Introducing the Twitter Moot
Given my moot history in law school it’s no surprise that I’ve been approached repeatedly by a number of different international moots now that I’m a lawyer. But I’ve never seen anything like this before.
A non-profit environmental law organization, West Coast Environmental Law (WCEL), is hosting the first-ever moot court held entirely on Twitter. Participants from different Canadian law schools will make their submissions in 140 characters or less. The intent of the exercise is to bring environmental law issues to a broader audience.
Yes, I’ve always dreamed about being a tweeting judge, and it seems that dream might come true.
The case will be a simulated fact pattern mirroring the West Moberly First Nations, obviously focusing on environmental law. Winners will receive a cash prize, their name on a plaque, and of course an incredible amount of exposure on Twitter.
You can follow WCEL on Twitter here, and the hash tag for the event, scheduled for February 2012, is #twtmoot. This will certainly be worth watching this exercise in pedagogue, social media, activism and engagement .
I’ll have more information related to sponsorship and participation on my personal site here.
I would rather have learned how WCEL justifies tweeting as mooting as the latter is traditionally done through oral submissions.
Hi g,
Oral submissions and Twitter both involve real-time communications, with interactions between lawyer and judge. There’s no particular difficulty in moving the format of moot onto Twitter. Here’s our #twtmoot webpages if you want to learn more about this first-ever event.
Andrew Gage,
Staff Lawyer,
West Coast Environmental Law