But we aren’t really talking about legislators, so I’m sorry to have brought it up. While the IL gift ban clearly applies to you, KY’s doesn’t appear to apply to Sarah, and CT’s certainly doesn’t apply to me as a private employee.

Maybe Sarah’s right that it would be beneficial to have a consistent standard that all Law Librarians (and vendors) can look to, but I don’t know that it would really resolve much because we all have internal standards.

FWIW, I think the iPod is preposterous because it has no legitimate connection to Westlaw’s business. On the other hand, I don’t consider the MN trip a gift because that sounded like a legitimate business trip to a company HQ. (I’d take a different position if they all went to Hawaii, and yet ANOTHER position if they all went to Hawaii, but that’s where TR’s HQ’s were). While my own code is clear to me, it would be easily manipulated if it were a written policy. The same would occur if there were a dollar amount attached to gifts.

Right now I like and prefer that we have to struggle with this as individuals.

Most government jurisdictions, have similar laws about not being able to accept gifts over a particular amount, and I think those laws are entirely reasonable and just. Ryan, I think you are mistaken in saying that disclosure is enough for elected officials. That may be true in some jurisdictions, but it isn’t in the jurisdictions that I am most familiar with. The recent Supreme Court ruling that allows for corporate campaign ads before an election may say that disclosure is enough, but that is an entirely different situation. Disclosure may work tell a television audience who produced an advertisement they just watched, but how do you disclose to a patron that Westlaw paid for a trip or an iPod for you? Sure, you can disclose it to other librarians, but what about to the people for whom you are supposed to be providing a service? Furthermore, what is a patron supposed to do with that information? People come to librarians because they expect us to direct them to the most relevant, authoritative and reliable information. If we tell patrons that that we are accepting gifts from companies, and therefore, opening ourselves up to at least the appearance of bias, then what does that do to our profession as a whole? Can people feel like they can then rely on us to lead them to the best information or do we just become some other form of a corporate/political hack? Why then, do people even need us as librarians?

I am glad that the people who went to the all expenses trip paid for by West have told us who they are in at least one respect, because now I know that I probably should look to other people to more fairly evaluate the product after a more deliberative and interactive look at the product. I myself could end up loving it for all I know, but I would want to be sure that my love for it is based on the fact that I love how it works, not because I love all the things Thomson Reuters has given me. I may think of myself as an ethical person, but I am subject to the same human foibles as any politician is who is considering what kind of relationship to have with an industry lobbyist. So just as I would hope that my elected officials wouldn’t accept those things and then be trusted to govern impartially, I have to expect that other people would expect the same of me in my professional sphere.

Two other points and then I will shutup: AALL isn’t a professional licensing organization, like a bar association, so it makes ethical canons more tricky. However, I do think AALL could do one of two things. First, they could put up a set of advisory ethical considerations when dealing with vendors. Or two, they could make signing some kind of ethical statement (for example, like stating “I will not accept gifts from vendors with a redeemable value of over $30″ or something similar)a condition for membership in the organization.

Final point, now. I don’t begrudge Thomson Reuters for doing this. The fact is, they are a corporation and they owe no fiduciary duty to you or me as a librarian, but rather to their shareholders to maximize their return on investment. It is our responsibility as librarians to refuse to participate in or accept things that could give the appearance of bias, whether real or not. You are right to take this seriously, Sarah. All librarians should. We owe it to the people who come to us seeking information.

In general, I find it hard to be unduly influenced by vendor swag because most of it is so crappy. Some of it is just cute which is why I have some flying and/or stuffed pigs in a bag at home somewhere. I do keep a look out for decent writing utensils so that I will have some that I don’t mind losing. Even your iPod Nano which is towards the upper end give aways, and would usual tends to be part of a prize package for a drawing or something would not be something I would purchase for myself. So basically I’m too snobby to be influenced much by vendor swag?

The underlying question still stands, though. Unfortunately, I think one of the answers is that people are very bad at determining which sorts of gifts will unduly influence them, particularly until they get something that does start to cross the line. Unless you’ve thought about it in advance this sort of thing can sneak up on you. I certainly haven’t given it much thought up until now, but I’m probably going to have to start laying down some ground rules. It may actually be easiest if your institution does have some guidelines already in place, to simply follow them. Not all workplaces do have stated guidelines about these sorts of things, though. If you’re creating your own maximum gift limit, I’d try to stick to a simple dollar amount and not let any gifts exceed it. Some “swag” is just not going to have a clear price, like that vendor karaoke party with drinks at whatever conference, but keep in mind that nothing is free and there is a reason that vendors are willing to spend money on this stuff. Just like any advertiser, they are paying for a piece of your attention.

Illinois, for example, has a complicated set of rules and exceptions and remedies for gifts from potential sources of business with the state, and in none of the contemplated scenarios does mere disclosure of a gift get you off the hook. See, e.g., http://www.ethics.uillinois.edu/policies/giftban.cfm. We all grouse about the annual Ethics Testing and how little power librarians have in securing large state contracts, but it’s not just about purchasing decisions (as Sarah and others have said so well).

Serious competition for WEXIS is a relatively recent development, and IMNSHO is not yet taken seriously enough, particularly by those who teach legal research. Nevertheless, few would argue against the idea that sources for legal researchers are much more competitive than formerly — a churning pool and not a static puddle. That’s important, because it places additional weight on the librarian’s role as information broker/adviser. It argues against the past practice of passively accepting whatever vendors chose to offer (yes, I know that librarians have always groused about vendors among themselves. But that rarely occurred in public, and never rose to the level of Consumer Reports). This changed environment argues for a more developed sense of information-broker ethics among librarians.

I suspect that, consciously or not, it was easier for the profession to grapple with ethical issues when the inevitability of WEXIS overwhelmed any sense of individual responsibility for the consequences inherent in giving advice to clients about the sources they should use. You need not worry about what one is recommending, and why, if the person you’re advising has very limited choices.

Svengalis was the first to point out that perhaps those choices are not so limited after all — minimally, they include an option not to accept vendor recommendations unquestioningly. Certainly now the client or patron faces much a much wider range of choices at a much wider range of price points. And librarians, it seems to me, have a need for their own guideposts when it comes to offering responsible advice to those clients.

You and others have the simple option of accepting the gift, disclosing it on your site, and blogging your merry little heart out about all things West related, leaving it up to us to see if your judgment has been clouded.

Of course, you’re not really talking about a general standard though (as your appeal to Omar indicates), are you? You’re working out your own. I think you should do what you clearly want to do; ignore MPOW, return the gift, and continue eating candy from vendors you’ve never heard of.