed the state House unanimously, but was postponed indefinitely in the Senate once cooler heads prevailed. As noted in More Amazing Tales from Indiana (2003), the recalculated value would drastically skew...

The Duke Law School now has access to Intellectual Property Watch (IP Watch) , a source for the latest news and developments in copyright, trademark, and patent law around the world. Current Law School students, faculty and staff may access the website anywhere in the Law School building or from off-campus with a NetID and password. IP Watch provides frequent updates about international and domestic intellectual property law. A unique feature for subscribers is its annual series " The Year Ahead in IP Policy ,"  which explores current trends like 2013's focus on public health and genetically-modified food. An RSS feed is available to keep up with the latest stories, and the site also offers categories to help readers find stories on particular aspects of IP, including human rights, indigenous knowledge, and innovation policy. IP Watch joins several other available sources at the Law School for IP news. Bloomberg BNA provides the IP Law Resource Center & Worl...