Readers of Legal Information Management will have noticed the newly designed front cover that accompanied the previous issue, volume 13, number 1. Over a period of time the LIM Editorial Board discussed and considered the image of the journal and, after much deliberation, took the view that the presentation would greatly benefit from a refreshed new ‘look’. The style is deliberately neutral and relatively formal with a slight nod towards the academic market. Although the editor wishes to continue to attract writers from the academic world, LIM remains a journal for the legal information profession as a whole, incorporating material that is relevant for practitioners who work in all sectors for our business.
BIALL DISSERTATION PRIZE 2012
This latest issue of LIM offers a different approach this time around with no particular theme at the start. The opening piece, which is more substantial than most articles that the journal usually incorporates, is an edited version of the winning entry of the BIALL Dissertation Prize 2012. This prize has been awarded annually since 2009, by BIALL's PR and Promotions Committee, for dissertations written with a corporate or legal information theme. The 2012 prize was awarded to Erin Gow, who is a library assistant at Gray's Inn Library. Erin's paper aimed to explore the information literacy and legal research training needs of users of the Middle Temple library. Erin kindly agreed to reduce the length of the piece for publication in LIM and, as a result, I am pleased to publish this very worthy contribution to legal information research.
INTERNATIONAL PERSPECTIVES
LIM is always interested to reflect developments in other parts of the legal world. To that end, there follows an extensive piece of research that was submitted by Wan Satrrah Wan Mohd Saman, a Senior Lecturer in the School of Information Management in the University Teknologu MARA in Malaysia and Dr Abrar Haider, who is a Research Fellow at the University of South Australia. Their joint article provides an insight into E-Shariah and the information and communication technologies concerning the management of the Shariah Court system in Malaysia.
CURRENT ISSUES
The Current Issues section of this LIM contains four pieces on a variety of subjects. Ian Hunter writes about information literacy and the google generation in the context of teaching research skills to sixth formers. Natalie Kent discusses her experiences as a law library trainee and Kate Faulkner writes about the project she is working on for the Inner Temple and the issues associated with the indexing of thirty six volumes of committee minutes. Finally, in this section there is a topical piece, written by Brunella Longo, on BOYD (bring your own device), embedded systems, wireless technologies and cybercrime.
PRACTICAL MATTERS
This popular section which, judging from recent feedback continues to be highly valued by the LIM readership, offers an informative and amusing piece by Jackie Fishleigh about how to provide relevant and effective training in legal research to lawyers in law firms.
CURRENT AWARENESS AND BOOK REVIEWS
The issue finishes, as usual, with the current awareness section and, finally, there are two book reviews.
Again, I am hugely grateful to all those who have contributed to this issue of Legal Information Management, especially the members of the LIM Editorial Board and our colleagues at Cambridge University Press.
FINALLY…
With recent developments with the Open Access movement, and in the certain knowledge that academic contributors will wish to have their articles made available on an OA basis (particularly in light of future research assessments - ie, the REF (Research Excellence Framework) beyond 2014), requests for articles to be published as OA pieces should be directed to the LIM Editor or to Cambridge University Press for advice on how to proceed in this way.
