The One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBBA) — signed into law in 2025 as P.L. 119-21 — made significant changes to federal tax law, and practitioners are still working through the implications. If you’re trying to get up to speed, Jenny Zook, Reference & Instructional Services Librarian at the UW Law Library and current chair of the Law Librarians Association of Wisconsin’s Public Relations Committee, has written a timely guide for the State Bar of Wisconsin’s InsideTrack.
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Amanda White Eagle on the Great Lakes Indigenous Law Center and Expanding Access to Tribal Law on WI Law in Action Podcast
A recent episode of the Wisconsin Law in Action podcast features Amanda White Eagle, Director of the Great Lakes Indigenous Law Center (GLILC) at the University of Wisconsin Law School. Host Kris Turner of the UW Law Library draws out a wide-ranging conversation about how the Center works with Tribal nations, students, and practitioners to support Indigenous law across Wisconsin and the Great Lakes region. The Law Library’s close partnership with the GLILC is evident throughout, from joint…
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Need Help Researching Law in a Foreign Jurisdiction? Check out UW Law Library’s Country-specific Legal Research Guides
Need Help Researching Law in a Foreign Jurisdiction? The University of Wisconsin Law Library maintains a growing collection of country-specific legal research guides designed to help you get started. Each guide provides an introduction to a country’s legal system and government structure, and directs you to key primary and secondary sources — including constitutions, legislation, case law, legal journals, and more — available through the Law Library and online.
Whether you’re working on a comparative law issue or simply…
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From WisBlawg to the Chronicle of Higher Education: A Closer Look at AI-Generated Media for Promoting Scholarly Work
Last summer, I received an email from Academia.edu with a link to an AI-generated podcast it had created based on an article I wrote about law faculty scholarly visibility. I listened, and I wasn’t impressed. The AI narrator mischaracterized my arguments and even fabricated a plug for Academia.edu’s platform as though I had said it. I wrote up my evaluation in a previous WisBlawg post, comparing it to a podcast I generated myself using Google’s NotebookLM. The…
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BookBub: A Free Tool for Finding Discounted Ebooks
I recently discovered BookBub, a free service that sends daily personalized emails featuring discounted and free ebooks. After a quick signup, you select the genres that interest you—legal thrillers, science fiction, biography, history, fantasy, whatever you prefer. Each morning, you get an email with curated book recommendations in your chosen categories, most priced at 99 cents to a few dollars, with some completely free.
How It Works
An editorial team picks the selections, so you’re not sorting through…
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WisconsinEye is Back while Legislature Considers Long Term Solution
WisconsinEye, Wisconsin’s nonprofit public affairs network is back online for the month of February after going dark for about seven weeks due to a lack of funding.
On Monday, the Joint Committee on Legislative Organization (JCLO) unanimously approved a $50,000 cash infusion for the short term as they continue to work on a longer-term deal.
An Assembly committee is preparing to consider a bill Tuesday that would provide a longer term solution. Assembly Bill 816 proposes granting WisconsinEye…
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Joshua Braver Examines When Military Officers Should Disobey Orders on WI Law in Action Podcast
The latest episode of the Wisconsin Law in Action podcast features Professor Joshua Braver discussing his research on a particularly thorny question: when should military officers disobey orders that are lawful but unethical?
Braver’s recent paper, Disobeying Lawful But Unethical Orders in the Army, explores what happens when following the law conflicts with the military’s professional code—issues that go to the heart of civilian control of the armed forces and democratic governance.
Origins of the Research
The research…
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The Polarizing Legacy of Baseball Commissioner Bowie Kent Kuhn
The latest episode of the Wisconsin Law in Action podcast features Elizabeth Manriquez, Head of Reference and Scholarly Communication at the UW Law Library, discussing her chapter in the book Attorneys in the Baseball Hall of Fame: A Collection of Biographical Essays.
Liz’s chapter focuses on Bowie Kent Kuhn, who served as the fifth commissioner of Major League Baseball from 1969 to 1984. As she explains in the podcast, Kuhn was “one of the most polarizing figures…
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UW Law School Winter Ethics CLE Seminar Series Returns January 27-29
Each January, the UW Law School offers a series of Ethics CLE seminars. Once again, I have the pleasure of presenting on GenAI with my Law Library colleague, Kris Turner.
If you’re interested in attending this live virtual session or one of the other sessions in the series, you may register here.
Session 1: Tuesday, Jan. 27, 2026, 12-1 p.m. CT
Three Rules That Change Your Life with Margaret Raymond, dean emeritus and Warren P. Knowles Chair, professor…
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NotebookLM for Lawyers: AI That Focuses on Your Documents
Legal work runs on documents. Case files, contracts, discovery materials, correspondence – they accumulate. Whether you’re building a timeline from scattered dates, searching for contradictions in witness statements, or extracting key clauses from multiple agreements, the process is often slow, meticulous, and time consuming.
In my recent Wisconsin Lawyer article, “NotebookLM for Lawyers: AI That Focuses on Your Documents”, I explore a different approach to AI in legal practice—one that focuses exclusively on your documents rather than pulling…
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Monitoring Webpage Changes with Visualping
Have you ever been frustrated that some important websites don’t offer email alerts or RSS feeds? Manually keeping track of changes can be very time-consuming. Fortunately, website monitoring tools solve this problem by automatically watching pages and sending notifications when changes occur.
There are many website monitoring tools available, each with different features and capabilities. While there are multiple options available, I heard the most good things about Distill and Visualping so I gave them both a try.
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Spring Semester Planning? Explore UW Law’s Legal Hypothetical Archive
While WisBlawg typically focuses on resources for practicing attorneys, this post highlights a tool that may be of interest to any readers who teach legal research and writing or know faculty members preparing courses.
As spring semester approaches, law faculty face a familiar challenge: developing hypothetical assignments that effectively teach while engaging students. A well-designed hypothetical needs realistic facts, authentic documents, and just the right balance of complexity to challenge students without overwhelming them. Enter the University of Wisconsin…
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WisconsinEye to Suspend Coverage Dec. 15 Due to Funding Shortfall
WisconsinEye, the statewide public affairs network that broadcasts Wisconsin capitol proceedings, will stop event coverage on December 15 due to lack of funding, according to a statement on their website. Their archive of more than 30,000 hours of footage will also go offline.
Impact on Government Transparency and Legal Research
For legal practitioners conducting legislative history research or tracking statutory developments, this is significant. WisconsinEye has been an invaluable resource since it began broadcasting capitol proceedings in 2007.
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When America Celebrated Two Thanksgivings
As we approach Thanksgiving, you might assume the fourth Thursday of November has always been the designated date for this federal holiday. The actual history reveals a more contentious story involving presidential proclamations, state resistance, and congressional compromise.
The Beginning
On September 28, 1789, just before leaving for recess, the first Federal Congress passed a resolution asking that the
…
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Is a Change to Wisconsin’s Statutory Interpretation Framework Imminent?
For two decades, Wisconsin courts have followed the approach to statutory interpretation established in State ex rel. Kalal v. Circuit Court for Dane County, 2004 WI 58, 271 Wis. 2d 633, 681 N.W.2d 110. As noted in a recent blog post from Stafford Rosenbaum, that framework may soon change.
Kalal established a two-step methodology for interpreting statutes. Courts first examine the statute’s text using only “intrinsic sources”—the statute’s language, structure, purpose, and closely-related statutes. If the meaning…
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A Practical Guide on AI Prompting for Legal Professionals
The November issue of Wisconsin Lawyer features a practical guide I wrote on using generative AI effectively in legal practice. “AI Prompting for Legal Professionals: The Art of Asking the Right Question” offers a framework for attorneys looking to improve their interactions with AI tools while maintaining professional standards.
The central premise is straightforward: the same critical thinking skills lawyers use when interviewing clients or examining witnesses apply equally when working with AI. Vague information from a client…
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