New HeinOnline instructional modules

HeinOnline is an enormous database of legal materials, including over 2200 law journals. Use it to find articles, discover who cited them, and what they cited. HeinOnline also gathers historical primary sources from the UK and USA, including bilateral and multilateral treaties.
To find out more, and to find out how to get the best out of HeinOnline, a suite of training videos has been made by Quimbee, and are available on the HeinOnline YouTube Channel.
Links to these video and other training materials are also on HeinOnline, and the Law Subject Guide, Research Strategies page.

Learning in the 'Post-Truth' Era

The Oxford English Dictionary chose 'post-truth' as the word of the year in 2016 .

The other phrase to hit our ear-drums, social media pages, and the TV is Fake News. We are drowning in it. Google it, and you are spoiled for choice! Snopes is running a select archive.

To combat all of this, and help us learn how to make up our own minds is a fantastic new syllabus from two scientists from University of Washington, Carl T. Bergstrom and Jevin West



You can read their interview in the Chronicle of Higher Education.

The Fine Art of Sniffing Out Crappy Science

By Steve Kolowich January 16, 2017 

And take a look at their syllabus, course outline, and case studies here.

http://callingbullshit.org/index.html

Fabulous.
 

New interactive crime data reporting tool goes live

NZ Police have created an up to date interactive tool for the public to look at crime statistics.
Some of this data was on the StatsNZ website, and has been integrated into this new tool.
There are currently five datasets around victim demographics and offender demographics, with the intention to add more in 2017.
 
This press release from NZPolice has more information.

The tool itself is here www.policedata.nz

Exam Stress-relief : clowns and pirates

For some Friday Frivolity, check out these vaguely Law-related and quite entertaining stories.
This morning on National Radio, I heard about Iceland's Pirate Party, which was founded four years ago as a party for hackers and activists. After the elections on Saturday, they could be the new government!

Then on a blog I follow (see below) called Law & Humanities Blog, there was a big piece about the rise and rise of creepy clowns. "(Please don't) send in the clowns?".
Apparently some states in America are banning clown costumes for Halloween, which in turn has raised the question of a first amendment breach.
There is also a nice reminder that clowns have always been creepy .... think Punch and Judy, medieval court clowns.....

GOOD LUCK FOR EXAMS

Good luck everyone. Study hard, study well.
Look after yourselves, and just as importantly, be considerate of your colleagues.

Study spaces are filling up, so PLEASE share the spaces equitably. The 'egg' dividers assist in creating equal sized spaces, if used correctly. Please do not 'hog' more than your fair share!

Do take breaks, get some fresh air, and eat your (delicious) greasy, crunchy or smelly food out of the library.

All the best, your librarian