For a brief while, a long time ago, I played silly mid-off — which was probably the most foolish of all of the “silly-this” and “silly-that” things I’ve done. It’s a fielding position in cricket, and I’ve got a picture here to show you what the “silly” part is all about. My theory at the time was that I’d be so close to the batsman that there’d be no time at all to think about whether or not I wanted to apply my bare hands to a very hard and very swift ball: it’d simply be a case of rapid . . . [more]

Anyone who has been shy about launching a blog because of a worry about the tech side of things need worry no more. Posterous makes starting and maintaining a blog as easy as… well, as easy as email. (We have all mastered that, no?) All you need to do — and I mean “all” — is email anything (photo, video, MP3 file, other file) to post@posterous.com and there you are: you’re blogging. Talk about “greasing the skids of prolixity,” this is crazy easy.

The text of your email becomes the text of your post, photos are cropped and posted for . . . [more]

Congratulations to Doug Cornelius who has started the new blog Compliance Building. You may remember last October we mentioned he had moved from his real estate practice and knowledge management law firm work to take on the role of Chief Compliance Office for Beacon Capital Partners, LLC, a real estate private equity firm. On the “About” page, he explains the new blog: “I focus on compliance issues applicable to real estate private equity firms.”

I love the dual meaning of the blog title! Very clever, even if it does stray from his “spaces” blog name theme. . . . [more]

I DO have a dependence on coffee. I DO NOT have a dependence on technology…or do I? This question requires some serious philosophical introspection on my part, which I will not make you suffer through. I hope that the more interesting aspect is why I write about this today.

It is the anniversary of Abe Lincoln’s birthday, and as the Smithsonian points out, he had an interest in technology. The US News agrees that Lincoln was a technology leader. Lincoln was even a communications technology leader with his use of the telegraph. A reasonable person may theorize that his . . . [more]

As everyone knows by now, Amazon is poised to bring out Kindle 2 in the U.S. Apart from its other features, the Kindle 2 can read — out loud. This is, of course, no more than any competent computer can do nowadays, and in tones that are increasingly lifelike. But this ability to speak a book worries the American Authors Guild, which opines that an act of turning text to speech might violate copyright, or, more precisely, impinge on an author’s “e-book rights.”

(Most commentary you’ll read on this — WSJ, Boing Boing, and those quoted in . . . [more]

Courtesy of the Northern European law firm Roschier comes news of this most alarming decision from the Finnish Supreme Court: running an ice fishing competition without a lottery licence.

Supreme Court Rules on Lottery Offence in Ice Fishing Competition Case

The Supreme Court ruled on 30 December 2008 that an ice fishing competition can constitute a lottery in accordance with the Lotteries Act. […]

[T]he participants were entitled a prize of monetary value for each fish caught based on the weight of that single fish. The value of this prize rose substantially along with the weight classes, but at the

The Georgetown Law Library will hold a symposium on the Future of Today’s Legal Scholarship on July 25, 2009 in Washington. It will debate how blogging has become an integral part of legal scholarship:

“The Future of Today’s Legal Scholarship is a symposium that brings together academic bloggers, law librarians, and experts in preservation to tackle the bigger, more imperative challenges that will influence legal scholarship and democratic access to legal information for generations to come.”

“We must determine how to prioritize, collect, archive, preserve, and ensure reliable long-term access to the burgeoning amount of legal scholarship being published through

I’m at the CanLII meeting at Osgoode Hall here in Toronto to learn more about their new legislation database. At the moment the speakers are thanking their funders.

Ivan Mokanov is presenting SATO, section and time-based operations. The first simple demo called up the Human Rights Code that was in force on a given date. Above the text of the legislation is a linked list of all possible versions, making comparison easy. The screen will print properly with sections aligned.

Any statute or section can be noted up. (Results can be refined by narrowing searc terms.)

The third tab of . . . [more]

For those interested in the legal challenges posed by the “war on terror”, this Friday’s broadcast of “The Agenda”, on TVOntario, will have an interview with my good friend Ben Wittes, a scholar at the Brookings Institution and author of the recent book Law and the Long War: The Future of Justice in the Age of Terror. Well worth a look, especially for those who comfort themselves with the idea that maximal protection for human rights entails no trade-offs in terms of security – or vice versa. . . . [more]

I just got back from giving a presentation on IP law to a group of accountants, in which I gave a high level view of various forms of intellectual property. I have been asked to give this presentation several times over the years, so thought it might be worthwhile to share the slides.
ip-slides . . . [more]

SLAW has had some recent posts on the availability of the works of Charles Darwin being available online (here and here), presumably as a result of tomorrow being the 200th anniversary of his birth.

Likely because of that anniversary, PBS in Buffalo/Toronto broadcast last night a documentary called “Intelligent Design on Trial.” The documentary can be viewed in clips at the foregoing link where there are also transcripts and extra video clips and links.

The show was a documentary on the attempt by the Dover Area School Board (in rural Pennsylvania) in late 2004 to . . . [more]

Many lawyers assume that simultaneously acting for members of the same family and their business or corporate entities is relatively safe from fraud and conflicts issues. After all, the parties all know each other and everyone is on good terms.

Unfortunately, this is just not the case. An analysis of LAWPRO claims files tells us that there is actually a greater likelihood of a fraud or conflicts of interest issue when clients are related to or know each other.

Understanding when and why malpractice claims arise when work is done for related clients can help you avoid a claim. . . . [more]