During my 21 years at the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade (DFAIT) – now known as Global Affairs Canada (GAC) – I was privileged to represent Canada in a number of GATT, WTO, and NAFTA trade disputes and one somewhat obscure but important case under the Canada- U.S. Free Trade Agreement (CUSTA). While the case was not a “headliner” the Panel decision in Puerto Rico Regulations on the Import, Distribution and Sale of UHT Milk from Québec [USA-CDA-1993-1807-01] was important in demonstrating the application of a claim of “non-violation nullification or impairment” (“NVNI”). One of the . . . [more]

I have been a member of the American Association of Law Libraries (AALL) since 1975 when I graduated from the University of Chicago Graduate Library School. That school was dissolved in the 1980’s. Now it looks like my profession of law librarianship may be disappearing as well.

AALL is in the midst of a major rebranding project. I am not averse to change and I empathize with those librarians who need to call themselves information professionals or specialists in order to gain respect in their organizations. But I had hoped that AALL would take the approach of organizations that have . . . [more]

Dear Slaw reader,

As you may have noticed from the banner at the top of our homepage, we’ve just launched our first-ever reader survey (hard to believe Slaw has been up and running for over 10 years now, and we’ve never formally sought reader feedback)!

We’d really appreciate you taking a few minutes to complete the survey. It won’t take long (promise!) as it’s mostly multiple-choice questions (the easy kind to answer, though we’d be grateful if you’d share your answers to a couple open-ended questions, too).

Slaw’s readership has multiplied over the years, with close to 700K unique . . . [more]

Legislation recently introduced in the US Congress would compel publicly-traded companies to disclose in their filings with securities regulators whether any member of their board of directors was a ‘cybersecurity expert’.

Does this make sense to you? It does not to this commentator from the law firm Jones, Day. He says the role of the board is not to *be* the expert but to ensure that expertise is sought and its advice considered properly.

The comment notes that the SEC “has already made it clear that companies must disclose material cybersecurity risks and incidents to investors in their public filings.” . . . [more]

It is a wise businessperson that asks… “If I invest X what will my return on investment (ROI) be?”

A good question… not so easy to answer.

There are many wrong ways for lawyers to calculate ROI.

The investment industry will calculate the ROI as: the return of an investment is divided by the cost of the investment; the result is a percentage. Some firms simply use multiples: for example, spend $1,000 and get a case for $10,000, and the return is 10 times the investment. Others use the comparison of hard dollar cost to hard dollar profit.

For most . . . [more]

The annual Consumer Electronics Show is now underway in Las Vegas – where tech companies show off their latest and greatest. Popular themes this year include drones, internet of things, and cars. And of course TVs. LG is showing OLED 4K TVs that are impossibly thin – 2.57 mm, yes, mm thin. While they are expensive, and there isn’t much 4K content yet, that is expected to change much faster than HD came to market.

It is easy to scoff at some of the individual items that show up at CES, and certainly some of them will never gain any . . . [more]

Early in December, I read a court decision summarily dismissing a lawsuit against a hospital. The plaintiff alleged that the hospital was responsible for putting fleas on his neck that immobilized him, allowing the military to control his mind. The decision was short, to the point, and unremarkable. It is usual in the online world for the author to provide a hyperlink to decisions referred to in the column. I hope that by the end of this column my decision not to hyperlink the decision will be self-evident.

What was striking about this decision was that the plaintiff was identified . . . [more]

Each Wednesday we tell you which three English-language cases and which French-language case have been the most viewed* on CanLII and we give you a small sense of what the cases are about.

For this last week:

1. Meads v. Meads, 2012 ABQB 571

[1] This Court has developed a new awareness and understanding of a category of vexatious litigant. As we shall see, while there is often a lack of homogeneity, and some individuals or groups have no name or special identity, they (by their own admission or by descriptions given by others) often fall into the following . . . [more]

“Being a giver is not good for a 100-yard dash, but it’s valuable in a marathon.” – Adam Grant, Give and Take 

In each jurisdiction, the same issues frequently arise, causing counsel to duplicate work. For example, let’s say you are litigating a case where informed consent plays a central role. As competent defence counsel, you research the law on informed consent and draft a corresponding memo on the case law. Down the street, defence counsel on a separate case has the same central issue. They also research the law on informed consent and draft a memo. Both are medical . . . [more]

Fellow Slaw contributor Kim Nayer wrote about QPLegalEze’s imminent dismantlement back in April 2014. Her post, titled “Goodbye QPLegalEze; Welcome Open Law“, heralded an end to an era of embargoed legal information, and hinted at the promise of a more democratic trend—one where the government lets the law become knowable even in the absence of our wallets.

Some goodbyes take longer than others. 20-odd months later, however, it really does feel like the house has cleared out. The repository of BC’s laws (various enactments, historical tables, ministerial orders archives, and that sort of thing) which was once kept  . . . [more]

Contrary to the segmenting visible in the Thompson Reuters Top 100 Global Innovators report released today, innovation exists in legal services, professional services and in Canada! There is a simple explanation for the exclusion of services industries – the innovation celebrated is based on patent analysis.TR does a great job of explaining the methodology behind the awards – which includes volume of patented inventions, successful patent applications, globalization and influence of patented discoveries.

I love seeing this annual list of innovator awards; success should always be celebrated. I also always have a moment of resentment over the word ‘innovation’ being . . . [more]

The ABA Journal recently carried a story regarding another firm held hostage to ransomware hackers. In this case, the lawyer felt he had no choice but to pay. This follows incidents in North Carolina and B.C.

An Oklahoma lawyer says his computer files are being held hostage by the encrypto virus, despite his installation of three layers of protection to thwart such attacks.