LawLibTech

Perhaps you need convincing. Then let's start with a quote directly from the Lexis web site. "With LexisNexis Publisher you can enhance the value of the information by adding comments and links to direct users to related internal or external documents."

Publisher provides content that can be delivered to the an Intranet or via email. You design searches to grab articles, typically news, on a topic. So far it sounds a news-feed, and it is. But the administrator also has the option of reviewing the search results and removing items that aren't pertinent. The administrator can also ADD entries that can point to internal or external content. The content can be pushed to your intranet OR your external, public web site.

The content is typically shown in reverse chronological order. Remember Darlene's Fichter's simple definition of a blog? "A web page containing brief entries arranged chronologically."

Now, if they would add a icon to the browser that would allow an administrator to grab links to anywhere on the Intranet or Internet, including Lexis, there you'd be, Bob's your uncle, and Publisher is a blog.

There could be many applications for a tool that would blog content from Lexis and/or Westlaw. You could create a blog on the fly for a particular research project, adding links and comments as you went along, and deliver your research in blog format. You could create custom newsletters on a particular topic, incorporating content from any web site, paid or free.

Why not just use a regular blog tool? For a couple of reasons. First, Lexis has dynamic addresses, which means you can't just copy a URL, click on it later, and get back to where you started from. (This will, however, work on Westlaw, which has static addresses.) And you have the advantage of content being fed to you, kind of a blog on steroids. Add robust categorization features, and who would need anything else.

If it looks like a blog, and acts like a blog...