A sailboat is an incredibly complex machine made up of other machines. It’s full of expensive parts whose cost seems to run proportionately with the length of their names – e.g., a “fiddle block with ratchet, cam, and becket.” Even something as apparently simple as the sail itself is a complex feat of engineering, with complex curves sown into the fabric. And the “ropes” these days are made of high-tech materials that can run many dollars per meter.

All of those expensive, complex, and absurdly named parts have to work together properly for a sailboat to even approach maximum performance. . . . [more]

For most law libraries, the percentage of the library budget representing subscriptions to online databases has been increasing. Many of these subscriptions represent multi-year contracts and there is little flexibility in the contracts to accommodate budget cuts.

For law firm libraries, one way of alleviating the effect of the increasing cost of these databases is to pass some of it on to clients. How this is done varies amongst law firms; some pass on all online costs to clients, some charge back a percentage of costs, and some just treat them as overhead. My 2011 survey of Vancouver-area law firm . . . [more]

 Mediation is gaining popularity in Canada but promotion of mediation is still mostly anecdotal. To develop further, the field needs a more solid foundation of deep empirical research. Mediate BC is attempting to fill some of the gaps based on fourteen years of data collection by its Court Mediation Program (the “CMP”). The CMP has administered the mediation program in the Provincial Court of BC, Small Claims Division, since 1998 and now mediates claims up to $25,000 in Vancouver and up to $10,000 in four other locations. The CMP recently celebrated its 20,000th referral! It has thousands of mediations in . . . [more]

Are online courses changing the teaching structures of the traditional university?

The traditional university instruction model is perhaps best represented by Cambridge and Oxford in the UK. There, the teaching involves a mixture of lectures and tutorials (or supervisions). Typically the tutorials are hour long sessions in which the students meet weekly with a member of the teaching staff. The relative importance of these methods varies according to the needs of the subject.

It is intellectually enriching for most students to be in the same room with a stimulating teacher. And it is equally important for most students to be . . . [more]

Part 3 of the three part test for sound prediction from AZT (“The Test”) should be added to part 1. This would better reflect the practical application of the sound prediction test and avoid unnecessary judicial scrutiny into ultimately irrelevant factual and evidential areas.

It has been 10 years since the Supreme Court of Canada (“SCC”) established The Test (in Apotex Inc. v. Wellcome Foundation Ltd., 2002 SCC 77). The Test has invalidated many pharmaceutical patents (and more recently, non-pharmaceutical patents). As we await another SCC decision on utility and sufficiency, this may be an appropriate time to . . . [more]

In the Internet age, people still have the same interests and passions as they had before electronic communications became pervasive, but they have different methods of expressing them. It may be a challenge to apply traditional rules of law to those methods. This note reviews one example of such a challenge, with respect to the use of evidence from Facebook and the reliance on Wikipedia to inform the tribunal of relevant facts.

In Landry c. Provigo Québec Inc (Maxi & Cie), 2011 QCCLP 1802 (CanLII), Madame Landry complained about harassment at her workplace at Provigo, the Quebec grocery chain. . . . [more]

Do you really know who you are? Maybe… maybe not. When I work with lawyers to articulate their personal brand it is generally clear… that it is not clear. What is the solution? We need outside perspective. So, I have them ask a few people who know them very well, to answer a few questions. Such as… How would you describe me? What do you see as my strengths? The answers are often times extremely enlightening. We just don’t see ourselves as other do.

Why is this so? Heidi Grant Halvorson, a contributor to Forbes Magazine has some answers . . . [more]

At the Canadian Bar Association 2012 annual meeting in Vancouver, Chief Justice Beverley McLachlin again made the case that access to justice is probably the most urgent policy challenge facing Canada’s justice system. The Chief Justice argued,

Being able to access justice is fundamental to the rule of law. If people decide they can’t get justice, they will have less respect for the law. They will tend not to support the rule of law. They won’t see the rule of law, which is so fundamental to our democratic society, as central and important.”

This message is one that she has . . . [more]

For a variety of reasons, some law firm websites may not have reached the top slot in Google, Bing, or Ask. There is competition for keywords, and the search engines change their algorithms frequently. Without having a team of folks tweaking the site, there will likely be some ebbs and flows in visibility in search results. However, there are a number of ways to boost visibility on the web so that whether someone finds the firm or attorney through social media, a directory, the website, or a professional nameplate site, you can get the message out about the firm’s professionals . . . [more]

[This column was written with the asstance of Meredith James.]

One of the challenges in environmental work is the inconsistent and erratic relationship between law and science. To be effective, environmental policy needs to be based on good science, which is why current government cuts to key environmental research are so harmful, in both the short and the long run. But even when good science exists, the law struggles to properly incorporate it, and sometimes science can’t (yet?) answer the questions the courts are interested in. What should happen then?

Criminal cases

The courts sometimes seem to have a poor . . . [more]

The issue of succession for small firms and solo practitioners has received a significant amount of attention of late in Canada. The attention stems from a demographic reality that sees the majority of lawyers in many provinces in the country in excess of 50 years old and a general recognition that a substantial amount of these lawyers have not adequately planned for succession. Concerns regarding succession are especially poignant for small firms and solo practitioners who often suffer from a lack of resources to address succession issues but who are the most at risk for negative consequences due to an . . . [more]

If the maxim Ignorantia juris neminem excusat (“ignorance of the law excuses no one”) means something in a society governed by the Rule of law, legislative materials ought to be made available in a manner that makes the most out of current information technologies. Before the invention of the printing press, such technologies included a stone stele put in a public place in ancient Babylonia or parchment documents issued in several handwritten copies to English medieval barons. Up until 15 years ago, the most efficient technology to disseminate Acts, regulations and related proclamations to wide audiences has been printed sessional . . . [more]