These are ominous days for law librarians in the United States. On Thursday, February 23, I spoke at the sixth annual ARK conference on law libraries in New York City. The conference was attended almost exclusively by law firm librarians, with a sprinkling of academic law librarians and vendors sprinkled in. Jean O’Grady of the law firm DLA Piper was the lead organizer. I have known Jean for a long time; she is smart, funny and business-savvy. Her firm made news by signing on to the new Bloomberg Law service, making her even more interesting. For details check out Jean’s . . . [more]

I was relating to a BigLaw colleague how I had recently spent a weekend at a CLE event in rural Australia where it was a 53 year tradition. Again I learnt a lot from my audience some of whom had probably attended each year.

A striking fact was that 85% of the 134 attendees were male. This was to be contrasted with a colleagues recent experience where her legal team and their client met with the other side. It was an all female event. She suggested that the reason there are so few female practising lawyers outside large cities was . . . [more]

I have long believed, certainly before we spoke so much about “communities”, that if a professional publisher is to achieve its best, by all the relevant measures, it has to engage closely, intimately, regularly and consistently with the key member institutes, associations, societies and representative bodies in the market. In its efforts to reach and understand the members, as well as to build trust with them, to circumvent the membership route is unwise and can be a recipe, to some extent at least, for failure. That said, it is not necessarily an easy route for the publisher . . . [more]

by Tom Ullyett*

Cross country skiing is Canada’s sport. This is almost sacrilegious to say within living memory of the recent national celebration of hockey known as “Hockey Day in Canada”. Don Cherry would beg to differ and probably label me a wimp (until he found out that I was the penalty leader in my 9-team hockey league). But folks, really, “xc” skiing has been with us for over 100 years. Consider Exhibit A: The Montreal Ski Club started to offer xc ski trips into the Laurentians as early as 1905. To top it all off, any Canadian with Scandinavian . . . [more]

What lawyer wouldn’t want to hear these words from a prospective client? “You had me at hello!” A personal brand is what gets you there. Most lawyers can’t conceive of themselves as a brand. But, let me tell you… YOU already have a personal brand! And I guarantee… 99.9% never give it a thought. Everything one does, adds to his or her personal brand… positively or negatively. But we don’t often see it that way.

The question here is… can you change your personal brand? Sure you can. You can create it with purpose. Ask yourself these questions. What does . . . [more]

Tuesday January 24, 2012, First Nations chiefs from across Canada met with the Prime Minister and an array of his cabinet ministers. Was there an expectation of material results? The chief of Attawapiskat attended; her deputy chief, when interviewed by the C.B.C. asked rhetorically whether anything would be different “tomorrow” because of the meeting.

It may be better that the meeting happened than not having had the meeting. It lends credibility and legitimacy to the demands of First Nations leaders. But there are a series of fundamental obstacles that will prevent significant change until those obstacles are removed. This column . . . [more]

This January, Silicon Valley got political, and effectively so. The giants of the valley were soon credited with saving the Internet from the threat of Hollywood-inspired legislative clamp-down on online piracy. Google – “End piracy, not liberty” – as well as Facebook and Wikipedia, actively opposed two draconian bills Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) and Protect Intellectual Property Act (PIPA) that were seen to pose threats to the free flow of information that opened the door to censorship. The bills were effectively “defeated” by the corporate and non-profit outcry.

However, what was left standing is the Research Works . . . [more]

Lawyers have not adequately met the vague notion of due diligence when it comes to legal technology, probably because they are unable to. This realization hit me at a CLE seminar when one of the panelists – perhaps me – made the comment that, if lawyers want to use cloud computing, they should perform due diligence about the company they were going to use. The lawyer’s response was, “how do I do that?”

Due diligence is way of showing one has acted reasonably. When it comes to technology, it’s an assessment of all of the variables that impact the . . . [more]

The Law Society of Upper Canada has just announced a program that will provide up to six hours of coaching to assist women leaving and then returning from maternity or compassionate leave. The coaching will be available only to sole practitioners and to women working in law firms of five or fewer lawyers. It is estimated that 35 women will access this program in the first year.

This program is similar to one offered in Manitoba since 2008 where female or male lawyers and their spouses or life partners can receive six confidential sessions with the Law Society Equity Ombudsperson. . . . [more]

I have been an adjudicator for nearly ten years. This experience has given rise to much food for thought. Training a diverse range of adjudicators from a variety of tribunals has caused me to reflect on why we do the things we do in adjudication. While core processes are similar across tribunals, there is a great diversity in approaches. For me, the adjudicative processes need to meet two, primary objectives: fairness and efficiency. These columns will highlight the diversity in approach and look at best practices in meeting these twin objectives.

Testimony is at the centre of most oral hearings. . . . [more]

What does context mean for legal information? “Context” is one of the latest buzzwords in the world of publishing. In a new online collection of essays, Book: A Futurist’s Manifesto, Brian O’Leary exhorts us to consider context when we are developing content. He defines context as “tagged content, research, footnoted links, sources, and audio and video background, as well as title-level metadata”. Although his focus is trade publishing, his ideas apply to legal publishing as well.

Christine Kirchberger, lecturer and doctoral candidate at Stockholm University, is working on a doctoral dissertation entitled “Legal information as a tool—Where legal . . . [more]

by Ashley Major

Ashley Major is a Canadian student completing an internship at Independent Academic Research Studies in London, England. Upon the completion of this internship, she will graduate with a Bachelor of Arts Degree in Human Justice from the University of Regina. She plans to attend law school in the future, specializing in human rights law. Her main focus is on addressing human rights violations against women, particularly sex trafficking.

In Canada, there have been discussions as to whether or not we live in a “rape culture”. Although difficult to define, this term refers to a society in which . . . [more]