Pitt’s Jurist site explodes with popularity, Web hits

It is a little-known fact that the world’s only law-school-produced legal news and research… It is a little-known fact that the world’s only law-school-produced legal news and research service began here on Pitt’s campus.

Pitt’s Law school has been benefiting from this landmark online service for the past 10 years.

The aptly titled Web site Jurist at www.jurist.law.pitt.edu is a Web-based public service that provides its users with real-time information, legal documents, judicial decisions, accurate research material and more.

Although Jurist has become an increasingly popular public access Web site, its creator, law professor Bernard Hibbitts, had other plans for the simple site he began 10 years ago.

“I started it to provide other law professors with a comprehensive location to find legal documents and work written by other professors,” Hibbitts said.

Much to his surprise, there was a serious interest for the source documents provided by his Web site. Law professors and law students became drawn to the site especially during times when politics were a major issue in the media.

For example, Hibbitts recalled the Clinton impeachment scandal of 1999. He said that Jurist received so many hits with law students searching for legislation and hard-to-find legal documents that the server crashed.

In the early years of Jurist, the site was limited to featuring one story at a time because it was being run by Hibbitts and a staff of two. Fortunately, in 2004 the Web site changed as Hibbitts’ vision expanded. Today, Jurist is run by 45 law-student staff members which allows for more stories sooner. The site now has employees in California, North Carolina and Philadelphia.

Hibbitts noted that a major strength of Jurist is in the fact that all the news featured on the site is accurate and classified as real news. The service provided by Jurist is essential, as Hibbitts remarked, because it is hard to find real legal news in today’s media because of the extent of sensationalism in our society.

An important aspect of Jurist is the up-to-date accessible information. The site has featured real-time stories along with legal information during the presidential recount in 2000, terrorism laws within a few days after Sept. 11, 2001, and national law during the execution of Saddam Hussein.

However, the most beneficial component of Jurist is the impact it has on the law students.

“Jurist is just another classroom,” Hibbitts said.

The law students that run the site act as reporters, writers, editors and Web developers for Jurist and are trained by the law program as well as Hibbitts himself. They are required to go through a strict application process in order to even get on staff.

“Our students work harder than any other law school students anywhere in the country,” Hibbitts said. “They also learn as they contribute to Jurist. They learn about public policy, how to write, edit and they learn about the seriousness of deadlines. I am very inspired by the students on staff.”

Student staff members work in shifts from 6 a.m. to 10 p.m. even during holidays and from home because “news never takes a vacation,” Hibbitts said. The law students involved with Jurist are taught to share their information with others by providing this public service because the site reaches the community and beyond.

It seems their efforts have been noticed, because the popularity of Jurist is growing. Policy makers access the information featured on the site. Jurist was also noted in several forms of major media including The Washington Post. Records show that on average Jurist receives more than 100,000 visits and is viewed by 140 countries worldwide per week. During peak periods of news events, the number increases. After the Saddam Hussein execution, Jurist received 400,000 causing the server to crash once again.

It is important for people to note that Jurist is not only for law students. Although the site is run by law students and features legal documents, it is a site that covers national and current issues.

“Even though Jurist is taking news and delivering it with a legal aspect, it is written for everyone. The site is public and accessible to everyone, not just law students,” James Yoch, president of Jurist’s Student Staff Association, said.

Hibbitts and his staff are preparing to go into the next stages of Jurist. There is much more that the site seeks to accomplish with the growing technology.

He would like to see the site broaden its base and attract other law schools and academic programs. Yoch would like to see Jurist build a strong working alumni group and further its influence in the workplace and among non-law school students on this campus.

When asked about the future of Jurist, Hibbitts answered with an enthusiastic, “You ain’t seen nothing yet.”