Risky Mail: Concerns in Confidential Attorney-Client Email

Early in the days of attorney-client email, David Hricik wrote a soothing law review article, Lawyers Worry Too Much About Transmitting Client Confidences By Internet E-mail, arguing that email had risks but could be assumed private for the purpose of professional ethics. The ABA agreed in 1999, issuing a formal opinion that encrypting email was not required by ethical standards, and most jurisdictions followed suit. The 1999 ABA opinion persists today, despite being dangerously technology-specific, focused on almost obsolete technology, and over ten years later its legal foundation remains unsettled. I present three reasons why attorneys should be concerned about the risks to confidentiality in attorney-client email: legal uncertainty about general privacy expectations for email, broad waivers of email privacy through provider policies, and unrelated disclosure by third parties. Case-specific issues ¬¬have become more important to determine ethical duties in confidential emails: manifold local privacy laws, local ethical standards, and provider policies. At least one type of email, employer-provided email, is no longer considered confidential in this context, a known ethical hazard for attorneys. In the context of Fourth Amendment law, email privacy remains unsettled, even after the landmark Sixth Circuit decision in Warshak. Legal, authorized third-party access now poses a serious risk to confidentiality in attorney-client email. Attorneys and clients need to understand these risks before informed consent is possible. Technology-based solutions may be part of broader best practices to protect confidentiality. Attorneys and clients must understand the technology at issue, rather than blindly risking clients’ confidences and their ethical duties on technologies they do not understand

A New Species of Diploid Quillwort (Isoetes, Isoetaceae, Lycophyta) from Lebanon

A new species, Isoetes libanotica Musselman, Bolin & B. D. Bray (Isoetaceae, Lycophyta), is described from Akkar District of northern Lebanon. It is a seasonal terrestrial species of basaltic soils, diploid (2n = 22), with complete velum coverage. Megaspore diameter ranges from 338 to 477 mu m with remote, low tuberculate ornamentation and a low to obsolete equatorial girdle; microspore length ranges from 25 to 30 mu m, with echinate ornamentation. At the type locality of I. libanotica, two other Isoetes L. species occur sympatrically. These superficially similar Isoetes species can be differentiated from I. libanotica using megaspore characters; I. duriei Bory has larger alveolate megaspores and I. olympica A. Braun has a prominent equatorial girdle

A New Species of Diploid Quillwort (Isoetes, Isoetaceae, Lycophyta) from Lebanon

A new species, Isoetes libanotica Musselman, Bolin & B. D. Bray (Isoetaceae, Lycophyta), is described from Akkar District of northern Lebanon. It is a seasonal terrestrial species of basaltic soils, diploid (2n = 22), with complete velum coverage. Megaspore diameter ranges from 338 to 477 mu m with remote, low tuberculate ornamentation and a low to obsolete equatorial girdle; microspore length ranges from 25 to 30 mu m, with echinate ornamentation. At the type locality of I. libanotica, two other Isoetes L. species occur sympatrically. These superficially similar Isoetes species can be differentiated from I. libanotica using megaspore characters; I. duriei Bory has larger alveolate megaspores and I. olympica A. Braun has a prominent equatorial girdle

Discovery Investigative Group (DIG) Report, December 2016

This report is a response to the following charge from project sponsor DeeAnn Allison: Develop a working definition of the purpose and scope for a discovery tool that includes a description of what it should accomplish. How will it help scholars connect with information? The charge included a request to answer seven questions: 1. What content should be included and why? 2. What functions or search capabilities should be included? 3. What social media enhancements should be included? 4. How can it be structured to help both novice and advanced researchers? 5. Can you identify a “perfect” tool? If not, which ones are better and why? 6. Should we abandon Encore? Why or Why not? 7. What is the relation, or non-relation to Google products? Is a discovery tool just a variation of Google? Should it be? Over the course of the Fall 2016 semester, DIG committee members, comprised of seven Libraries faculty who voluntarily participated, met frequently to discuss the charge and determine how to best answer each question. Our answers were ultimately informed through a combination of reviewing the current literature, investigating peer institutions’ search tools, soliciting feedback from our library colleagues through a library-wide survey, and the committee members’ own insights. The responses to each of the following questions are a reflection of the consensus of the DIG committee members

Discovery Investigative Group (DIG) Report, December 2016

This report is a response to the following charge from project sponsor DeeAnn Allison: Develop a working definition of the purpose and scope for a discovery tool that includes a description of what it should accomplish. How will it help scholars connect with information? The charge included a request to answer seven questions: 1. What content should be included and why? 2. What functions or search capabilities should be included? 3. What social media enhancements should be included? 4. How can it be structured to help both novice and advanced researchers? 5. Can you identify a “perfect” tool? If not, which ones are better and why? 6. Should we abandon Encore? Why or Why not? 7. What is the relation, or non-relation to Google products? Is a discovery tool just a variation of Google? Should it be? Over the course of the Fall 2016 semester, DIG committee members, comprised of seven Libraries faculty who voluntarily participated, met frequently to discuss the charge and determine how to best answer each question. Our answers were ultimately informed through a combination of reviewing the current literature, investigating peer institutions’ search tools, soliciting feedback from our library colleagues through a library-wide survey, and the committee members’ own insights. The responses to each of the following questions are a reflection of the consensus of the DIG committee members

Outcomes and Cost-Effectiveness of Two Nicotine Replacement Treatment Delivery Models for a Tobacco Quitline

Many tobacco cessation quitlines provide nicotine replacement therapy (NRT) in the U.S. but consensus is lacking regarding the best shipping protocol or NRT amounts. We evaluated the impact of the Minnesota QUITPLAN® Helpline’s shift from distributing NRT using a single eight-week shipment to a two-shipment protocol. For this observational study, the eight week single-shipment cohort (n = 247) received eight weeks of NRT (patches or gum) at once, while the split-shipment cohort (n = 160) received five weeks of NRT (n = 94), followed by an additional three weeks of NRT if callers continued with counseling (n = 66). Patient satisfaction, retention, quit rates, and cost associated with the three groups were compared. A higher proportion of those receiving eight weeks of NRT, whether in one or two shipments, reported that the helpline was “very helpful” (77.2% of the single-shipment group; 81.1% of the two-shipment group) than those receiving five weeks of NRT (57.8% of the one-shipment group) (p = 0.004). Callers in the eight week two-shipment group completed significantly more calls (3.0) than callers in the five week one-shipment group (2.4) or eight week single-shipment group (1.7) (p < 0.001). Using both responder and intent-to-treat calculations, there were no significant differences in 30-day point prevalence abstinence at seven months among the three protocol groups even when controlling for demographic and tobacco use characteristics, and treatment group protocol. The mean cost per caller was greater for the single-shipment phase than the split-shipment phase ($350 vs.$326) due to the savings associated with not sending a second shipment to some participants. Assuming no difference in abstinence rates resulting from the protocol change, cost-per-quit was lowest for the five week one-shipment group ($1,155), and lower for the combined split-shipment cohort ($1,242) than for the single-shipment cohort ($1,350). Results of this evaluation indicate that while satisfaction rates increase among those receiving more counseling and NRT, quit rates do not, even when controlling for demographic and tobacco use characteristics

Why “intergenerational feminist media studies”?

Feminism and generation are live and ideologically freighted issues that are subject to a substantial amount of media engagement. The figure of the millennial and the baby boomer, for example, regularly circulate in mainstream media, often accompanied by hyperbolic and vitriolic discourses and affects of intergenerational feminist conflict. In addition, theories of feminist generation and waves have been and continue to be extensively critiqued within feminist theory. Given the compelling criticisms directed at these categories, we ask: why bother examining and foregrounding issues of generation, intergeneration, and transgeneration in feminist media studies? Whilst remaining sceptical of linearity and familial metaphors and of repeating reductive, heteronormative, and racist versions of feminist movements, we believe that the concept of generation does have critical purchase for feminist media scholars. Indeed, precisely because of the problematic ways that is it used, and the prevalence of it as a volatile, yet only too palpable, organizing category, generation is both in need of continual critical analysis, and is an important tool to be used—with care and nuance—when examining the multiple routes through which power functions in order to marginalize, reward, and oppress. Exploring both diachronic and synchronic understandings of generation, this article emphasizes the use of conjunctural analysis to excavate the specific historical conditions that impact upon and create generation. This special issue of Feminist Media Studies covers a range of media forms—film, games, digital media, television, print media, as well as practices of media production, intervention, and representation. The articles also explore how figures at particular lifestages—particularly the girl and the aging woman—are constructed relationally, and circulate, within media, with particular attention to sexuality. Throughout the issue there is an emphasis on exploring the ways in which the category of generation is mobilized in order to gloss sexism, racism, ageism, class oppression, and the effects of neoliberalism

Predicting flood insurance claims with hydrologic and socioeconomic demographics via machine learning: exploring the roles of topography, minority populations, and political dissimilarity

Current research on flooding risk often focuses on understanding hazards, de-emphasizing the complex pathways of exposure and vulnerability. We investigated the use of both hydrologic and social demographic data for flood exposure mapping with Random Forest (RF) regression and classification algorithms trained to predict both parcel- and tract-level flood insurance claims within New York State, US. Topographic characteristics best described flood claim frequency, but RF prediction skill was improved at both spatial scales when socioeconomic data was incorporated. Substantial improvements occurred at the tract-level when the percentage of minority residents, housing stock value and age, and the political dissimilarity index of voting precincts were used to predict insurance claims. Census tracts with higher numbers of claims and greater densities of low-lying tax parcels tended to have low proportions of minority residents, newer houses, and less political similarity to state level government. We compared this data-driven approach and a physically-based pluvial flood routing model for prediction of the spatial extents of flooding claims in two nearby catchments of differing land use. The floodplain we defined with physically based modeling agreed well with existing federal flood insurance rate maps, but underestimated the spatial extents of historical claim generating areas. In contrast, RF classification incorporating hydrologic and socioeconomic demographic data likely overestimated the flood-exposed areas. Our research indicates that quantitative incorporation of social data can improve flooding exposure estimates