Check Your Sources

An article in yesterday’s New York Times, “A Mistaken News Report Hurts United,” makes the case for always checking your sources and would be a perfect story to use when teaching business students. The stock of United Airlines fell from $12 to $3 dollars in less than an hour and trading in the stock had to be halted. How did it happen? An analyst in a research firm found an article about United saying they would file for bankruptcy and put it in his investment advisory where it was linked to by Bloomberg News. He found the article in a search on Google for bankruptcy filings in 2008. What he did not note was that the article was six years old. A follow-up story in today’s Wall Street Journal, “UAL Story Blame is Placed on Computer,” puts the blame on search robots. First the Sun-Sentinel featured the story as one of its most popular for the day and then Google’s bot picked it up and featured it on Google News, and finally, automated trading programs picked up the headline and started selling.

AP Images

Our subscription to AP Images has been canceled and I am removing it from the list of databases.

Gale Virtual Reference unavailable

Gale is looking into the problem.

Problems with CUNY Plus

This is the latest update from systems:

CUNY+ has come back, but browse is not working properly in the local catalogs - it is investigated and you'll be updated when it's restored.

Browse works OK in the Union Catalog (all CUNY libraries), and keyword works OK in the local catalogs.

CUNY Network Problems

CUNY CIS sent this notice out at 8:25 AM this morning:

CUNY CIS is currently experiencing some networking problems. Some application such us the CUNY Portal Login, Sharepoint, Stellent, Track-It, etc. may be inaccessible. Our administrators are working diligently to resolve the problem.

Westlaw Campus Research

We cannot connect at the moment. West is investigating.

Now that's advertising!

The statewide chat reference service QandANJ aired a 30-second spot in NJ markets last night during the MTV Video Music Awards. Here's the ad:

(link to video)

This is actually the 2nd year that QandANJ has done this. Here's last year's ad:

(link to previous year's video)

FYI: QandANJ is part of the QuestionPoint chat reference cooperative.

Gale Virtual Reference unavailable

Gale Virtual Reference is not working. Gale is aware of this and working to solve the problem.

Additional alternatives to Investext investment reports

Other sources of analyst reports are:

IS Emerging Markets has analyst reports, including some Thomson Investext reports. Because this database focuses on the "emerging markets" this might be most helpful for those doing international research. A few years ago, a professor was impressed with the reports available from India on Indian companies.

Standard & Poor's NetAdvantage..The Interactive Stock reports offer independent research by S&P analysts. The interactive choice lets you study the stock "like an analyst." The Stock Picks and Pans provides very short reactions by analysts to the news/events of the day.

Morningstar and ValueLine also have analyst reports. These may provide some help for students, although they are not the same caliber as investment reports from investment banks. Probably most helpful to beginning researchers.

Alternatives to Investext

We have access to two databases with investement reports that can be used instead of Investext. The best option is Thomson One Analytics since it has the most complete coverage including fixed income, equities,economic and country reports. It covers U.S. and international securities. All the "bulge bracket" banks are contributors including Goldman, Merrill Lynch and Morgan Stanley. And since Thomson One is a "real time" platform, reports are added daily without a long embargo. The drawback for our students is that Thomson One is not available from off campus. Students can use the database in the Subotnick Center or at the Reuters terminal at the reference desk. Students can not print from these terminals but must e-mail the reports to themselves.

Another alternative to Investext is the investement reports in Business and Company Resource Center. They come from Reuters Research on Demand. But none of the "name" banks are contributors; rather the reports are from boutique firms that focus on earnings forecasts, technical analysis and various investment strategies. (For more detail on the contributors, see my blog post of July 29th). Reports in BCRC are only available on companies, not on industries.

Investext

In the breakup between Gale and Thomson, Gale lost Investext. At this point our subscription has run out and I have removed it from our database list. It would be great if people could post here alternative sources for that information so we all can get a refresher.

Naxos: New interface coming

Naxos will be upgrading to a the new Naxos Music Library 2.0 between Tuesday, September 9th through Friday, September 12th, from 10:00 P.M. to 12:00 AM, each evening. The database might be unavailable at that time.

Researching Foreign Companies

I've had several students taking BPL5100 contact me wanting to know if it's a good idea to do their presentation on a foreign company. If you are helping a student with this question, they need to do some research to answer these questions:

1. Is it a public company and where is it listed?
2. Does it have a website with financial filings and other "Investor Relations" data?
3. Is it big enough to be covered by the U.S. business media and investment research firms?
4. Are its operations global?

If you can answer yes to all these questions, there is a good chance that there will be enough authoritative information that is current and in English to complete the assignment.

Students Discuss the Wikipedia

The 15 minute video from Prof. Bornstein's LIB 3040 class is now available in the Digital Media Library. It is described as "Excerpts of a class discussion on Wikipedia.Questions include: "What is Wikipedia?," "What is the controversy over Wikipedia?'" and "What is the policy for the use of Wikipedia when doing research and writing term papers?"

Better wording for "Title Request" in CUNY+

Eric Neubacher will be going to the CUNY committee next Tuesday that meets to discuss the catalog interface. At a recent IS meeting, it was proposed that we let Eric know of our recommendation for better wording for the "Title Request" link that lets users have books shipped from one CUNY library to another:

(screenshot of a holdings info page in CUNY+)

If anyone would like to suggest some better wording, please add a comment to this blog post by Monday (Sept. 8).

Anchorage Daily News's stories re Sarah Palin

The Anchorage Daily News announced this morning that all their stories on Sarah Palin, Sen. John McCain choice for his running mate, are now available on the paper's website. This is the largest daily newspaper in Alaska.

Printing Guest Logins at Reference Desk

Use IE to print out guest logins at the Reference Desk. For some reason guest accounts sent to the printer from Mozilla come out as gobbledegook.

Google Chrome and ebrary

Yesterday, I installed on my PC at home the brand new browser from Google: Chrome. I was amazed by how much faster it is than any other browser I've ever used; it's a noticeable difference. It's Windows-only software, for now, but Google promises that it will work on Macs, Linux, etc. in the near future.

For what it's worth, just want to note here that I was able to use Chrome to log in remotely to Factiva using Chrome and that I was able to pose as a patron in the QuestionPoint chat software. When I tried to read an e-book in ebrary, Chrome had some real issues. I was able to load pages and move through the book, but the screen flickered in portion of the page that offers a clickable table of contents. It may be worth trying out other databases in Chrome to see if there are any compatibility issues we should be aware of.

IRS Code and Treasury Regs

Students in TAX9878 have specific citations and need to find those sections of the IRS Code and Treasury Regulations. In CCH Tax Research, you will find the Current Internal Revenue Code and Federal Tax Regulations (in the grouping of Primary Sources). Choose one and then click on "Find by Citation" under the search box.

Problem: Students using id cards in photocopy machines

During the past weekend three students tried to use their Baruch ID cards in the photocopy machines, which resulted in no copies and the need to use tweezers to get the cards out of the machine. I would like to suggest that the notice on the machines be changed to make references to the need for a photocopy card (showing the card that can be purchased in Room 309) and that Baruch ID cards are not to be used. For new students, the reference to not using the old photocopy card holds no meaning.