by Elliot Ferrell, UMN Law Student, MJLST Staff

The average law student incurs $125,000 of debt and pays almost twice as much in tuition as a student did in 2001. Law students are understandably concerned with the legal market's job prospects, and many are vocal about. Students are not the only ones voicing their concerns, as a lawyers (employed and unemployed), professors, employers, and business people add their opinions and observations to the discourse as well. A common theme is to decry the rise of tuition costs and debt and the fall of enrollment and job openings.

by Eric Maloney, UMN Law Student, MJLST Staff

Facebook has become a part of everyday life for people around the world. According to Mark Zuckerberg and Co., over one billion people (yes, with a "B") are active on Facebook every month, with an average of more than 600 million active users every day in December 2012. Disregarding bogus or duplicate accounts, that means roughly one-seventh of the entire human population is active on Facebook every month (with the world population currently sitting somewhere in the neighborhood of seven billion people).

Apparently, Facebook has become so commonplace and ingrained in the daily routine of some that they feel the need to use the social networking service from the privacy of their prison cells.

by Ian Birrell

Since at least 1999 when Napster was originally launched, internet piracy, or downloading copyrighted materials (especially songs, videos, and games,) has been a contentious activity. The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) has historically taken a very public and aggressive stance by finding individuals associated with IP addresses matching those where this "file sharing" is coming from. After finding such a target, the RIAA would send a letter demanding a settlement for thousands of dollars or threatening litigation, risky and expensive to the target, despite a potentially very small monetary value of downloaded material. The RIAA suits, which have continued for a number of years, include a number of well publicized absurd claims.

by Sabrina Ly

Evidence from social networking websites is increasingly involved in a litany of litigation. Although the widespread use of social media can lead to increased litigation, as well as increasing the cost of litigation, use of social media has assisted lawyers and police officers in proving cases and solving crimes. In New Jersey, for example, two teenage brothers were arrested and charged with murder of a twelve year-old girl. What led to the two teenagers' arrest was evidence left behind in their homes along with a Facebook post that made their mother suspicious enough to call the police. In another case, Antonio Frasion Jenkins Jr. had charges brought against him by an officer for making terroristic threats to benefit his gang. Jenkins posted a description of his tattoo on Facebook which stated: "My tattoo iz a pig get'n his brains blew out." Pig is considered a derogatory term for a police officer.The tattoo also had the officer's misspelled name and his badge number. The officer who is a part of the gang investigation team saw the Facebook post and immediately filed charges against Jenkins as he interpreted the tattoo as a direct threat against him and his family. These are two of the many situations in which social networking websites have been used as evidence to bring charges against or locate an individual.

by Jeremy So, UMN Law Student, MJLST Managing Editor

As China's Communist party prepares for its once-a-decade leadership transition, the news has instead been dominated by the fall from power of Bo Xilai, the former head of the Chongching Communist Party and formerly one of the party's potential leaders. While such a fall itself is unusual, the dialogue surrounding Bo's fall is also remarkable--Chinese commentators have been able to express their views while facing only light censorship.

by Sarvesh Desai, UMN Law Student, MJLSTStaff

Google glasses . . . like a wearable smartphone, but "weighing a few ounces, the sleek electronic device has a tiny embedded camera. The glasses also deploy what's known as a 'heads-up display,' in which data are projected into the user's field of vision on a small screen above the right eye."

The glasses are designed to provide an augmented reality experience in which (hopefully useful) information can be displayed to the wearer based on what the wearer is observing in the world at that particular moment. The result could be a stunning and useful achievement, but as one commentator pointed out, Google is an advertising company. The result of Google glasses, or as Google prefers to call them "Google Glass"(since they actually have no lenses) is that advertisements following you around and continuously updating as you move through the world may soon be a reality.

by Rebecca Boxhorn, Consortium Research Associate, Former MJLST Staff & Editor

Helen of Troy's face launched a thousand ships, but yours might provide probable cause. The FBI is developing a nationwide facial recognition database that has privacy experts fretting about the definition of privacy in a technologically advanced society. The $1 billion Next Generation Identification initiative seeks to harness the power of biometric data in the fight against crime. Part of the initiative is the creation of a facial photograph database that will allow officials to match pictures to mug shots, electronically identify suspects in crowds, or even find fugitives on Facebook. The use of biometrics in law enforcement is nothing new, of course. Fingerprint and DNA evidence have led to the successful incarceration of thousands. What privacy gurus worry about is the power of facial recognition technology and the potential destruction of anonymity.

Once just the province of Generation Y and high tech culture, it is not breaking news that social media is now as mainstream as . . . well . . . the internet. What is new is that social media issues are no longer just an interesting specialty niche for tech savvy lawyers, but something that likely touches most attorneys' practices.

A look at the rapid rise of appellate level cases involving social media evidence gives a hint at just how common social media evidence is becoming in civil litigation and criminal prosecution. The chart accompanying this post, while not a definitive study, shows the results of a Westlaw search for the number of appellate cases that likely involved the admission of evidence related to the major social media outlets -- increasing 8-fold since 2008 and doubling in the past two years.