One would think that the ATF, the federal agency charged with keeping track of firearms in the United States would be able to quickly pull up a list of people who legally own firearms in this country.

Just press a few buttons on the computer, and — presto! — ATF agents should be able to efficiently track all guns and their owners’ purchase histories, right?

Guess again.

Friends, lawyers–did you know that the Bluebook is available online? I confess, I did not until a couple weeks ago.

I needed to research citation formats, but my Bluebook was sadly out of date (think law school). I didn’t want to wait for the copy to arrive by mail, so I bought an online subscription. I was kind of skeptical. After all, half the benefit of the book is all the little tabs and notes that you’ve added over the years. I was impressed by the service though, so I thought I would share.

Last week, I saw a penny machine at the San Francisco Zoo. These machines are commonly found at amusement parks and other popular tourist destinations. Basically, for 50 cents, the machine will flatten and emboss your penny with a commemorative design. If you experience a case of buyer’s remorse, you can always unload your pressed penny on eBay.

Happy New Year to all our Justia friends!

As Courtney wrote in her year-end review, one of the big trends of 2010 was the emergence of social media and its integration into the work of legal professionals. While I’m sure many of our readers may already have a blog, a Facebook page, LinkedIn Profile or Twitter account (to name but a few of these types of tools and platforms), many folks may still feel a bit unsure how this all works. For that latter group, we’re going to post articles on Onward throughout the year that provide basic social media “how-tos” and resource links to help you get started. This post is going to focus on Twitter and also briefly cover Justia’s Twitter community Legal Birds – a place we hope that those of you who are already in the social media mix might join up and participate in.

2010 was a busy legal year, especially for free law advocates.  Here are some of Justia’s legal predictions for 2011:

• Lawyers and legal professionals will continue to embrace free law as fast as our Law.gov movement friends can crank it out.  Free law will continue its dramatic growth, and Justia remains proud to support the efforts of Carl Malamud’s work at Public.Resource.Org, along with Google, Fastcase, LII and other friends.
• SCOTUS will grant certiorari after the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit renders a decision either affirming or denying a lower court ruling that California’s ban against same-sex marriage is unconstitutional.

Lately, I’ve been playing around with the Books Ngram Viewer from Google Labs. This experimental site displays how often searched phrases appear in publications scanned by the Google Books project over time.

For example, open government really jumped in the 1970s.

And, as you may have deduced, it correlates with the rise and fall of Nixon.

2010 is almost gone–it’s been a very eventful year here at Justia. Indulge us while we review this year’s contributions to legal information on the internet. And, we are getting plans ready for 2011–if you have any ideas about things you’d like to see at Justia.com, please let us know in the comments!

Free Law!!

First of all– we have to talk about Law.gov. This movement really took off in 2010, and we are very proud to have been a part of the effort. There have been meetings and conferences across the United States, from which a Principles and Declaration was drafted. Google granted Public.Resource.Org $2M in furtherance of the law.gov effort, and most recently, the Report of Current Opinions was announced. RECOP will distribute current caselaw from the 50 states and the federal courts freely on the internet.

On January 10th, the Tostitos BCS National Championship Game will feature an exciting match-up between the 12-0 Oregon Ducks and the 13-0 Auburn Tigers. Cameron Newton, the quarterback who led the Tigers to an undefeated regular season, has already garnered several prestigious college football awards, including the 2010 Heisman Memorial Trophy for being the nation’s most outstanding college player. The House of Representatives even congratulated Cameron Newton for winning the Heisman Trophy.

While Cam Newton’s athletic achievements certainly merit some form of acknowledgement, the violation of amateurism rules by his father, as determined by the National Collegiate Athletic Association, is problematic. Considering that the NCAA had recently sanctioned USC, leading the BCS to vacate the Trojans’ 2005 Orange Bowl victory over Oklahoma, the potential disqualification of another Heisman winner and national champion cannot be entirely discounted.

Great news, friends! Starting in 2011, Public.Resource.Org will release a Report of Current Opinions (RECOP) on a weekly basis. The Report will include a FREE HTML feed of ALL slip and final opinions from the appellate courts of the 50 states and the federal government. The feed will be available for reuse under a CC CC-Zero license, and will include page numbers. For more details, read Carl Malamud’s announcement on O’Reilly Radar. This is one of the major projects that Public.Resource.Org has undertaken since being awarded the Google 10^100 Grant in September.

1. New York City street performer the Naked Cowboy is suing competing street performer the Naked Cowgirl in federal court. Both play the guitar in Times Square nearly naked except for cowboy boots and a hat. The Naked Cowboy is claiming that the Naked Cowgirl is “tarnishing the Naked Cowboy’s wholesome image.”
2. A Wisconsin restaurant owner, who famously marketed his establishment with a herd of goats grazing on the roof, is suing a Georgia market for trademark infringement for drawing in customers with their own herd of roof goats.