On 4 and 5 November 2010, The World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) is hosting meetings on Emerging Licensing Modalities, as part of its initiative on Facilitating Access to Culture in the Digital Age. These are global meetings with speakers and participants from around the world, with representatives of a variety of stakeholders. Many speakers are experts in their fields and countries. Harvard Law School Professor Lawrence Lessig will be the keynote speaker. The Themes for the meetings are:

Licensing Content Online: New Trends
Competition and Licensing of Music
Software: Tailoring Licenses to Markets
Research and Education: Emerging Licensing Platforms . . . [more]

Later today I’m headed for the Canadian IT Law Association’s annual conference, which is in Montreal this year. In my opinion this is consistently the best continuing ed conference for those who practice IT law.

Are any other Slaw contributors or readers going? . . . [more]

very different type of presentation software

The days when law students lament over whether they should “blog” are surely over when the Dean of Law has their own blog.

Lorne Sossin, Dean of Osgoode Hall, has just launched Dean Sossin’s Blog, where he “can draw your attention to topics that affect Osgoode, our students and the broader legal and academic community.” The sole post is from Monday, and provides a response to Maclean’s always contentious 2010 law school rankings.

It’s not off to a bad start, although there could be greater use of the hyperlinking function. There also appears to be a significant . . . [more]

The Canadian Encyclopedia is 25 years old (plus one month). Wow! It seems like it wasn’t that long ago that my parents drove to the post office to pick up our copy of this 3 volume set.

There is a nice history of the development and release of the work which has evolved and is now a free, bilingual, fully searchable online resource.

The full text of The Canadian Encyclopedia and its related resources has been made available online by the Historica Foundation as a public service since 1999. Since its publication in book form in 1985, The Canadian Encyclopedia

. . . [more]

The Khan Academy represents a new way to learn. It’s a YouTube-based video library consisting of over 1,800 videos on topics ranging from math, science, the humanities and other topics. Sal Khan, an MIT graduate, Harvard MBA and ex-hedge fund manager, singlehandedly delivers each of the lessons. His videos have more than 22 million views and are viewed more than 70,000 times per day – more than the combined courseware provided by both MIT and Stanford. For an idea of what a typical lesson looks like, take a look at Khan’s lessons on DNA or solving linear equations.

His . . . [more]

Last week when I wrote about Students and the New Personal Learning Environments, the topic of students now contacting experts directly came up. One major component of students’ Personal Learning Environment (PLE) is the Personal Learning Network (PLN).

The new social networking tools allow students to more easily find, connect and interact with experts and other students from around the world learning about the same topics. Educator Wendy Drexler, who presented last week’s video, wrote and produced this Common Craft-inspired video a year earlier (December 2008):

Asking others about what they know and looking for expertise within our . . . [more]

The Ontario Bar Association (OBA) is creating an online video library to help educate the public about the justice system in the province. The videos cover the basics of the civil litigation process.

The library is created by the charitable arm of the OBA, The Advancement of Legal Education and Research Trust (ALERT). The civil litigation videos feature James Morton, a Toronto lawyer with Steinberg Hope Morton & Israel LLP and adjunct faculty at Osgoode, who blogs at Mortons Musings.

The press release from the OBA can be seen here. The entire libary can be viewed on . . . [more]

Sujit Choudhry of the University of Toronto was recently awarded the Trudeau Foundation Fellowship. Fellows are selected based on their research achievements, creativity and social commitment.

Choudhry is a constitutional law professor who has had increased profile in Canada in recent years working as intervenor in a number of cases and commenting in the media on public affairs issues. In the UofT press release Choudhry indicates he will use the $225,000 provided by the award to develop post-conflict constitution-making.

An interview with The Globe can be seen here. . . . [more]

What can today's students teach us about combatting information overload? Personal learning environments

The Canadian Association of Law Libraries is hosting a webinar next week.

Wednesday September 29, 2010
Time 1:00 p.m. to 2:30 p.m. (EDT)
The Unified Theory of Everything (in Information Policy)

SPEAKER: Jacob Glick, Google’s Canada Policy Counsel

Jacob Glick is part of a global policy team, working with academics, civil society, industry and government to keep the Internet awesome. He regularly writes, presents, blogs and tweets on issues related to privacy, intellectual property, telecommunication and broadcasting regulation, online advertising, and innovation policy. Jacob studied Political Science and Law at the University of Toronto. Prior to joining Google he was

. . . [more]

As part of a new Academic Success and Wellness program at York University’s Osgoode Hall Law School, Ronda Bessner, the Assistant Dean of the Juris Doctor (JD) Program, led a session this past Monday called From Keele Street to Bay Street: Learning About the Writing & Research Skills Necessary to Succeed in the Legal Profession.

I had the pleasure of being one of several persons on a panel of practitioners who dealt with legal research and writing in their work in one way or another, along with Chief Law Librarian Louis Mirando and a 3rd year Osgoode Hall student . . . [more]