LawMoose
Encyclopedia
LawMoose launched in September, 2000, is believed to have been the first U.S. regional legal search engine
operating its own independent web crawler
.
Initially LawMoose provided a searchable index drawn from Minnesota
law and government sites. Later, it added a similar capability for Wisconsin
law sites and select general legal reference starting point sites.
LawMoose has since evolved into a hybrid bi-level public and subscription legal knowledge environment, featuring a thesaurus
-based topical map of legal and governmental web resources (which spans the U.S. and globe and adds non-legal resources in a subscriber edition), a list of the largest one hundred Minnesota law firms, ranked by number of Minnesota lawyers, the Minnesota Legal Periodical Index, listing and topically categorizing more than thirty thousand articles published in Minnesota legal publications from 1984 to the present (in the public edition), and a densely interconnected, constantly evolving legal words, phrases, concepts and resources network (in a subscriber edition).
LawMoose's legal words, phrases, concepts and resources network consists of more than 177,000 legal, governmental, business, insurance, and popular terms, interconnected through more than 697,000 relationships. Interconnections are based on a relationships vocabulary of more than 200 relationship types. This multi-dimensional intellectual network functions as a navigable intellectual model of law and law practice.
This semantic, intellectual network-based approach to organizing legal knowledge and locating legal resources is a significant departure from traditional hierarchical, case law-specific legal taxonomies, such as the taxonomy
utilized by the West American Digest System
.
The Minnesota Legal Periodical Index has been continuously maintained by the Minnesota State Law Library since 1984. Since 2002, it has appeared on LawMoose through a collaboration with LawMoose publisher, Pritchard Law Webs, Minneapolis, Minnesota
.
Search engine
A search engine is an information retrieval system designed to help find information stored on a computer system. The search results are usually presented in a list and are commonly called hits. Search engines help to minimize the time required to find information and the amount of information...
operating its own independent web crawler
Web crawler
A Web crawler is a computer program that browses the World Wide Web in a methodical, automated manner or in an orderly fashion. Other terms for Web crawlers are ants, automatic indexers, bots, Web spiders, Web robots, or—especially in the FOAF community—Web scutters.This process is called Web...
.
Initially LawMoose provided a searchable index drawn from Minnesota
Minnesota
Minnesota is a U.S. state located in the Midwestern United States. The twelfth largest state of the U.S., it is the twenty-first most populous, with 5.3 million residents. Minnesota was carved out of the eastern half of the Minnesota Territory and admitted to the Union as the thirty-second state...
law and government sites. Later, it added a similar capability for Wisconsin
Wisconsin
Wisconsin is a U.S. state located in the north-central United States and is part of the Midwest. It is bordered by Minnesota to the west, Iowa to the southwest, Illinois to the south, Lake Michigan to the east, Michigan to the northeast, and Lake Superior to the north. Wisconsin's capital is...
law sites and select general legal reference starting point sites.
LawMoose has since evolved into a hybrid bi-level public and subscription legal knowledge environment, featuring a thesaurus
Thesaurus
A thesaurus is a reference work that lists words grouped together according to similarity of meaning , in contrast to a dictionary, which contains definitions and pronunciations...
-based topical map of legal and governmental web resources (which spans the U.S. and globe and adds non-legal resources in a subscriber edition), a list of the largest one hundred Minnesota law firms, ranked by number of Minnesota lawyers, the Minnesota Legal Periodical Index, listing and topically categorizing more than thirty thousand articles published in Minnesota legal publications from 1984 to the present (in the public edition), and a densely interconnected, constantly evolving legal words, phrases, concepts and resources network (in a subscriber edition).
LawMoose's legal words, phrases, concepts and resources network consists of more than 177,000 legal, governmental, business, insurance, and popular terms, interconnected through more than 697,000 relationships. Interconnections are based on a relationships vocabulary of more than 200 relationship types. This multi-dimensional intellectual network functions as a navigable intellectual model of law and law practice.
This semantic, intellectual network-based approach to organizing legal knowledge and locating legal resources is a significant departure from traditional hierarchical, case law-specific legal taxonomies, such as the taxonomy
Taxonomy
Taxonomy is the science of identifying and naming species, and arranging them into a classification. The field of taxonomy, sometimes referred to as "biological taxonomy", revolves around the description and use of taxonomic units, known as taxa...
utilized by the West American Digest System
West American Digest System
The West American Digest System is a system of identifying points of law from reported cases and organizing them by topic and key number. The system was developed by West Publishing to organize the entire body of American law...
.
The Minnesota Legal Periodical Index has been continuously maintained by the Minnesota State Law Library since 1984. Since 2002, it has appeared on LawMoose through a collaboration with LawMoose publisher, Pritchard Law Webs, Minneapolis, Minnesota
Minnesota
Minnesota is a U.S. state located in the Midwestern United States. The twelfth largest state of the U.S., it is the twenty-first most populous, with 5.3 million residents. Minnesota was carved out of the eastern half of the Minnesota Territory and admitted to the Union as the thirty-second state...
.
External links
- LawMoose named Netlawtools 2001 Site of the Year.