Emily Feldman, AALL Advocacy Communications Assistant who is working with the White House’s Open Government working group, is asking AALL members to contact her with specific types of information and datasets that you’d like to see Federal government  agencies publish. The working group is also very interested in any cross-agency datasets you’d like to see added to Data.gov (e.g., crime data from DOJ/DHS, health data from EPA/HHS).
Some of the suggestions received so far include:

• All historic content that agencies have digitized (presuming that agencies followed the Paperwork Reduction Act and didn’t make exclusive deals)
• All the legislative histories that have been digitized by the Department of Justice Library
• Dataset on “charges of discrimination” filed from the EEOC

Are there other information holdings or datasets that you’d like to see added? Please email Emily (efeldman@aall.org) the title and name of the publishing agency by close of business today,  Wednesday, March 17.

Anurag Acharya, Chief Engineer of Google Scholar,  will be the guest on this week’s edition of BlogTalkRadio’s “The Law Librarian.”  The discussion will focus on  Google Scholar’s new Legal Opinions and Journals product.
Co-hosts Richard Leiter, Marcia Dority Baker, Greg Lambert, and Roger Skallbeck will discuss the development of Google SLOJ and Google’s plans for their future foray into legal research. They welcome in advance any questions or suggestions for topics to talk about with Mr Acharya.
The show will air this Friday, December 4, at 3:00 PM Eastern Time.  Listen live at http://blogtalkradio.com/thelawlibrarian, where you can listen, call in with questions or comments and join the discussion in the chat room.

Westlaw has heard from many in the law school community about the Lexis ASPIRE program (blogged last week) and will be launching its own plan for those soon-to-be law school graduates impacted by start date deferrals and similar circumstances.  The program will be called YourLegalCareer dot com and the website will bring together a number of useful Westlaw resources including links to free CLE courses through WestLegalEd Center, a discount subscription to Attorney Jobs, and options to request a free password for pro bono or other work.  It is expected to be up and running by the end of May, so stay tuned.

A recent post from the rips-sis listserv points to a recently published article entitled “The Virtual Tax Library: A Comparison of  Five Electronic Tax Research Platforms” by Katherine Pratt, Jennifer Kowal & Daniel Martin of Loyola Law School in Los Angeles (8 Fla. Tax Rev. 931, 2008).  The article studies and compares the tax research platforms of BNA, CCH, RIA Checkpoint, Lexis and Westlaw.  It also provides a comprehensive listing of many free tax information sources online, including government sites, tax scholarship sites, policy organization sites, and blogs.  The article is available on Westlaw:  The Virtual Tax Library: A Comparison of Five Electronic Tax Research Platforms.  An earlier edition is posted on SSRN and has the virtue of including all screenshots and Appendixes A and B which are tables comparing the 5 platforms (the Westlaw version doesn’t include the visuals).