Fastcase 7 now available to ISBA members

Starting today, the ISBA is bringing you Fastcase 7, the all-new version of Fastcase. Many members already access Fastcase for their legal research and are familiar with the features and smart search tools that help you find the results you’re searching for faster. Fastcase 7 is an even more fluid and easy-to-navigate online legal research library. It has all of the familiar features and tools, plus an enhanced Forecite, Tag Cloud, Authority Check and Bad Law Bot, more advanced search options, new results screen options, larger fonts and selections to make documents easier to read on computer screens, and new dual-column printing options.

You choose when to use Fastcase 7. You’ll see a slider in the top right corner of your screen that allows you to toggle back and forth between Fastcase 7 and the classic Fastcase service.

As a member of the ISBA, you have unlimited access to one of the largest law libraries in the world. The member benefit is unlimited — with no restrictions on time or number of transactions, unlimited printing, unlimited reference assistance and unlimited customer service included for free, as well as a newspaper archive, legal forms and a one-stop PACER search of federal filings. The member benefit provides for free access to Fastcase’s intuitive and smarter legal research tools, training webinars and tutorials, industry-leading mobile apps, and live customer support from members of the Fastcase team.

Members have access to Fastcase through the ISBA’s website where they can log in with their bar username and password.

When you use the new Fastcase 7 version, you’ll also get the following new features and additions:

The New Home Screen

As soon as you enter Fastcase 7, you will be greeted with a guided visual tour that automatically loads the first time you toggle over and can be viewed anytime, as many times as you need. You will notice several resources, tools, and updates are prominently displayed, including: Help resources, such as the ability to live chat with a Fastcase reference attorney, any new results on alerts you have set for particular searches, and quick access to a much more detailed version of your search history than was available in previous versions of Fastcase.

A More Advanced Search

For the first time you can search across different types of materials at the same time. Cases, state constitutions, attorney general opinions – choose to search everything or filter results down to just a select category. You can also choose to search across all materials associated with a particular state jurisdiction simultaneously.

The Results Screen

When you run a search on Fastcase 7 your main results are accompanied by several tools, all on the same page. These panels can be hidden or expanded without any load time, everything is pre-loaded. You can also move panels and customize your research experience.

You control which results are displayed with the Filter pane and can clear and apply filters to your heart’s content without ever leaving the results page.

The Tag Cloud is the first of its kind in the legal research space. You can ascertain which terms are being used to discuss a legal issue in a flash, and can click any term to see only results that use that term.

The Interactive Timeline is now displayed directly below your search results. You do not have to go to another page to view the timeline, and can now see your results and the data visualization of those results simultaneously.

Suggested Results are displayed alongside your main results for every search. This right-hand column is no longer just for HeinOnline materials, but Forecite Results, Journals, and everything in between.

You get bottomless results. There are no pages of cases to click through on Fastcase 7. When you scroll to the bottom of the initial results, more results will load automatically.

The Document Page

Fastcase 7 makes reading cases on a screen easier by using large, beautiful fonts. You can make the reading experience even cleaner by activating full screen mode using the diagonal arrows on the top right of the opinion text.

Your results list is now displayed alongside the opinion text in larger format. You can favorite or add cases to your print queue directly from an opinion page.

The New Authority Check

You can view Authority Check alongside your opinion. All of your citing cases, the case-level Interactive Timeline, and Bad Law Bot, can be viewed without opening a new tab or window. Statistical information about which jurisdictions are citing your case is now clearer so you can spot trends in the law on the fly. You can view the Authority Check report right next to your case, or expand it for the full dashboard view.

New Dual-Column Printing

Now you can download up to 500 documents at a time in a zip file, with each document in a separate file.  Each file has an intelligent name, so you can identify them in a snap.

Headquartered in Washington, D.C., Fastcase is the nation’s fastest-growing and most popular legal research service. Many of the nation’s largest law firms and 27 state bar associations have subscribed to Fastcase. More than 800,000 lawyers currently have a subscription to Fastcase, many through their state bar association.

“Our team takes pride in developing smarter research tools that legal practitioners can use in everyday practice, and we’re excited for everyone to try the new Fastcase 7,” said Ed Walters, Fastcase’s CEO.

The Fastcase service ordinarily costs $995 per year for an individual subscriber, but bar members have access to Fastcase and Fastcase 7 for free as a complimentary member benefit. The Fastcase service is provided at no charge to members, but it is not a discount legal research service. Fastcase has pioneered the smartest legal research tools in the market, with integrated citation analysis tools, data visualization maps of search results and the first legal research apps for iPhone, iPad and Android devices. The service also includes Bad Law Bot, the first big data service to identify negative citations to judicial opinions.

Fastcase has gained strong momentum in the legal research market and continues to challenge the incumbents in legal publishing and legal technology. In the American Bar Association’s annual tech survey, users have ranked Fastcase the most popular smartphone app for lawyers every year, including in the 2015 survey. From 2010 through 2014, Fastcase was named to the prestigious EContent 100 list of companies that matter most in the digital economy alongside Google, Amazon, Apple and Facebook from 2010-14. The American Association of Law Libraries named Fastcase’s integration with HeinOnline its 2014 New Product of the Year, and its app for iPhone the 2010 New Product of the Year.

About Fastcase

Fastcase is a leading legal publisher focused on smarter legal software that democratizes the law, making it more accessible to more people. Using patented software that combines the best of legal research with the best of Web search, Fastcase helps busy users sift through the clutter, ranking the best cases first and enabling the re-sorting of results to find answers fast. Founded in 1999, Fastcase is one of the fastest-growing legal tech companies, with more than 800,000 subscribers from around the world. Fastcase is an American company based in Washington, D.C. For more information, follow Fastcase on Twitter at @Fastcase or visit www.fastcase.com.