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Archive for March, 2006

RIM Blackberry /NTP Settlement

I am surprised to appear to be the first SLAWyer to post the news that the Blackberry patent dispute appears to have been settled, as per this CBC news story. This is major news. I assume because the settlement was reached late Friday night that more discussion of the settlement will not occur until the open of business on Monday. . . . [more]

Posted in: Miscellaneous

Public Domain and Copyright

Further to Simon’s recent post on the possible establishment of a “public domain” registry/database: I think this is great news if it happens. I have been quite silent as a SLAW poster due to research I am conducting on early Canadian ragtime sheet music (circa 1899-1920) and have been trying to assess the possible public domain status of several pieces of sheet music. The US has a relatively simply rule (roughly, anything before 1923 is public domain, although the rule is not that simple). My limited understanding of the Canadian rule is that the Canadian rule depends on the . . . [more]

Posted in: Miscellaneous

Will the Boycott Reach Lexis?

Thursday’s Times Literary Supplement contains a Letter to the Editor from a distinguished group of authorsIncluding two Nobel Prize Winners, and a brace of Booker prizewinners, including Canadian Yann Martel suggesting a boycott of the London Book Fair, because its organizers (a sister company to Lexis) are linked to a company pivotal to world arms sales:

Times Online March 01, 2006
The London Book Fair

Sir, – The London Book Fair reflects the benign internationalism that can come from the business of writing. Later this week its stands and seminars will host visitors from eighty countries. The commerce of

. . . [more]
Posted in: Miscellaneous

CBA PracticeLink Articles

Some items of interest in today’s CBA’s PracticeLink:

On KM:
How to Build a Knowledge Management System: Manage Files Right, Right from the Start By Edward Poll

On RSS and Blogs:
New Media Marketing, Part I – Blogs: How Lawyers Can Become Thought Leaders in a Niche Market By Janet Ellen Raasch

New Media Marketing, Part II – How RSS Can Supercharge Your Legal Communications By Janet Ellen Raasch

…and they offer two poscasts and RSS feeds as well. . . . [more]

Posted in: Miscellaneous

Public Domain Registry

Access Copyright, The Canadian Copyright Licensing Agency and
Creative Commons Canada, in partnership with Creative Commons Corporation in the US, today announced the development of a Canadian public domain registry. The ground-breaking project – the most comprehensive of its kind in Canada – will create an online, globally searchable catalogue of published works that are in the Canadian public domain.
Access Copyright news release

The first stage of the project will produce a registry of  Canadian works, the second a  registry of works from elsewhere. We are told (without any sense of irony) that the registry will  be freely . . . [more]

Posted in: Miscellaneous

Broadband Meets Cellular – Part 2

I wrote about my adventures with the Bell EV-DO Wireless card in an earlier post. Having used this card for a couple of months, I have to tell you I am in no rush to give this up. This card has been a lifesaver in the car and on the road – including on campus.

I have found the speeds at which you access the Internet using this card to be more than acceptable. I even use it around the office when not at my desk and separated from a LAN port.

For the mobile / road warrior the . . . [more]

Posted in: Miscellaneous

RSS Feeds From Publishers, a Reprise, and Reducing Catalogue Production Costs

Two weeks ago in this space I did a survey of major Canadian legal publishers, only to discover no one has yet started using RSS feeds to supply updated information about their products. A question was posed, as to whether the only reason to create an RSS feed is to avoid spam filters that mass email messages might encounter.

While this is a solid reason to use RSS, I envision something a wee bit beyond just reading each feed in a personal aggregator such as Bloglines or Feedreader. I envision setting myself (or perhaps my library association members) up with . . . [more]

Posted in: Miscellaneous

Introducing Darlene Fichter

You might already be familiar with Darlene Fichter, but if you’re not, I think she’s someone you should know about. Since I’m the lone Saskatchewan Slaw contributor for the time being, I think it’s high time I promoted some local talent.

Several years ago, I attended an “Introduction to blogging workshop” at which Darlene presented. She is a front-runner in all things to do with libraries and technology. In fact, Darlene was one of Library Journal’s 2002 Movers & Shakers: The People Who Are Shaping the Future of Libraries.

Darlene Fichter is Data Library Coordinator at the University . . . [more]

Posted in: Miscellaneous

Other Posts by Author

I’ve long wanted to be able to let a reader of Slaw see all the posts by a particular author, and a number of you have asked me for this function. Until today, however, I couldn’t seem find the tool I needed. Now, as you’ll see if you look at the “post post” material, I’ve disovered what was needed.

I’ve got to do a bit of work on the styling of the Author Archive page, and that will happen in due course.

As always, let me know if you experience difficulties with this feature. . . . [more]

Posted in: Miscellaneous

Comments by Email

Slawyers will notice that I’ve added a way of subscribing to comments via email. There has been an RSS feed for comments for a while, but because some readers are more comfortable with email, I’ve added the new function.

The new subscription box is in the sidebar to the right. Please let me know if you experience any difficulties with it. . . . [more]

Posted in: Miscellaneous