In all honesty, our title is somewhat (and voluntarily) misleading. There is no clear sign that online dispute resolution is going to be the norm in the near future in Quebec – or anywhere else in Canada for that matter. Even in British-Columbia, where the much talked about Civil Resolution Tribunal should finally launch later this year, it’s doubtful that the judicial process will transfer online for other courts and tribunals any time soon. “Then why the misleading title?”, you may ask. Because recent legislative changes in Quebec have paved the way for ODR service providers to make great strides . . . [more]

Is the debate over Alternative Business Structures in the legal profession dead on arrival before it truly begins? I don’t know.

Among the most active participants in the current debate, things are hardly over. But from my perspective, the volume and passion of the opponents of ABS is such that much of the potential discussion risks foreclosure. If ya ain’t fer us (the opponents), yer agin’ us!

The opponents raise many valid concerns that warrant further exploration, most significantly the risk to the public interest if a lawyer’s duty to the client and her ethical obligations could be comprised by . . . [more]

The time has come to begin seriously considering whether to separate the long-fused offices of Attorney General and Minister of Justice. The Attorney General is responsible for providing legal advice to the executive branch of government and for representing the government in all legal proceedings. In certain matters, the Attorney General is supposed to act completely independently in the public interest without reference to partisan politics. The Attorney General is known as the “defender of the Rule of Law” and indeed, under federal and provincial legislation, the AG is charged with seeing “that the administration of public affairs is in . . . [more]

Resume drafting is it’s own unique torture. First, there’s pressure because you very much want to secure a new job. Second, you can no longer recall much of what you did even a year ago. And on top of that it is really hard to sell yourself. For those of you who have started the New Year with a search for greener career pastures here are 5 tips to help you to create a resume that succeeds at highlighting your unique strengths.

Tip One – Include a summary

The big challenge for job hunters is that the common approach to . . . [more]

The Supreme Court of Canada recently decided a contractual dispute, Bhasin v. Hrynew, involving businesses selling educational savings plans (ESPs). In doing so, the Court recognized a duty of honest contractual performance. While the Bhasin decision did not concern intellectual property, the Court’s ruling has implications for all contracts, including intellectual property (IP) licensing agreements.

Previously, Canadian law was divided as to whether parties to a contract were required to discharge their contractual obligations honestly or whether the duty of good faith only applied to specific types of contracts, e.g. employment agreements. The Supreme Court’s ruling in Bhasin recognizes . . . [more]

Email newsletters are a marketing tool that can help you to stay in regular contact with current and former clients and strategic alliances, and to create relationships with potential clients. But in order to be effective, your email newsletter needs to provide value to your readers, not just serve as a promotional vehicle for your practice.

In the January 2015 issue of Entrepreneur magazine, content marketing expert Ann Handley, in her article, “Before you hit ‘send’: 13 steps to emails that don’t suck,” says, “[E]mail is the Rube Goldberg machine of online marketing: There are multiple moving parts in what . . . [more]

Among his many other activities – including practising law – Robert Ambrogi has been writing a blog on legal technology issues, LawSites, since 2002. His posts are always interesting and often very informative. His posting at the end of last year, entitled The 10 Most Important Legal Technology Developments of 2014, particularly caught my attention.

Several developments, such as those relating to legal research, legal hacking, encryption, and searching court dockets, are outside my particular area of interest, knowledge management. Three, however, were of particular interest to me:

• Businesses and technology are changing the nature of law practice

Much electronic ink has been spilled in the pages of Slaw over the need for lawyers to up their game when it comes to using technology. In a previous column, I argued that “while technological competence might once have been properly seen as a helpful but optional skill set,….[it] is now essential to delivering effective and ethical legal services”, but then hedged, “[e]xactly what type of technological competence a lawyer needs to have has been debated and, presumably, will constantly evolve as technology itself evolves.” Both of these observations seem unavoidably true. The problem is, however, they only . . . [more]

The ADR Institute of Canada has adopted new arbitration rules, which came into effect in December 2014. The new Rules are significant because they apply to any new arbitration commenced under the ADR Institute rules after December 1. Although the Rules are designed mainly for domestic commercial arbitration, they can also be used for international and non-commercial disputes.

First adopted in 2002 to provide a comprehensive set of national arbitration rules, the last major revision of the Rules was in 2008. The new Rules are the product of an in-depth review and broad consultation that began in 2012. This . . . [more]

Podcasting has become something of a recurring joke around my office this year.

One of my colleagues has recently become intrigued by the medium, and is eager to find suitable client or in-house projects where our agency can work in this arena. I’ve been helpfully proposing that every project we discuss is a nail for which this newfangled podcasting hammer would be the perfect tool and teasing her about the cutting edge nature of this technology, which has had native support within iTunes since 2005, and is really but a short technological hop from old-fashioned radio serials that have been . . . [more]

Since women entered the legal profession there has been a steady erosion of women moving from private practice to in-house, government and other legal positions that offer a more supportive work environment. This trend may reverse itself with the advent of New Law.

New Law refers to the new model firms that have exploded into the marketplace. Some of these firms operate as legal outsourcers contracting their lawyers to small businesses that want a lawyer on-site but cannot afford a full-time in-house lawyer or to large corporations that have in-house legal departments but need extra assistance from time to time. . . . [more]

Back in 2012, I wrote a Slaw blog post on “Tracking Down the Brazilian Anencephalic Abortion Case, in English.” I thought I’d revisit this frequently-asked foreign, comparative, and international law (FCIL) legal research question and highlight key resources for English translations of case-law.

Generally, it’s difficult to find English versions of cases, but here are some standard tools for locating them by country and topic, as well as general strategies to use.

Research Strategies

Check if someone has already located an English translation of the case. Look for citations in full-text law journal and book databases, as well . . . [more]